The Thing That Waits

Silence lives in those places no one ever visits except by accident, coming at the end of words and vows - the wrong turn on a windless night that forces you to stop somewhere you fear you can’t be found, some place never written down on maps. This is the silence… the thing that waits between the screams of a zillion cicadas in suicide season, holding its breath until the hot buzz stops all at once, and nearly topples us over into dust. Before the wet, the mangoes hang & drop, out of sight of human ears. There is no sound silence does not hear, even when no one’s listening. This is the silence Silence is: the shout-less shout, the essential word without which there can be no words at all.