Living Silence

Silence makes people uncomfortable. They try to fill it with noise and clutter as if it were a void. They think it is an empty, dead thing.

I disagree--

It is the scrambled classroom after the last bell.

It is the frozen darkness just before dawn when the world waits to resume.

It is the inside of the chapel on a Thursday.

It is midnight on the empty street street when the fog in the light of the street lamp puts everything into a hazy soft focus. . .

. . .and it is a minute later when he tells you that he doesn't want you anymore.

It is a second after the impact when the spinning world has come to a screeching halt.

After all of the frenetic pulliing of oneself apart, it is middle-of-the-night clarity.

It is the long, tense moment when the whole world holds its breath. . .

waiting for the baby to cry.