Synkroniciti is pleased to welcome Australian writer and poet Megan Cartwright with “Things We Couldn’t Say at the Temple,” a poem walking the edge between whimsy and earnestness as it explores mindfulness and silence. At a retreat, the signage in the dining hall provides space for meditation, for the itchy pearl of knowledge to take shape. “I reconfigure the words, waiting my turn in line. Eating Silence. We are. Along with the melting eggplant, the tofu, the rice, rice, rice.” Megan’s wordplay is clever and also reveals how the human mind resists silence at first but later comes to love and appreciate the healing rest it provides. This poem is an exercise in slowing down to observe and is companioned with a photograph of lotus plants that Megan took during her time at the Temple.
Read “Things We Couldn’t Say at the Temple” in Synkroniciti’s “Recovery” issue, available for purchase here: https://synkroniciti.com/the-magazine/purchase-individual-issues/.
Megan Cartwright (she/her) is an Australian author and Literature teacher with a talent for growing absurdly small vegetables. Her writing has featured in print and online in journals and magazines including Barrelhouse, Contemporary Verse 2, Cordite Poetry Review and SINK.