What is Silence?
By Julia Shaw

Silence is snow falling outside your door
Turning the world into seamless white
Covering up all things ugly and impure
Quietly caressing the earth through the night

Silence is a mime telling stories without words
Using only features by his face recorded
He's understood perfectly though his voice isn't heard
By all that see him he's greatly adored

Silence is a window through which one can look
Seeing wondrous things, but not hearing a sound
Silence is also realized in an interesting book
Where exciting stories can always be found

Silence is sitting and thinking thoughts alone
That no one can know really understand
But thoughts make up what your life has sown
In your silent thoughts, I hope they are grand

You are the sunshine
That pours into my car
In mid July

I have always savored
Your feverish embrace
That swaddles my
Anemic bones

And while I sometimes
Catch myself getting burned
By my steering wheel

I would rather kiss
The hot asphalt
Than return to someone
Who feels like January rain

Bullace
hedge haematoma
blue-black against the fading,
once young green,
bruising for sharp winter thoughts,
clean frost lines,
untouched snow-blank focus

but before, to swell and drop
in the last pale suns,
feed the field mouse, rabbit
and endure the muds

Pink snow falling soft
A stroll in cherry blossoms
My soul rejoices

That time of year is upon us
Longer nights, shorter days
Sky full of grey and gloom
**** I miss the sunshine
Fur coats and winter boots
The wind mightier than Zeus
**** I miss the sunshine
Couples unite for a cosy winter night
But
Where is my sunshine

Like wind that buffets lofty trees
And breaks what’s loose and dry
The trials that bring us to our knees
Will cleanse us by and by

And like the winter snows that fall
To grant the earth a rest
The colder times that come for all
Will help renew our best

Like dusky eve and dawn so bright
Give cycles to our sphere
So let your dark give way to light
Let hope oppose your fear

Let rhythms flow and guide your way
In yielding - you will find
Both strength and joy in every day
Both wealth and peace of mind

i want someone to notice the way i laugh at the wrong parts of movies
and know what weird thought i had about the scene
to hold my hand and kiss my dimple and write about how witty i am
we can joke about it every time we rewatch it

i want someone to read to me under a fading sky in the wintertime
as our breath curls around our throats and it's hard to keep their voice steady
but the words are pretty, and so are their fingers as they wrap around my hair
sylvia plath for the darker days,
robert frost when the sun starts peeking through

i want someone who will dye my hair in shades of pink and green
our noses curling at the scent of the overwhelming bleach
laughing hysterically as we get high on the fumes and try to be quiet when we hear my mom's footsteps outside the bathroom
i'll cut their bangs choppy to match

i want someone who will sing duets with me to a blown out car stereo
as we drive aimlessly through the nights of this ghost-town-to-be
i'll steal the aux cord more than once, and mess with the windows like a kid
but they'll tolerate it because they like the wind
almost as much as they like me

i want someone to dance with me in the rain like we're in a bad romance novel
and enjoy it anyway because it smells like promises (and i keep those)
we can waltz badly and laugh until it hurts to laugh, and then we'll just sway
i'll splash them with puddles and they'll splash back harder
and we can ditch our clothes and get hypothermia together

maybe one day i'll want them enough to have them

but for now i'll watch movies by myself and still laugh at all the wrong parts, knowing that i'm weirdly clever

i'll read poetry in my own voice under the grey sky cut open by leafless branches, because it's pretty

i'll dye my own hair and cut my own choppy bangs and i'll feel untouchable

i'll scream 'bohemian rhapsody' by myself driving down main street in the middle of the night

and i'll just wait for it to rain so i can catch in my mouth and pretend it was a kiss from the sky

This hikikomori soul
seeking to curl up
in silent conversation with a duvet
and two fat pillows
as the petulant winds blow
arguments

The slide has a 60 pound weight limit.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit and
It smells like freshly mown grass and a
Soaked one piece Ariel swimsuit—the pink ruffles that
Cling
To a toddler’s stomach rolls as she squeaks and squelches down the plastic
Into the dark blue Made in China kiddie pool
That has creatures from all levels of the ocean together
And she doesn’t care.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit and
Has visible handprints on the sides from
The toddler holding on for dear life before
She gathers the courage to balance on top on her own.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit and
Sits in that yard for almost a decade at the end
Of the sickly green swing set that lifts up out of the ground
Whenever the toddler pumps too hard,
And is a end destination for the intense races across the apparatus
That occur every Sunday noon amongst the Sunday School kids without fail.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit and
Under it is one of the best places for hide-and-seek in the winter,
When it is almost buried under the glistening snow
And the toddler can’t feel her legs anymore but she doesn’t care because
She can’t be found.
At that age she has no limits, no mental restraints that
Cut her dreams off before they bear fruit.
The slide has a 60 pound weight limit,
And of the world beyond it she is only a
Prisoner of fierce fascination.