When the Quiet Left the Room

Contemporary man builds temples of glass,
kneels before a screen of light and motion,
and calls it progress.
Yet the quiet has left the room,
slipping through vents and open apps
while we scroll for something
we already have.

Our hands, once meant for holding,
now tremble with the pulse of machines;
our faces glow but seldom meet.
We worship connection
through wires that divide,
forgetting the warmth of another breath
beside our own.

I walk slower now—
each step a rebellion against speed.
In the hum of the world’s engines
I listen for the small sounds:
a sparrow’s wing,
a child’s laugh,
the breath of my wife as she sleeps.
There, the real revolution begins.

For mindfulness is not retreat,
but return.
It is love unclenching its fist
in a world that has forgotten
how to be still.

© Susi Stiles-Wolf