Poetry Magazines - The best collection of poetry magazines online - Simon Armitage

A poem is a dream of sound
And this is my dream.

I dream of a vast sunbird from Andromeda
Gliding to our planet on the secret
Thermal breath of stars.
The sunbird lands on Madagascar
In a frenzied din of hope and fear.
A figure descends, thin and graceful as an impala,
Its cloak of feathers the colours of fire.
The face is almost human, but shines like a wetsuit.
The eyes are stiller and deeper than a whale’s.

In the clash of cameras Earth’s great leader
Swells with bearded charisma and points to the sky.
His top scientists have lassoed the noon
And are winching it across for an eclipse, so their visitor
May observe the entire planet lit up by day in neon light.

The visitor takes the leader’s hand and hushes him
With his sea-dark eyes. “Please do not,” the visitor whispers.
“Please take me to the edge of your sea, to a place
where only the wind and the waves disagree.”
A young scientist with nocturnal eyes knows a place.
“By the desert. The Skeleton Coast.”

The young man takes them there and under the first stars
The three men sit crosslegged in the sand,
Looking out at the skeletons of battered ships,
Listening to the tale of the wind and the waves.

“In your loud world” the visitor begins, “I must tell you this.”
“The knowledge that will save you lives in sound. All the love,
The truth of happiness: all is hidden in natural sound.”

Wave after wave falls in the night.

“But what about silence?” the young man asks.

“The greatest secrets of all are hidden
In the ultrasound of silence.
The power that fuels the brightest stars burns there.”

“But what must we do?” asks the leader.

“We shall wait patiently for the dawn,
And listen to the songs of the light.”