Silenced

Like eating, I tend
to talk when I’m happy . . .
and when I’m sad

when I’m energized . . .
and when I’m tired . . .

when I’m healthy . . .
and when I’m sick . . .

It’s the constant of
this being me amid
all the variables –
I sort my life and
around-me-world
by voice

So it is the silence
that is the surprise

silence does live
within this soul I call mine
the sitting kind of silence
that welcomes the day
like an old friend on
the front porch

Yet there is a chasm
of difference between
silence
and
silenced

Silenced I am
in the face of
that which I cannot
understand

where the fathoms
and I do not meet –

there –

that’s the silenced place

garden-variety cruelty
it isn’t – no, it’s the
the one that comes
bidden or unbidden –
just like God –
in the place that was
wide open, hoping
for something else

not all surprises are good