i. Imagine how we all would sound
without our heads, if all
we had were throat, tongue, jaw, and mouth,
but not the hard white bone
of cranium within which all
we say reverberates
to soften and refine itself
into a melody.
We'd be like rusty guitar strings
stretched taut and played without
a soundbox, quiet yet still harsh
and twangy. How could we
distinguish the discordant from
the balanced voice? How then,
in the absence of the skull, discern
the presence of the heart?
ii Imagining this, it's not so hard
to postulate the growth
of bulky parietal bone,
dome-like above the ears,
as evolution's wise response
to the urgent need of the heart
to articulate itself.
Implied in this, of course,
existence of the heart
before the mind, the primacy
of intuition over clear
hard absolutes of reason.
Strange to think that all we've said,
or ever longed to say,
was there already, only waiting
for the chance to say itself.
ii We've always thought of cavemen grunting.
Appropriate, it seems,
given their awkward slouch, their stark
bowleggedness. Their thick
course hands we imagine grappling clubs
or some crude instrument
of violence. "Ugh," one might have said
to greet the other. Ugh!
But maybe cavemen sang. Perhaps
they only cooed at first,
then punctuated their soft voices
with sharpened consonants,
but only for the sake of adding
a rhythm to their songs.
The S's were the cymbals of
the earliest percussion.
iv If it is true that language is
a bleeding of the heart,
that heads are only hollow spaces
where voices resonate,
then why not argue for the rest,
that torso, arms and legs--
through careful movements, like in dance--
give ample evidence
of their first purpose, to express
the silent hidden pain
of knowing of the nothingness
they must have all come from,
but not remembering it, the curse
of every atom. Listen
as all existence strains to give
voice to the still unspoken.
Luke Meisner