Voice

Nov 18 2019

Does it happen often

a day has passed

with not a word exchanged?

When you never once gave voice,

like an operatic soprano

giving her instrument a rest?

Never shaped your breath

into meaning,

never shared greetings and pleasantries

your deep confessional thoughts?

Or even the banal back-and-forth,

the mutual grooming

of formulaic speech,

“Hey” ...“hi”,

“how are you? ...“fine

       ... and you?”

Precocious apes, taking turns

plucking pests from matted fur.

The power of presence;

if not through touch

then there in words.

But today, silence.

And meanwhile

that voice in your head

that never stops

was still hammering away at you.

And only the dogs

who are incomprehending, but eager

were favoured with your cleverness,

barking out “fetch, Rufus, fetch”

and cooing “who's a good girl?”

Words, pent up,

contained

by a dam of silence

that will surely give way

in a sudden verbal flood.

Or unused words,

that, like neglected muscle

weaken and waste;

your tongue thickening

cords, thinned to whispers.

In want of company

we begin to hallucinate,

imagining old friends

resurrecting the dead.

While deprived of conversation

words spill out on the page

in incoherent torrents,

washing up on empty shores

unacknowledged

unheard.

Because without language

we are less than human,

dumbing-down, regressing

reverting

to grunts and gibberish.

Or perhaps

you were just waiting

until the fat lady sings,

her fine soprano voice

refreshed and restored.

I'm surprised this is the first time I've written about silence in this way. Because I live a rather reclusive hermetic life, and often arrive at the end of the day only to realize that I haven't spoken a single word to another human being. That if I die an old man, I will probably still have a firm young voice, preserved through disuse.

I suspect that the overwhelming urge to write is particularly strong in me during these fallow times.

What immediately came to mind was the forced voice rest of operatic singers, who train themselves to say as little as possible during the run of a trying performance, or between engagements that were hard on their instrument.

It also strikes me how singular language is in defining us as human, in separating us from our fellow animals.

And how words, like water, are unstoppable, pent-up only so long: seeking their level, penetrating every crack, eventually building up and breaking out.