Sifting Sound Into Shape Poem by Dónall Dempsey

“S”

he scrawled silently
(tongue in cheek) .

“ILE”

the pencil pondered ponderously
(an awesome feat) .

“NT”

his head empty
(...empty...)

“LY”

“You’ve got to try! ”
(He could only cry)

a prism
of tears
enclosing the word
(a microbe microscopically magnified)
by his despair.

The black markings that he made
would not talk back to him.

He saw only the silent white
that glowed around the lonely letter

felt only the emptiness
that writing cut out
of the page’s snowdrift.

He could not claim
to know how

letters chiselled

meaning into words

until once
(suddenly it seemed)
upon a time

sifting shape
into sense

there fell
through the mesh of letters

nuggets of words
golden with meaning.

“Gold! ”

stuttered his stunted pencil.

“Gold! ”

his startled hand mimed.

“Gold! ”
screamed his mind.

“Gold! ”
“Gold! ”
“Gold! ”