Hello.
I’m finding it a challenge to modulate my voice. Is this too loud … too soft…? I’m speaking again into this place after a time of absence. Life’s gone on of course, in all its hurly-burly, but part of me has been very quiet.
Research shows that the longer a person holds back from speaking in a group, the less likely they are to begin. Yep. So here I am, tumbling back into my blog, needing to start again this …logue. Suddenly wanting, really wanting, to overcome this curious sense of shyness, this inhibition that feels like it could grow big, and cause me to shut shop here at cadence.
Silence has been a theme for me for a while. I’ve had a love affair with it in recent months. Recently, I’ve been up against its other face. No longer the lush darkly folded place of presence (the fur coat route to narnia), but a place that seemed thin, reedy. I remembered a poem that I wrote a few years ago. Then too, I’d become aware that my own inner sound had altered - a sense that somehow my internal orchestra had gone quiet. It made me wonder – where did all the instruments go?
PICCOLO
A piccolo is playing in the hollow of my neck
The orchestra has vamoosed
The performance pit is empty
The piccolo is upstairs, playing on alone
The cello spat the dummy
Is sulking in the corner
Fretting on some score
The double bass has lost heart
It knows by holding still and turning to wood
It can pull off a vanishing trick
The trumpet has given up on noise
And is napping with the mute
On a bed of black velvet.
The violins are awol
Cavorting in a field
They may not be back
The piccolo is not holding its breath
PM
