I HATE POETRY MONTH – DAY 2
Why should anyone love a month that celebrates something that beckons you to follow it for the rest of your life and probably leads nowhere or, at best, you’d have done better going somewhere else?
First Words
Can we afford to forget
first born words
that clawed their way
from a virgin larynx,
gasping for breath,
demanding
reply to a question
we could not hear,
crueler than Sphinx,
it had no answer,
would not release us
(once born)
from the grasp
of death
came nearer
nearer until
no response
remained
but to scream
into the ear
of the world.
Should we remember
just how violent
the gain of language,
forced upon us
from the first,
appears
in deceit
in pain
in honeyed
training words
practiced again
again
until rapprochement
had been achieved
by stealth, by aggression
we learned to deceive
in turn
and turn
to pretend surprise
that words of love
are so easily betrayed?
That first sightings of accord
so easily collapse into
the savagery of war?
That soothing speech
makes so remarkable
the poignancy of pain?
again and again.
That we will die
in the choke
of our own sounds;
that much is assured
and then, perhaps,
be silent?
Doubtful,
not this vocalized
open-beaked species.
Given the chance,
it will scream from
the throat of hell itself,
given the chance
again
again
beating its wings
against the glass
of silence.
-rs
