Silence

SILENCE You must expose your inner self again, Must codify in words your pleasure or pain: This poem will extract a part of your life, Will cut experience free like a knife. No past, no future; there is only now. Now you try to write a poem, but how? Glasses steamed up with nervous breath, And the thunder if your pencil drops: death Of your thought train - your oar falling in a pond, Rippling for ever in your mind. The silence is choking, you cannot call For help. You sink or swim alone. No help at all. Even clock-ticks would be a welcome measure Of your time left, but there is no time, no pain, no pleasure As the white paper yawns before your pencil. You must learn to resolve this stress - no one to counsel. Time crawls for you, races for another: inner strife. You are the sole oarsman on this journey - your life. ……………………………………………………………………………………….. Written for Paula Swanson’s competition BREATHE IN THE SILENCE