THIS POEM

By Jameson Gillihan

this poem is listened to 
not spoken
body whispers
gurgles gasps
tender vocalizations
pressed through bands of muscle

i’m listening to my body
my speaker-stethoscope
distracted lyricism
this poem is listened to
not spoken

i sculpt my lips into shape
i form little o’s with my mouth
breath wrapped tight inside me
make the lip-shapes with me
spit-slick potter
you won’t need to use your hands
your mouth knows what to do

this poem wants to know what people sound like, really
how quiet does a room need to be before it hears your heartbeat
how much can it learn about you from
your silence, well
you’re never silent
not really

how much of the world’s information is conveyed through noise?
what percentage of you is contained in
a pulse of blood or the pulling of wind through windpipe,
can i really know you from
vibration
am i lying to myself when
i hold my breath a little too long and
articulate the ringing in my ears
whoosh or hiss or
ten thousand e’s or
other ways of pretending the thing on the page is
something else

my mechanical keyboard drowns out the silence
my finger-tapped touch screen drowns out the silence
my graphite on paper drowns out the silence

on stage or behind a podium or in a college classroom i find that lip syncing stops working
no one is compelled by my mouth puppetry
marionette tongue
slinging spit with strings attached
i struggle to keep quiet
not to render new sound god isn’t there enough sound already

nothing can justify speaking up the
latest introduction of nonsense the
repetition of what everyone else has already said
ten thousand times before
nothing justifies the pen on the page
all that information on unrelenting record
overwhelmed and undiscoverable
oversaturated market

god forbid we oversaturate the market

sorry for writing
sorry for reading this aloud or
giving it to you to read to yourself sorry for
putting my sounds in your head 
this poem just wants to know what’s
going on in there

see it’s been pseudo-silence for so so long
it wants to know the sound of something different
does electricity crackle
when it jumps from nerve to neuron
can i hear the hum of laughter
from the inside of your head

this poem says carry me with you
please
i want to listen