Silences By Barriss Mills

What I listen for in a poem
is silences. Without them
the words are so many words,
the poem merely talk
(we have had enough talking).

After the talk runs down
like a tired clock, the poem
can begin. (The noisiness
dwindles in echoing circles
into silence. What’s said
is nothing. The words are nothing.
They’ve worn thin with overuse.
We don‘t hear them any more.

The poem is an end of talk.
The words reverberate
till noisiness dies, and we hear
the silences underneath the poem.