Silences Amplified
written by: Carrie Magness Radna
@cmrboxwoodstar1
In quiet towns,
sounds are amplified:
ghostly creatures shake the trees,
cackling; they sing with birds.
Footsteps echo each other,
so no one knows which ones
belong with who—
The kids are not spooked;
their laughter bounce off every surface
at the meeting place before morning prayers.
They run around, causing commotion,
shouting down the troublesome djinns.
Lawnmowers cut down all silences
in every opportunity; whirring a mile away,
no one can escape its presence outside.
It’s not even dark,
yet—you are still haunted—
As Autumn appears
before it changes colors,
we stand attention,
shutting off the overhead fans.
Carrie Magness Radna is an audiovisual cataloger at the New York Public Library, a choral singer and a poet who loves to travel. Her poems have previously appeared in The Oracular Tree, Mediterranean Poetry, Muddy River Poetry Review, Spillwords.com, Poetry Super Highway, Shot Glass Journal (Muse-Pie Press), Vita Brevis, Home Planet News, Cajun Mutt Press, Walt’s Corner, Polarity eMagazine, The Poetic Bond (VIII-X), Alien Buddha Press, Jerry Jazz Musician, Rye Whiskey Review, Litterateur RW and First Literary Review-East. Her first poetry collection, Hurricanes never apologize (Luchador Press) was published in December 2019. Her new poetry collection In the blue hour (Nirala Publications), was published in February 2021. She won Honorable Mention Award twice, for “all trains are haunted” (Non-rhyming poetry: 2019) and “May (a Pantoum)” (Rhyming poetry: 2021) in Writer’s Digest Writer’s Competition. Born in Norman, Oklahoma, she now lives with her husband in Manhattan, New York.
Latest posts by Carrie Magness Radna (see all)
- Do I Dare to Eat a Peach? - June 20, 2024
- April - April 2, 2024
- Silences Amplified - November 14, 2023
