New poem: "Every Song He Sings"

Every Song He Sings

His voice was familiar, but I couldn’t

place it because he was singing in French;

it was the vibrational tone of his soul

that spoke to my inner ear.

“I know who that is,” I said to myself,

very proud of my gift for recognizing people

by the sound of their voice, especially TV

commercials with voice-overs.

So, I cocked my ears to listen intently,

and there was no denying that his voice

came from the seventh level of hell;

and I listened for the telling clue.

I wish I could say it was all French to me,

because it was; but the more I listened,

the more I heard his soul speaking to me

as it cried out for liberation.

It was all there, the anguish, melancholy,

and haunting fear; but it was the frequency

of his regret when he could raise his voice

no higher that his name came to me.

Every soul has its own vibration, defined

by its frequency; and I didn’t have to wait

for Nana aba Duncan, the host of Fresh Air,

to reveal the gay singer’s identity.

Stuck in his own abyss, he cannot, wish

as he may, raise his frequency any higher than

his tortured desires, and every song he sings

in French or English, reveals him.