Where silence lies

If you read me close enough

you may still smell traces

of a word meant

to echo in only you.

If you heard the way

it becomes spoken with my own lips,

a taste may not be enough

to say you have tried.

If you ever wondered

where the essence has gone, it is cold;

I only ask you to exhale me enough so

I may hear you near inside thick air.

If the silence were not

as sublime

as the word,

would we have this between us?

Art entitled, 'Woman at the Piano' (1889), oil on wood panel, 26.0 x 13.1 cm) by Tom Roberts (1856–1931).

The painting is in the collection of the Art Gallery of South Australia.