The Power of the Poem
There was wire chained inside me,
Spools of lead wrapped tightly,
The weight of words drowned me.
A reticent tongue deprived my growth,
A scarred soul shut my bones.
I was a girl without outlet.
Then beneath the waves of shushed tones,
I swam to a home upon shore.
A vessel came to find me,
Its wooden mast made pencils,
Its sails became my paper.
It drew out tacit thoughts
Through the mouth of a girl
Gone numb.
A thread of lead unraveled
the whole world I had traveled.
I made pen strokes
Into motion,
Every line
Seething emotion,
Every poem
Its own ocean.
I grew wings
Out of shoulders,
When the words I'd chained
Were spoken.
Such was the power
Of a poet and her poem.