There are voices.
Some stand over you: Uncle Sam pointing his finger (the ‘oughts’).
The godlike voice of the headmaster, ‘You boy!’
Pinning you down, bearing the image you have missed.
There is the voice at 4am: while the birds sing their hearts
out,
inside, under the bed clothes, you eat yours.
(Like a coiled snake, its voice slides under the pillow to
your hidden head
bearing a basket of worry - a ridiculous image, but then it,
too, is ridiculous in the light of day).
There is the voice of the knife, underhand, unseen, that
gets the guts:
the self-doubt that deflates you and you collapse.
And there is the voice of panic: the frenetic utter loss of
reason
which has fled the room, seemingly. The mind runs from wall
to wall
checking again and again, ‘are you still there?’.
There are other voices, too.
The quiet smile that, virus-like, rises from the heart
and spreads a rash, unbidden, across your face. You catch
it in a mirror and are surprised: where did this joy come
from?
All the ingredients are there, I see, but who the chef?
There is the voice of the well-oiled machine the craftsman
made,
whose cogs cut by hand have lain about the workshop for years,
and now, put together with a drop of oil, begin to
move with smooth
efficiency as if they were meant.
And there is the descending stillness, like a diaphanous cloth
dropping from
heaven knows where, which rests upon your shoulders, nobly
clothing you
with a peace like Rublev’s angels, sitting patiently
with nothing to do but gaze attentively.
