Absence as Blessing

I am holding a phone to my mouth like a microphone,

as I walk through the ravine. Any stranger can see me.

In my throat there is absence. My child

fills every space with words.

When she cannot think of the right ones

she makes up new words.

She is trying to turn the thoughts in her head

into sense and language is not meeting her halfway.

These days language rarely meets me anywhere.

I start to argue, only to find myself at peace

with the argument. Where once there was anger,

there is absence.

There are larger problems to be found in this world

than anger being replaced with emptiness.