Linda Stevenson #44 September 23 Voices

Voices

Don’t think that I can’t hear your voices,

please, don’t think that  -

it’s just I’m dealing with my own

sadnesses,

here, cupped in my hands,

my griefs.

It’s not that I maintain

any particular belief about you,

or myself, any adherence; simply

that time careens across the waters,

drowning my good intentions,

swallowing your screams.

Today, we have a power outage.

Such a slight deviation from norm,

yet it changes the forward estimates

of planning, disrupts. I must

find a way around it. The tv,

computer, fridge and lights, all off.

The conduit that leaks your cries, though,

it still sounds. I hear you,

your thin, high shrieks of impotence,

the splashing of too much sea against

the broken hulls,

the silences around your dying...

I hear those even,

the tides carrying your boats off course,

sinking you also, unasked,

into my sadness.