The Boy Who Couldn't Speak

He listened very well
He could not help himself
Every sound he heard he remembered
Making a great library of music inside himself
He didn't mean to but could not help himself
A sound asks for attention and he gave it
He stored much of that noise in his head
But his knuckles cracked some out when he bent them
And other body parts did the same
He was full to overflowing with what he heard
And he stored those noises wherever he could
Frowning at his noise-leaking knees when he knelt
When he listened he listented slowly
And people mistook this to disregard
But it was the opposite
It was instead
That he took great care to hear
Something so rare in others
They did not recognise it
He listened quietly but it was as if it was ravenous
And took the sounds of the world in
As if it were food just meant for him
If noise had calories
He would have been enormous
And when he read, it was slow as well
Every paragraph a great garden
Every book a city
Though they pretended not to
Those letters those words those exclamation points
All made a sound
Just as sure as if they had been whispered
Through it all for years
He could not speak
But biologically he could
He could not open his mouth
It was a fear he had
A certaininty
That if he did his voice would let go
Something that mattered  not to others
But to himself
Something that fit
The perfect building concert inside himself
Made by rest of the sounds at their work
They filled him
Held him up
And to let go of even one
Would be to falter to stumble
Instead quiet wisely he felt he kept quiet
But this only reinforced of what people thought of him
It was well known that when asked a question
He did not answer
People thought the worst
They could not see inside of him
Hear what was there
Understand that he could not answer
That he was at his work all the time
Sorting through the great harvest of his ears
Clear in his belief
That the world had something very great to say
And that when he found it he would say it
And give people their turn to listen

- Nirmohi