For once, the statue wouldn't speak.
Every day, throughout the years,
She had (at one moment or another)
Turned her stony chin towards an upturned face
Or floated a delicate finger in someone's direction
the scraping of stone on stone
Belying the craftsmanship of her creator.

Her voice was soft, in contrast
And she amused the people, though
they held like a smirk deep in their chest
The knowledge that no one ever truly asked for
her to speak.

Her words were soft, and usually kind -
a wondering, an advisement, a wish or dream.
They bubbled over like water poured too quickly aloft
spilling just a bit too much of a good thing
and while she was a gently beloved piece by many
some smirked to know that they could leave
the ageless statue
stopping her curved lips mid word
crestfallen and stoic completely by design.

It was these folk who were the deepest disturbed
when the magic left her unannounced.

"No one asked her to speak:
They proclaimed,
feeling the thinness of their own vibration
dissipating in the air before them.

And it was true.

But she had taken from them the power of their denial
And without it they were only men
With nothing to show for all their disdain.