The Wordless God Poem by C.D. Xiang

The world is immense
and like a word that is still growing in the silence.

...............................................- Rainer Maria Rilke


In the East, behind the mountains,
the Mute God, a single tongue of light,
blubbering to be heard in the silent morning.

One by one the prairie flowers took form
in the empty sound, with the colors of intention,
waving and crouching among the tuft grasses.

In the brightening air, heaven’s hyphen circled
above and before us and we stopped, conceiving
this is what binds the earth and sky as one.

A red fox crossed the deserted road and barked,
the hawk declared itself. Listen, you said, the wind
came through the car window like church whispers.

On a bicycle, a man passed us singing, then silence.
I asked, who speaks for the Mute God here — hawk,
wind, fox or man? Where is the high and guiding drum-fire?

The ravaged beauty of the cities, asks for you
to speak, in the clusters of silent sorrow, the prayers.
In the face of a gray frieze a kestrel builds its nest alone.

The carillons ring, a frail wail rises over the cultured trees,
the mountains below, the curve in space, one of many,
the wave form of voices within voices, the sound and the hearing.