A stale, still mass of body folded into the floor next to me. Folded around me. Folded into me. Folded as me. I sat there, numb. No feeling, no words, no tears. I balanced in the equilibrium of silence centered in my stomach. I found silence.
It scares me. Sometimes. The silence. Wonder and doubt drench my skin. When I’m alone. I am not sure of anything. I talk myself into uncertainty. Who is to say I exist? A mere object. Blending in with the room. With the city. I am afraid of being alone. My thoughts are a siren. They call out to fear and forlorn. I crumble. I wilt into myself. A body I do not recognise. What is the difference? Between I and the desk. We both numb and needing to be needed. For a moment I am inanimate object.
In the midst of a waging war, a pending peace had been postponed. All my hope, cancelled. I found fear. Words would become the death of me. I feared all the razor blade words I wanted to say. Tell me where to go to erase the silence of that day. How do I break into heaven and ask God to bring back my mustard seed, all of where I have been storing my faith. My tongue is a petrol bomb. A soldier’s rifle, a drill, a saw, a spade. Any word that I utter becomes a suicide note written long after the death. I did not speak. I sat among strange men in uniform who claimed to be grieving but held all the words I wanted to say in their fists.
Saw women and young ladies drenched in the tears of their aching hearts. Still I did not speak. Instead the ground swallowed my mustard seed. The machine activated itself. The city came alive. I remembered myself again. I don’t like the silence. It makes me forget. Myself. Makes me forget Everything.