Poem: Forty days of silence

Mark 1:12-13

by Janet Wilkes 27th March 2026

The house was spartan, with no flowers 
To welcome guests tired from day-long 
Journeys, yet the brown-beige furnishings
In ev’ry room gave a certain kind
Of carceral aesthetic for the
Forty days of silence, like a month 
In a monastery in Tibet, 
Or in a wilderness with only
The sky, the wind, the day and the night
And the cold, bleak barren landscape and
No one but myself with whom to talk.