ISLA DE PASQUA

 

The choir of women

Turned to stone

For they believed

 

In the power of silence, 

In the powerful silence

Of their own stillness.

 

Sculptured heads, massive;

Ancient eyes carved with obsidian hand tools,

The swallowed-tongue women

On that island called Easter.

 

Cipher the message.

 

Wind in the trees, raindrops

Speak for me, their sister;

I am stillness

 

Before the sharp tongue of my love. 

My power, too, lies

In words unspoken.

 

So impassioned,

Sometimes 

He calls me stone.

 

Barbara Chaapel