In Silence, comes the Muse.
[ silence ]
Silence deserves a capital “S”. There’s so little of it. If you don’t believe me, read One Square Inch of Silence: One Man’s Quest to Preserve Quiet, by Gordon Hempton, (Simon and Schuster).
Ruth Ozeki’s essay, “A Crucial Collaboration” in the May/June Poet’s and Writer’s magazine states: A character speaks — whispers — mutters, shouts — breaking the silence, and in doing so, calls the writer into being, and the writer responds.” [ ……. ]
And now, a word from Wendell Berry.
Best of any song
is bird song
in the quiet, but first
you must have the quiet.
A Timbered Choir, Counterpoint Press, 1889.
The first two weeks of June, I will be in a cabin on Lake Kabekona in the North Woods of Minnesota. Eleven of us will be there (with one bathroom). Five of us will be under thirteen years old.
Where will I find silence? Around a campfire? You know how it is, there you are, hot dogs or marshmallows on sticks, crackling/roaring fire (depending on how many boys there are), and then a sacred silence falls. [ ……. ]
It may be brief, but this silence is where our souls may be heard, and find themselves on the page.
I include a cinquain of my own:
Solitude
At last,
stilled alone. No
guests, murmurs, chaos, news.
Only pines, the lake, a pencil.
Silence.
A third grader once said, Silence reminds me to take my soul with me wherever I go. When this third grader grows up, I hope he/she will discover Rumi.
Rumi
[ ……. ]
Why are you so afraid of silence?
Silence is the root of everything.
If you spiral into its void
a hundred voices will thunder messages
you long to hear.
In Kathleen Norris’ Cloister Walk, (River Head books, N. Y. 1996), she writes:
Liturgical time is essentially poetic time, oriented toward process rather than productivity. The rule of St. Benedict was written in the sixth century by a man determined to find a life of peace and stability. His first rule is LISTEN. The discipline of listening aims to still body and soul so that the words of a reading may sink in. Such silence tends to open a person.
Once, when Kathleen was asked, “What is the main thing a poet does? She was inspired to answer, “We wait.”
I imagine she waits [ ……. ] in silence.
Musician/composer, John Cage’s, definition of music is, “organized sound and silence.” He wrote a piece titled, 4′ 33″. Yes. Four minutes and thirty-three seconds —of silence.
A person comes on stage, bows to polite applause, and takes their seat at a concert grand piano —12 feet of shining curve. The pianist sits for four minutes and thirty-three seconds of silence, stands, bows, and leaves the stage.
Audiences laugh, cough, whisper, fidget. They are uncomfortable. They want their money back. John Cage doesn’t care. A room full of people have listened to four minutes and thirty-three seconds of silence. He asks, “What if it had been five minutes? Would that have made a difference?”
This June, honor silence. [ ……. ]
Scientifically, there is none. In total silence, we hear our heart’s rhythm, our bowels digesting breakfast, and the electricity of our brain. Acousticians have invented a soundproof chamber in which a person can hear, in this intimacy, his body perform.
Right now it is quiet, not silent, at my house. (As soon as I wrote that, the furnace came on.) I hear at least three birds welcoming the day. My computer keys click in well-behaved sequences. I pick up my coffee mug. In the quiet, my ring clinks against pottery. [ ……. ]
A few Poets on Silence:
Pablo Neruda’s, Keeping Quiet
Billy Collins, Silence
Fredrick Zydek, Praying into Stillness
Jane Kenyon, Let Evening Come
Wendell Berry, The Peace of Wild Things
Mary Oliver, Invitation, from Red Bird
