Palpable

Can the weight of words bear down such that

My breath is lost to the keening cries of time?

Is the silence quantified by the speech unsaid

Or punctuated by the mangled translation

Of ancient emotions into modernity – swathed

In grammatical parameters and sickened syntax.

I question the lump in my throat, secrets aching

My soul has gone septic by the strike of a single sentence.

Submitted as part of the 2025 Humanities and Healing Event. By Michelle Chin