The Voiceless Poem: Nothing
I. Introduction
what do you write?
I write nothing.
This now is a language
This now is not a language
This now is a language loss
This Now is a loss of a language
I have no voice
This is not having a voice
This is to not have a voice
How many voiceless people
How many people without a violent humor or an abstract romantic sense
This is not a voice
And neither is yours
This is me unable to speak except to say exactly what I mean. That is I have no voice.
This is to say nothing with its own quality.
This is a timeless voice, a voice without categories
This leaf is voiceless. Even [if it crackles/crumples/crumpled] it doesn't speak.
The street has no voice. I disregard the beats.
Voters have no voice. The speak at the same time.
My gun is not a voice. It cracks across a field of corn.
If there was a voice, it would sound like a whale, I suppose, except it would have words and a quality.
The quality of a category such as cause and effect.
The quality of nothing at all or a pine
Nothing. No voice. Nothing. No face. Nothing. No hands. Nothing. No feet. Nothing. No body.
Nothing. No pineal gland. Nothing. No mind. Nothing. No emptiness. Nothing. No no.
When I was at the bottom of the well, the living room floor, there was a raw nothing
nothing to nothing to nothing to
what
what nothing
no voice just no voice again
Nowhere as my book since I have no book. Not like father, Jabés. Nowhere a book and no voice at all.
Nothing. Nothing. Nothing.
Nowhere at all as wide as it all just as nothing grows from an empty seed that doesn't know anything.
Not anything at all.
Oh, nothing.
O nothing my Oh.
my Oh
I am enflamed with prayer
This is nothing new
O
O
O
and so what if this is my book? O sad, sad nothing.
II. my gun is not a voice it
my gun is not a voice it
cracks across a field
of corn, that nothing ploughs
so in a year nothing
grows, but from the crack
of my gun, the crack across
a field of wheat shakes wheat
to the ear. the house at the edge of the field
when the year the green
the off is green, where is
left the yellow off the branch.
And then is nothing. O
my nothing
my gun, O my gun, I am not my gun,
but O
I looked into the deeper well, the one where the woman sat, the one where the woman worked and
Jesus sat, this before I was, I am, and there the in the deeper well
there in the deeper well the receding twists of brownian motion in a lapse (a lack) of light
(the recession of the deeper well and in there the hell of brownian motion)
I sat. There was nothing.
in stead wander. the house at the edge of the field
the corn the waver of the corn the amber amber
the still the move the edge of the field
at the center a well and its steel girders for the pump
above the house in the field the mill winds the blow and the pump
the house at the edge of the field
a darker house a darker field
until the edge the light's recessing
from the surface of the water
the well where the green green water
the well where I was nothing
I was looking for a deeper field
a house of corn and nothing's
last yellow grains. I was nothing.
This mist (myth), of nothing
a red branch reaches sits
That when the green green nothing
now full, now the yellow rest
black recedes beneath the yellow
leaves
a denser labor, a denser field,
the house at the edge
of the field of corn
III. green green nothing
the green green nothing
at the house at the edge of the field
the dark house, the dark angel
a black surface reflects the glow beneath the water
before i green as the water am beneath the retracting glow
there was never more
this is an angel a revelation a new world starvation never touched this is nothing
this is nothing
there are only a few words
we ever need
that every angel is terrifying, that there is a trail of beings, that nothing nothing O green green nothing
IV. O nothing
Oh, nothing.
O nothing my Oh.
my Oh
I am enflamed with prayer
This is nothing new
O
O
O
and so what if this is my book? O sad, sad nothing.
That sad sad nothing is a book. Look
the green branch cut to make a scourge
flails yellow backs
floods of what/ not moved
then there the bloody crack, a yellow
yellow
nothing.
That is... that the book? That the book.
I am now enflamed in prayer.
Nothing O my nothing
this the hard space
the still the body question
a denser labor, a denser field
the crack at the edge of the field of corn
a black recessing water
the light leaves (wedded) water
I am rewriting, O my nothing, enflamed in prayer.
DM 44 a blodd sacrifice. god cut into a grotesque cross of wood.
the book is (written) rewritten
V. the death of angels the black
the death of angels the black
the field [and at the edge
[of the field] the house
the death of angels the black
the black and at the edge
the house, the green brocade
the death the death
the death, house.
O my nothing
O my nothing
the greenest field of nothing
how it wants a field of flowers
in a yard behind a suburban house
a table and a girl drinks tea
but the book the dead I O
O my nothing
Moses is dead
at the edge of the field, the house
the angel terrified. now the lights
in the window the house less real
a nothing at the denser field
O if winter comes as a symbol
it represents not death but the insulated light
something warm something warmer
the book is the chance to stop and resay what I stated before
the chance again to frame a verse or
take a breath from
this is the (written) rewritten book
(o book o my nothing is
my prayer until
the other else is finally a
yard)
I could not think of anything else to say and so I told her Moses was my friend and he sat behind the
gun. But Moses hung.
VI. what will rise again in the golden
beauty, amidst a great bursting
of sunshine and birdsong
this the end of reading
this the book
________________________________________________________________________
will rise again in the golden
beauty, amidst a great bursting
off
________________________________________________________________________
amidst a great bursting
off and birdsong
________________________________________________________________________
beauty, amidst a great bursting
off and birdsong
________________________________________________________________________
a darker field recedes
the densest water is as recorded as
the angel who, when night was through
rested what will rise again in the golden
beauty, amidst a great bursting
off and birdsong
Moses hung by the tree
___________________________________________________________________
a darker field of angels a
great bright bursting off
the end of the book
*****
Micah Cavaleri’s most recent book is 'the romances and other poems.' His first book, 'the syllable that opened an eye,' was published by Dead Man Publishing in 2010. He has served in Iraq, jumped out of helicopters and flown Humvees off of dunes as well as earning a few degrees along the way. Micah studied for his BA in Theology and Philosophy at the University of Saint Thomas in Saint Paul, MN, and received his MA in Philosophy from the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis, MN. There was poetry along the way. After that, he trained in satellite communications and as a cavalry scout for the Army National Guard, and completed graduate studies in Advanced International Affairs at Texas A&M in College Station, TX. Micah now lives in Michigan's UP and makes dinner, cleans the bathrooms, practices viola and runs while his wife and her students uncover the mysteries of the natural world. Oh, and he runs Dead Man Publishing too. You can find his poetry and literary criticism in elimae, Moria, Galatea Resurrects, Jacket2 and more scattered around the web.
Hi, Micah - good to see your work here. And it was good to hear hear you read in Minneapolis the other day.
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