Their White Elephant

Silence sits upon silence,

a mute accumulation;

minutes,

days,

months,

years,

a hush pervades them all.

He won’t acknowledge

the white elephant in the room,

so neither will she;

the stillness deafens,

the lulls clamour,

all resound

with secret censorship

that wails without sound in her heart,

pounds and crackles in his brain.

He looks at her with a nameless longing,

she cries noiselessly into midnight pillows –

but still, the stillness snags,

expanding the girth

of their

white elephant.

*

For more on this topic, visit Growing With God in My Garden

Cross-Section

Image courtesy of El Bueno, El Feo y El Malo

The years have added sediments,

Layers to her hard-worn core;

Each resplendent element

Accumulates and adds its lore –

Brilliant glaring youthful tones,

Subtle, mournful, painful hues;

Wrapping round her skeletal bones,

Percolating as they choose.

Remove one, and her personhood

Would be altered from its base;

Add one, and her entirety could

Adapt and find new resting place

For fresh material to stick –

Leaching chemicals that flow

Experience through veins so thick

That cross-section of life would show…