WE count the broken lyres that rest
Where the sweet wailing singers slumber,
But o'er their silent sister's breast
The wild-flowers who will stoop to number?
A few can touch the magic string,
And noisy Fame is proud to win them:--
Alas for those that never sing,
But die with all their music in them!

Nay, grieve not for the dead alone
Whose song has told their hearts' sad story,--
Weep for the voiceless, who have known
The cross without the crown of glory!
Not where Leucadian breezes sweep
O'er Sappho's memory-haunted billow,
But where the glistening night-dews weep
On nameless sorrow's churchyard pillow.

O hearts that break and give no sign
Save whitening lip and fading tresses,
Till Death pours out his longed-for wine
Slow-dropped from Misery's crushing presses,--
If singing breath or echoing chord
To every hidden pang were given,
What endless melodies were poured,
As sad as earth, as sweet as heaven!

One day, you
decided I would
speak no more.
So I sat as
you sawed my tongue
and sewed my lips,
"For proper measure," you said.
You smiled at your finished work.
I couldn't.
You see,
My lips were sewed
together, too tight
Like the pen
I held,
hidden in my hand.

My heart bled ink
on the ivories
of the piano;
enveloping all white
in supreme darkness.

He painted every key
with careful, calculated words
that spat venom
to cover
to conceal
and to showcase
the superior identity
of the black keys.

Suffocating black drowned
strangled cries
as the white blended beneath
the black;
forced to play the same
sharp
note
while ignoring their own.

But music is harmony.
Without white, there is no melody.
As a monotonous sound resonated,
the black scrambled to recover
these voices --different,
soothing, rich in beauty--
have already broken.

And so the black keys play
--imbalanced, remorseful,
and forever imperfect.

What am I supposed to write when I feel nothing at all?  When the letters and words beat at me, begging to be let out, but no poetry falls from my pen? How do I express the feelings when I am quite simply exhausted from their very presence and my mind has become a jumbled numbness? I am unable to express myself and so am stuck with the yearning to create without the ability. I sigh, not liking this mindless haze that is becoming the home of my brain, wishing I could find my way back to my voice.

It's an uncomfortable position to be in:
To be unhappy with yourself and others
It's like the thought of something greater
Is all you need to get through the day

And the question always seems to remain—
Should you remain voiceless?
I say, "No!"

Who gives a **** if you **** at tact
Or you can't find your "inner voice"
There's a true way to escape carelessness
Without falling victim to faux pas

If you look at yourself
Through another's viewpoint
Do you see content?