Twelve

I was twelve when I murdered for silence.
The senile hero from number nine
trained me to shoot straight.

Silence played a deeper tune
than my father’s violin,
its bullets swifter and cleaner
than any note his dusty bow could fire.

So I shot this thrush in its hedge,
allowing it one last song -
the lullaby my mother sang,
my sister’s piccolo in flight …

before silencing it
and something else, forever.

I watched it fall through its cage,
the instinct to sing
still alive in its wings

then listened again.

                 A sea wind
bowed the field of reeds beyond.

Paul Henry