parentheses

parenthetical thoughts never expressed

repressed like sexual urges in children too young to know

what sex is

what an urge is

or what it means

to yearn,

to ache,

to crave

closeness

parenthesis

stuck in the limbo of space

in between curved lines

enclosed in a space too big to confine

yet too small to define

like a feeling you thought you knew

but could never place

parentheses

parenthetical thoughts

nonessential yet vital all at once

the sentences contained between the lines do nothing to express

the significance of the silence

of the void of emptiness that exists

in the absence of words