Live Within Your Inner Self Poem by gershon hepner

Live within your inner self;
don’t leave your feelings on a shelf
where other people may by chance
discover them, which won’t enhance
your opportunity to be
the person only you can see,
because, unless you choose to veil
your thoughts you’re surely bound to fail.

Inspired by a translation by Vladimir Nabokov of a poem by Fyodor Tyutchev, “Silentium! ” whose rhythm is crafted to make reading in silence easier than aloud:

Speak not, lie hidden, and conceal
the way you dream, the things you feel.
Deep in your spirit let them rise
akin to stars in crystal skies
that set before the night is blurred:
delight in them and speak no word.
How can a heart expression find?
How should another know your mind?
Will he discern what quickens you?
A thought, once uttered, is untrue.
Dimmed is the fountainhead when stirred:
drink at the source and speak no word.
Live in your inner self alone
within your soul a world has grown,
the magic of veiled thoughts that might
be blinded by the outer light,
drowned in the noise of day, unheard...
take in their song and speak no word.

2/23/09