Written by Danielle Grisnich
The star songs cascade
all around me, descending
like deep mountain waterfalls mumble to stones,
and like rain on June evenings
slips from the glittering
leaves to dark puddles
and quieter pools—everything black but the
gleaming where streetlights
bestow on the pavement their shimmering gold.
That’s how all the stars sing—
in hushed, rushing whispers,
dancing in great halls
of measureless night,
music that glimmers
along endless corridors
where velvet silences
cradle the dark.
Among the hushed chorus,
assemblage of gravitas,
amid the high pillars
that hold up the sky, a single soprano line
lingers and falters,
rising and falling
like wind on a lake.
Long lullabies, legends,
and heroic histories
murmured in languages I cannot speak.
I am awaiting
my spirit’s reviving,
renewed in the silence
and calmed by the peace,
holding a harmony
suited to counter
calamity’s chords
with commensurate grace.
