Put your ear to the door of the universe:
do you hear star-birth?
the song of the void?
lost whispers…whispers…?
desire?
chaos?
time?
Don’t the same sounds echo inside you?
Except on some nights:
except on some nights
when all you hear is the silence
of an empty bucket being lowered
into a bottomless well
not stopped by a sudden splash of water.
Children were killed in tents.
Children were killed in refugee camps.
Children were reduced to bits, to parts, to earth.
What you hear is the wordless dirge
the absence
the vacated space
the never-after
the nothing
the cries before there were tears
colours before there was sky
white before there was the first flicker of light—
At the door of the universe
the quiet piles up
hold your breath
hold your breath
listen hard:
that is the sound
of thirst before there was water
of life before there was death
of bad before any good ever happened.
***
THOUGHT PURGE 
*Weeping.*
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😦
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What a fabulous opening stanza, Rajani! And then the shift to the ‘silence of an empty bucket being lowered into a bottomless well not stopped by a sudden splash of water’ – so devastating, especially followed by repetition and the images of the children ‘reduced to bits, to parts, to earth’. You made gasp at these lines:
‘that is the sound
of thirst before there was water
of life before there was death
of bad before any good ever happened.’
I wish we could send your poem to all the warmongers and evil-doers. I’m sure it would touch them too – if they are indeed human.
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Thanks so much, Kim. If only poetry could stop evil…how wonderful it would be!! Sigh!!!
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You’re welcome, Rajani. I agree with you.
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This really is from the heart – Hold Your Breath – perhaps in that moment fresh enlightenment will come !
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Thank you, Alan. Glad it resonated.
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What a powerful and beautifully written poem – Jae
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Thanks so much, Jae.
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A poem that leaves me breathless… Stunning in all senses of the word.
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Thanks Pearl. Am unable to read your poem, not sure if it’s my connection or the link…will try again later.
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Worked! Was possibly my Wi-fi blinking.. and such a great poem too!
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With such vast possibility, it’s doubly awful that we also hear, or especially hear:
“the sound
of thirst before there was water
of life before there was death
of bad before any good ever happened.”
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It really is and it’s hard to accept how nonchalantly we are letting things break and be destroyed on our watch. 😦
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Your poem brings to my mind Albert Gyorgy’s sculpture Melancholy. Piercing and poignant poem and brilliant as always, Rajani.
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Thanks so much Sumana… that is an incredible scultpure and am overwhelmed that this poem reminded you of it. In the end that’s what art is for – to show how we see the world or ourselves in it…
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“At the door of the universe
the quiet piles up
hold your breath
hold your breath
listen hard:”
Such vivid and painful images in your poem. So much chaos and hurt in our midst. And the deaths of so many children. Such sadness in our world!
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Thanks Mary, yes, nothing justifies that level of killing of children… we’ve used up all the sadness and now are numb I think…those of us who still care.
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Your opening stanza leaves me breathless at its concept – listening for star-birth, the song of the void. And the switch to the children dying, and the dirge and then – at the doorway again – that silence and the impactful closing lines. Wow, Rajani. So good.
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Thank you, Sherry… it’s incredible how the whole universe is carrying on as if nothing is happening… just sad.
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