© roy ballard 2012


Words

To counterfeit reality with words
what limp, insipid and unbellied things
are languages. What twitterings of birds!
What dessicated, snaky scribblings!
Beyond the power of languages to tell
the soaring eagle lives in heaven's eye;
he needs no words to ride the wind so well
or tell him how it feels to rule the sky.
If it is real, the world in which we live,
then we must feel its chill upon the cheek;
the reassurance that the cold winds give
cannot be found in any words we speak.
We have to feel the snow upon its wings
to know the message that the cold wind brings.