What happens to a voice postponed?

Does it close up,

Like the sound of a mother who lost her pup?

Does it lower in tone,

Like the sound of a father who never made it back home?

Or is it loud---

Like the scream of a child being gunned down?

Is it silent like the homeless man who was buried at the mound?

Is it written like a dream deferred,

Where a woman's voice is seen as absurd?

Does it screech like a bird,

Or is it slurred and stirred like a spoon in a prison's kitchen?

Maybe it's the baby's cries of tensions that have risen?

Does it have an unbearable stench,

Where one didn't have a seat at the bench?

Is it stitched in, like a needle and pin?

Or is it the grin that stains the skin?

Is it the chains of a world that's as empty as a bin?

Lost in the wind,

With nothing but the spin of a sin that has yet to be freed?

Nah...

What happens to a voice postponed?

It's the cries of a world disowned...