The First Poet

In the beginning was the stone.

Round and flat
and placed on the empty page
it said everything,
was the perfect answer.

All the languages of the world
wept in its shadow
knowing they were no longer needed.

But the King was unhappy
because the stone wouldn't fit
in his pocket

so a young clerk was hired
to make a replica of it in words,
something to balance its silence.

This is how poetry was born.

And today, centuries later,
our poems still sift
the dark river-bed of the truth

waiting for the day
when the sediment of our voices
will weigh enough

to be crushed into stone.

Yesterday was National Poetry Day. (Okay, okay, so I don't live in the UK. But any excuse to post poetry no?)