Out of earshot

Out of earshot                                                                                          

You’ve been given enough words, said my Lord,

but in truth, I have been long content with words

measuring my appraised worth against

distant utterings and their echoes –

sound waves crashing upon an empty shore;

quotations taken always from someone else’s book.

I have sought lifelong the living among the dead,

surrounding myself like a consensus

with cardboard and paper gravestones

as I pray so touchingly, beseech so effetely

for a truth that was never there for me

or has long since fled.

So very long it has taken me to hear it –

truth doesn’t enter through the ear.

O child of God, seek the truth out of earshot –

in the cavern of your chest.