Silence is leaden.
Silence speaks volumes. It says all the things that we're afraid to disturb it by saying.
Many years ago, when I was in ninth grade I had an assignment to pick twenty poems from an anthology and write a brief overview of each one. One poem's theme has stayed with me for many years, striking a chord then mostly because it was the only one where my critique was in turn critiqued by the teacher. The poem was about a couple traveling on a train, not speaking, just sitting in silence, watching the landscape pass by. I remember reading that poem and thinking of how sad it is that they have nothing to say to each other. I wrote that it was a sad poem, one that spoke to what happens to a relationship when the fire runs out, when two people are left with nothing to talk about. I remember my teacher at the time pointing out that the silence may have been a comfortable one, one filled with shared memories, a silence of companionship. At fourteen, I couldn't see that.
I see that now. I wish I could find that poem again and read it and perhaps see that other kind of silence. The kind that my teacher at the time spoke about.
I see now that there are two kinds of silences... Which is why these silences, the kind that my life at home seems to be filled with more and more often, seem that much more painful in comparison. These aren't comfortable silences. They aren't full of companionship or shared understanding. Instead they are brimming with unfinished sentences, hidden thoughts, suppressed emotions, recriminations and defensiveness never voiced. And like a wound that's allowed to glaze over and fester underneath, eating away the healthy flesh, these silences are slowly dissolving the fabric of my life.
I don't know how to air what's underneath. I don't know how to clean the wound and allow it to begin healing. I don't even know if it's possible.
