LOUDER
The dead speak louder every day.
I listen to their volume grow,
But I can’t tell you what they say.
I can’t see them and can’t look away
From the canyon where they echo—
The dead speak louder every day.
I feel how much their voices weigh,
Like pockets filled with river stone.
But I can’t tell you what they say.
We’re taught to whisper when we pray.
The frequency of God is low.
The dead speak louder every day.
In dawn’s first light, gray as age,
The chorus rises out of shadow.
But I can’t tell you what they say.
The more I hear the less afraid
I am of knowing what they know.
The dead speak louder every day.
But I can’t tell you what they say.
—from Rattle #85, Fall 2024
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Eric Nelson: “The first poet I discovered on my own (by way of Simon and Garfunkel’s take on ‘Richard Cory’) was E.A. Robinson. I loved his piercing character sketches and his tight, restrained language. The first villanelle I ever read was probably Robinson’s ‘The House on the Hill.’ I didn’t know it was called a villanelle, but I was fascinated by the pattern of repetition and the irony of saying over and over again that ‘there is nothing more to say.’ I wasn’t consciously thinking of ‘The House on the Hill’ when I wrote ‘Louder,’ but it’s easy to see parallels. Such, I guess, is the enduring influence of early loves.” (web)
