Chard deNiord: Late Night Listening, Tahiri Square, February 2, 2011

I felt: you are an I,

you are an Elizabeth,

you are one of them.

Why should you be one, too?

Elizabeth Bishop

I heard their voices inside the plugs that wired

my ears, more sound than words but words

in the sound of cries and ululations, like the sigh

of Aunt Consuelo in the dentist’s chair,

but thousands more in the distant square

throwing their voices into the air.