Beyond the Lack of Language

Beyond words, says you, beyond
The capacities of words,
The powers of languages,

As if you began with what
Limits words, their boundaries,
What words can manage to do.

Rarely, if ever, do you
Turn their limits inside out
To show where there are words, but

The world, without words, remains
Inadequate without them,
Since only words can express

What the world cries to express—
Not where there are no words, nor
Where words are inadequate,

But where only words will do—
Right words in the right order
Someone snatched away from you.

There are words, words you could sob
To the walls if you knew them,
If you could only recall.

Inside the broken ruins
Of meaning where the words
Pool everything you could use

At the bottom of the pond
Of what only the words know,
Dark, full of meanings you need.