A POETIC RESPONSE – “This universal silence” by Craig O’Flaherty | Day 9 — Centre for Coaching Switzerland

A POETIC RESPONSE – “This universal silence” by Craig O’Flaherty | Day 9

The poem tonight comes in two forms.  One being the words which find a way of combining to generate a way of considering what is happening around us in new ways.  The other is a picto-poem (see link below)– where words and imagery are combined to engage and create more sensory feel for what’s being said.  Let me know how it changes or adds to what you read.

This universal silence (words)

There’s an unfamiliar silence in our world,
one that floats over lakes, dams and ponds.
Forests or walks – where we used to wander –
are still. Their silence broken only by hums of
tender shoots; as they pop through glossy, moistened soil.
We’ve never heard what that sounds like.

It’s as if our own mind-thickets have started to echo.
Filled with leaf-rustles or whispers of grass sways –
that waft in on this tentative new hush.
We are now able to listen for things we’d forgotten,
like love, kindness and recognition. It glides around those
kitchen chairs, stoeps* or discarded tyres we’ve begun using again.

Perhaps we should give these noises names.
We gave one to this Virus, yet its inescapable passage
has stripped away our clamour, to release these
hums, swishes and whispers. It’s as if these sounds
chant into a sky that is nowadays empty.
Life is becoming a passage through silence.

*verandas

Craig O’Flaherty

Published 4 April 2020

This universal silence (picto-poem)

Craig O’Flaherty 

Published 4 April 2020