The fragments of several lost languages
trip over each other
presenting their partial translations
to my tongue
which tastes the sounds, comparing,
produces fractured phrases
that seem convincing
but don’t amount to much —

They are like ice floes
in a warming arctic sea
appearing formidable
but disconnected underneath
from contiguity —
I fail at fluency
when thoughts try
to follow their own lines

I return to my native tongue,
the other ones apparently
only good at talking about themselves.

©Wendy Mulhern
October 7, 2014