Sara Michener

Pencil

Like a lonely conch shell waiting

For the ear of a twenty-foot child

The voice inside our heads

Chatters, clatters, clicks and groans

Unpleasant, unpretty.

Laying on the seashore

Of cerebral sands

Our thoughts

Miles of grains

Of each and every one

The inane looks the same

As the profound from here.

Loud, unceasing

Unrelenting

Represents everything

We have not yet written

Tide comes, tide recedes

And those cursed to keep

One ear always on shore

We wait, we moan

In syndicated songs

And when it comes

When the incessant noise

And textured shapes

Become words

In an understood tongue

We sigh and cry

and close our eyes

And say yes

and hello

and smile

And welcome

One more

And rest for a while.