Nicole Lyons

Nothing Will Change The World

For Fiona, and every other guardian of nothing.

Nothing Will Change The World

You told us to stop writing
and start doing
because our words mean nothing,
our voices mean nothing,
and nothing we say
will change the world.
Nothing will convince the sun
that she should set
on golden shoulders and rise
falling over battlefields
exploding with something.
Oh, but darling you don’t
understand how nothing
has burrowed deep into our lungs,
sprouted and crawled sideways
up the length of our necks,
kicking its heels
into the back of our throats,
to dance upon a gagging silence.
Nothing was sown into the walls
of our mouths,
planted beneath our tongues
long before you ever
decided to be so wrong.
We are filled to bursting
with nothing, and nothing bursting
is a dangerous thing indeed.
Nothing has incited riots,
violent quaking change
erupting on the heels
of so much nothing.
With little more than nothing
the blind can see,
the world can taste red,
and we can make you weep
for your very soul.
We are the guardians of nothing
and nothing we shall unleash
onto you.

© Nicole Lyons 2017

17 comments

  3. I cannot read a poem of Nothing without thinking with love of Richard Fariña’s “Little Nothing Poems” included in the posthumous collection of his writings, “Long Time Coming and a Long Time Gone.” This one expresses a similar understanding. ❤

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