Thank you silence

There is silence in my mind.
In fact there is no trace of it. It is the craving of silence that makes me think it can exist within me.
All I can hear lately it is a perpetual, loud, bruit, which does not please my psyche.
I found it very difficult to concentrate and to focus on one mission or interlocutor. When you interact with a bunch of things at the same time, chaos is just around the corner, waiting for you with an evil smile.
In the era of hyper connection we are affected by the sound of our own stress. We are dramatically used to a constant noise. It surrounds us. And it scares me.
Voices, vibrations, echos, they stand too impressively between us and the simple need of calmness.
It appears as a natural desire and we should not be ashamed to isolate ourselves to rest or think.
How can we pause or write a poem if the entire world seems to scream?
I have long been athirst for some silent peace.
Silence and peace, an utopia sometimes.
Where are they?
I have been reading what writers and singers think about silence.
Some of them think it is connected to nature. Walking in a forest at twilight, swimming in the ocean at night are scenarios that carry an idea of silence? I think that waves have a sound, the wind which moves the trees has a sound, but can they lead us to a soundproofed field?
They can. Maybe silence hides through the birds’ songs, or the sound of the rain that really needs to fall down. It could be connected to nature but perhaps not to humans.
Regarding humans I have a huge matter that I am trying to analyze. Maybe it is something we can’t solve.
Is music, that we can consider the sound of humans, part of the noise or part of the silence?
When we listen to our favorite song, aren’t we transported in another dimension where traces of silence hug our soul?
With music we are pushed away from the annoying noise that fulfill our existence. But still, that is the absence of silence.
Can we see them as complementary or not?
I leave it as an open question to friends or strangers who are interested in this subject.
For me when silence exits from our scene it might be dangerous.
This is why I started a long time ago this journey of reflection. And I feel grateful to this inner research I am doing more and more often.
So, thank you silence.
Looking for you allows me to think where I am in my life.
What I need and who I love. What I suffer from and what I dream of.
Nurtured by a continuous dialogue with you I found myself suffused with a strong belief in light, humanity and healing.
When sorrow and pain are too intense, I know I can always run to you and ask for help.
I look up at the stars and call you.
You have taught me to be open to anything that is fragile, to anything that cannot happen immediately.

In my thoughts there is a scene I won’t forget.
It is something incantatory and strong at the same time.
There is a young man seeking for a slice of silence in the middle of the night.
He stands in front of a river and the river sings its melody for him.
The man is begging silence to show him the way to untangle his heart’s knots.
And somehow silence was found in there.

“Pero porque pido silencio
no crean que voy a morirme:
me pasa todo lo contrario:
sucede que voy a vivirme.
Sucede que soy y que sigo.”
Pablo Neruda, Pido silencio

Pictures by the amazing photographer Mia Battaglia, shot in Monemvasia, Greece.