musée mia burrus

Another poem springs from silence

Who can I tell
          of this sadness? 
What can I tell of it? 
          It arrives, unattached,
on two tears.  It blows
          in like a brown leaf
onto a window screen. 
          It rudely intrudes,
like the sudden bloody sight
          of roadkill, asking, why? 
Where is the story
          that bid the hidden
sadness come?  Buried
          as deep as the artesian
well of tears that abhors
          the empty mind.
Don’t forget me!
          it cries from the earth. 
Don’t forget the nameless
          sadness of life; don’t think
 you’ve figured it all out! 
          Away on a sigh
I send sadness off;
          then sit, puzzled. 
What is this life after all?