Elephants

by silvershoes   Nov 13, 2012


Hanging in the fissure of a whalebone,
mourning songs like foghorns
dangling in decibels on distant, bony shores.

But not this one.
Not this shore.

They blow from a thousand suns ago;
from a thousand years before.

There are dead birds around
in wakes of disarray-
slick, melted, disfigured,
black tar on their awkward bent wings,
frozen in time.

Their silence is deafening.

I hear them in the night's blind eye...
when the gray light is down;
when waves crash through this burial ground
and time moves slower than

coagulated blood.

Sometimes in the twilight, the whalebone looks like elephants-
alive as stone,
but they are less like ivory than dust is sand.

I admit,
there is no value here.

There is nothing but whalebone and sand-
whalebone and sand,
and if wind didn't waste itself against my teeth;
drowning out my cries,
I might repudiate this shore.

    report violation
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  • 9 years ago

    by JaneDoeWrites

    While reading through this piece it reminded me of this photographers work I had seen a while back, especially with your description of the dead birds...

    http://www.demilked.com/calcified-birds-lake-natron-nick-brandt/

    Such a dark and moving piece.

  • 11 years ago

    by The Queen

    This poem, as a whole, evokes certain aspects of historical consciousness (whalebone as statue) and of folktale style due to its opening lines. I admire the structure of this poem, not all of free verse poems are good, except when it's 'structured free verse', (accurate line length and appropriate spacing), such as this. Throughout the poem, the poet just describes visual scenes by constantly using vivid descriptions, "dead birds", "slick, melted, disfigured", "mourning songs like foghorns", when the gray light is down; when waves crash through this burial ground" almost close-up scenes behind my eyelids as I read further. As for the use of punctuation, from ellipsis to semi-colon, dash to comma, in my opinion, was done effectively. The sound and the rhythmic language choices of this poem are the key factors that made it stood out from the rest of the nominated poems this week and not to mention, its surprising ending line, as well.

  • 11 years ago

    by Polaroid

    Wow. that was beautiful.

  • 11 years ago

    by vikas sharma

    Great poem :)
    I am aslo on same way and a writer :)
    I have a huge collection on the world's creative website touchtalent.com .
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    Link- www.touchtalent.com?cmpgn=2&uid=9907

  • 11 years ago

    by Yakari Gabriel

    "They blow from a thousand suns ago;
    from a thousand years before."

    dying, crying...etc

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