Contours Of Silence Poem by Om Chawla

What is silence? I sat brooding,
how this silence can silent be! ?
Silence without, crowds your mind
with many a shriller sounds.
Silence sans silence, when you find
You with yourself can then bind.
Silence that speaks in whispering tones
Is heard by the heart, when in tune.
Ideas then flood a poet and a thinker
A distressed heart, fortitude then discovers.
A lover's heart-beats with fantasies then rhyme;
without silence you yourself cannot be thine.

When a demure bride blushes on first night,
when a woman attains motherhood, first time's pride,
when an infant in mother's lap sucks at the breast,
oozes happiness silently from faces aglow
Or from their blushing downcast eyes,
you need to feel and listen its resonant melody
Hark and listen,
Thus speaks silence.

When ailing and infirm mother is abandoned,
blessings of grannies, when children are denied,
when lustful infatuations at the conjugation strike,
relations get stained and disillusioned
silently it curses the course of life,
you need to feel and listen the cry for just dispensation.
Hark and listen,
Thus speaks silence.

The misery of a farmer whose crop has failed,
gnawing pain of hungry, starved and unfed,
traumatised girl molested, raped and shied,
shrill are their cries beneath the apparent quiet,
you need only look into their dismayed eyes
to listen to their silent simmering disgust.
Hark and listen,
Thus speaks silence.

You need discern the silent noises,
of deprived and discontented masses,
sulking, deprived and exploited,
gathering storm beneath surface of silence
ignore the voices, at your peril,
whence Marie Antoinette's fate your's shall be.
Learn tolisten the silent war cry.
Hark and listen,
Thus speaks silence.