Wednesday, February 7, 2018

The deep, deep hammer

The deep, deep hammer                                                                        

He’s teaching me another language –
the One known as the silent Christ.

I run to spread the news and quickly learn
no one else speaks it; even I don’t know

what I’m talking about – the resemblance   
to sheer gibberish dispelled only

by a resonance in the deep, deep hammer,
anvil and stirrup of my boxed ears,

the throttled pipes of my throat,
my heart beating under His heel.

A very thin stitching holds my world together.
Ambiguous and elusive –

reaching for a word suddenly unpronounceable;
just as well, for it has lost all sense,

come to a thousand shades of meaning –  
one thing this moment, another the next.

I’m being taught a language
where I speak only by listening,

dismantling as we go the definition
of every word I have ever uttered.

O child of God, faithfully say your prayers
and with all your heart listen to the silent Christ.


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