The House of Silence
“In every word we breathe we bring the Void- the utter zero of its depths unseen, the sum of worlds it swallowed and destroyed: dead myths and fables, fallen gods and dreams.”
Photo by Aman Pal.
The Ars Poetica of the Beyond
This poem, “The House of Silence,” was written as part of a longer story in which several poets in a fictional interstellar empire gather together to debate the art of poetry. “The House of Silence” was placed in the mouth of a mad bard who silences the dispute with this display of his art.
The House of Silence
The House of Silence
Slumbers by the pit
From which the waking world
Once had its start.
Its windows glitter
Like the distant stars,
But silence,
Always silence
Is its heart.
Its bards are those
Initiates who know
The lights around
The edge
Of the abyss.
Our poems are
Invocations of its dreams.
Our songs displays
Of its mad drunkenness.
In every word
We breathe
We bring the Void-
The utter zero
Of its depths unseen,
The sum of worlds
It swallowed and destroyed:
Dead myths and fables,
Fallen gods and dreams.
Behind these words,
These masks,
The black abyss.
The silent screaming
Of an unheard song:
My words are born
From Void
And nothingness,
Returning to the dark
When they are done.
Each weight of meaning
That you seek to wrap
Like beggar’s rags
Around the lords of dream
Will fall from them
And tumble in a heap.
This is the Void!
There’s nothing that it means.
Black holes where
Stars and planets go to die,
In trailing streams of
Ice and fading light
Leave bright and shattered
Wreckage through the sky-
And none escapes the grip
Of endless night.
We dive headfirst
Toward silence even now-
Our eyes wide open,
Staring straight ahead.
Pretending that it isn’t
What it seems...
Not what it seems,
But manifestly is.
You fear the Mysteries
Because you know.
They gape before you
As the cold wind screams.
The awful magic
Of the Void is yours,
And yet you settle
For these placid
Dreams-
Thin so-called facts
You hide behind
To shield
Your lack of courage
As an act of will.
Rejecting magic
As a childish song
While all along
Its wind is screaming still.
Each drop of water,
Every living cell,
Contains the whole,
The mystery entire.
The hope of heaven
And the fear of hell,
The monk’s cold hardship
And the lover’s fire.
To taste a single moment
Of this life,
A single drop of wine,
Should be enough.
To bow the knee in dread
Or laugh out loud,
To burn its cities
Or to fall in love.
In paradox
Between the words
The perfect word
Is found.
In darkness
Without motion
Without sound.
In contradiction’s
Twisting truth is
Coiled the cold and clear
Impossible perfection
Of your fear.
Explosive
Joyful
Radiant
This horror that we’ve found:
The Ars Poetica
Of the beyond.
So dive away
Hold nothing back
Guard nothing,
Don’t defend.
Surrender and advance!
This is the end.
I wrapped my head
In silent darkness
So that I could learn
To hear the wind
From which
We won’t return.
I closed my eyes
In dark and silence
So that I could find
The words I wanted
On the howling wind.
In paradox
Between the words
The perfect word
Is found.
In darkness
Without motion
Without sound.
I bow my head
In silent darkness
As the future burns.
And having sung,
To silence I’ll return.
Christopher Scott Thompson
Photo by Tam Hutchison.
is an anarchist, martial arts instructor, and devotee of Brighid and Macha.