I thumb thru the tissue paper pages
of the weary dictionary,
ignoring its heavy sighs.
searching every entry
and still I can’t find
the noun
the verb
adjective, adverb,
the ancient origin, the mother tongue.

The frayed thesaurus
casts a lazy eye in my direction
hoping to be shed of my mindless wanderings
across its dog eared and tattered pages.

Gathering up the letters,
alphabets in faded fonts,
I shake them
into an old brown paper bag
and carry them to the rubbish bin.

They cannot be found-
no longer seen
or read
or heard-
they have left us here,
stranded with no words,
wringing our hands
at the crash site
in the bombed out street
on the high dry desert
in the wailing of the wind.