There’s how I don’t answer the phone, and how I sometimes like to lie down on the floor in the kitchen and pretend I’m not home when people knock. There’s daytime silent when I stare, and a nighttime silent when I do things. There’s shower silent and bath silent and […] car silent and then there’s the silence that comes back, a million times bigger than me, sneaks into my bones and wails and wails and wails until I can’t be quiet anymore. That’s how this machine works.
— Ada Limón, excerpt from “The Quiet Machine”, in Bright Dead Things: Poems
Notes: Portrait by Lucas Marquardt @ About Ada. Passage via antigonick
It’s possible to connect to the silence in every part of our lives. I love that she lies down in the kitchen floor ha! 👏
What? You don’t do that too?
Oh I will do anything to connect to silence! 🤗
Silence is a treasure
Yes!
Have always marveled at the many distinct forms of silence. The silence of a welcome retreat…a quiet,cool room best suited for a Sunday afternoon nap….versus the silence of one’s home after beloved family and friends have departed. So very different….
Oh, yes!
Love Ada Limon – got to participate in a reading she did with WritingxWriters interviewed by Pam Houston … She is a treasure ……
Wow. So lucky Catharine. She is amazing. Thanks for sharing.
There are so many levels of silence. Some comforting, some not so much. Love this.
Can’t say I’ve ever tried to hide from whomever at the door, though!
Oh I have. Let me count the ways!
Why am I not surprised? I don’t hide… I just don’t answer 😉 Not that anyone who knocks isn’t expected, really so …
Laughing. Hermit.
Uh huh…
Dave, a tall man, who posses wit & confidence,greets life on his own terms, who hides…you hiding, make me think of a bashful boy of yesteryear…and I smile…
Thank Goodness for that!
Wow!
Yes!!!
Reblogged this on It Is What It Is and commented:
I also have a ‘aquiet machine’ … I can see myself doing the same!! … “That’s how this machine works.” — Ada Limón, excerpt from “The Quiet Machine”, in Bright Dead Things: Poems.
It’s rarely silent anywhere on my parts of the earth, but I always prefer quiet; the opposite somehow seems a wound.
So agree with all this. Thank you.
What Lori and Dale expressed about the types of silence…I agree with their POV’s…///
Growth within Silence is a gift…