Tag: mute

  • The Myth of Silence


    I wrote on paper
    And was called a poet
    I wrote on walls
    And was asked to wait
    On a chair nailed to the floor
    In a cold, cold white room
    Where the only sound was of my breath;
    No different from a writer’s womb
    So I sat in the pleated emptiness
    With a glass of water left to precipitate
    Watching the walls seduce me to sadness
    When the pendulum peeled an eight
    And in came this ladybug green
    Glasses carved on the tip of her nose
    She had grey pad and a bald blue pen
    And a red ring in the shape of rose
    ‘Ahem, ahem’ She said ‘Ahem, ahem’
    And I coughed and cleared my throat
    She looked at me for a second
    Then this is what she wrote:
    ‘The subject is kind of rude
    He has no manners so to speak
    He sits like a beggar on his throne
    A man of power sold in sale to the weak’
    It made no sense, nonsense, I tell you
    For she was no poet for god’s own sake
    She was too tidy to have chaos inside
    And that is how I knew she was fake
    ‘The subject now seems annoyed
    He is watching me with furrowed brows
    As if I have stolen something of his
    And now pretending that everyone knows’
    Ah the audacity of this usurper
    Who claims my kingdom as her own
    I have pieces of paper in my pocket
    And a dozen verses to loan
    ‘The subject is trying to smile
    And I am feeling all sick and ill
    There is wrong with his mind
    He says naught but I can feel’
    She knows nothing of my madness
    Of how it hurts to sit and smile
    For only writing on the wall
    I pretend to die once in a while
    ‘The subject has tears in his eyes
    Maybe my saying something will change
    But what should I say at this point
    That will not make him seek revenge’
    The fool, the fool is writing
    And what a caricature does she draw
    Looking from behind a pair of glasses
    She writes what she thinks she saw
    ‘The subject does not comply
    To any form of my treatment
    So must be treated in harsher terms
    Or in an asylum must be sent’
    Oh I did snatch her pen and pad
    And wrote down my own choice
    Before you judge what others have said
    First make sure if they even have a voice…