Linda Stevenson #13 August 13 Old Language

Old Language

Of course I don’t write

poetry; you write poetry.

I am the stumbling child

with undone shoelaces, the one

with inky fingers, blotches.

You are the flowering of your fathers,

anointed by their absence; ecstasy,

all wondrous poems

are invested in your knowing, all receive

the ardent admiration of your tribe.

But I did, I do, hear it...

the indefatigable music of the old language,

its hard cadence,

rites of passage, the inbred soul of it,

sweet as darkening honey,

its laments,

its generations of

corruption,

the crying pity of its loss,

its deep,

deep soundings.