Carl Sandburg

Jabberers

I RISE out of my depths with my language.  
You rise out of your depths with your language.  

Two tongues from the depths,  
Alike only as a yellow cat and a green parrot are alike,  
Fling their staccato tantalizations        
Into a wildcat jabber  
Over a gossamer web of unanswerables.  

The second and the third silence,  
Even the hundredth silence,  
Is better than no silence at all      
(Maybe this is a jabber too—are we at it again, you and I?)  

I rise out of my depths with my language.  
You rise out of your depths with your language.  

One thing there is much of; the name men call it by is time; into this gulf our syllabic pronunciamentos empty by the way rockets of fire curve and are gone on the night sky; into this gulf the jabberings go as the shower at a scissors grinder’s wheel…

Cornhuskers. 1918.

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