"But I prattle/ Something too wildly, and my father's precepts/ I therein do forget." - Miranda, The Tempest
(Naples. Enter Miranda.)
It is others' words I used
to cover up my own silence.
My head filled with snippets
of conversations other people had.
My dumbness evaded discovery
or even acknowledgement.
I travelled
in other people's countries
without tongue, without language.
Some thought I was wife, daughter, property,
unpolished gem in the crown of a man's family.
Some thought I was virginal daughter, on duty
to an old man's misplaced sense of dignity.
But then I inserted myself
between words and sentences and songs
that hung from other lips.
I filled up the gaps
with my breath, my voice, my body.
So She.
Some think I am mad, unbecoming,
my language decipherable to nobody.
"Letting the rank tongue blossom into speech./ .../ It was fool's play, this prattling." - Caliban Upon Setebos
