So here I sit, without a voice, more alone than I am comfortable with. Even with productive chords I was never able to find the harmony. But this unceasing caesura has left only a residue of refrain, and the building suspicion that my solo might remain unsung. It descends into my throat, enveloping me in more silence than I want to give and siphoning any illusion of interaction that I have clung to.

Defenseless, I am reduced to gestures and have taken to staying longer than I should. I am too much aware of the well-meaning and solicitous nature of those who would otherwise laugh a little too loudly and move on a bit too quickly. Attention that is unwarranted and unwanted. But I will take what I can get, which has never been much. I will remain seated, though I can’t stand this air, too solid around me.

Ironic that words, my strength and source of power, were never so forceful as my silence has become. I am left in the open, unable to deflect, feeling bare. I am not one who is comfortable with my own nakedness, yet I am forced to be on display with no recourse, no redress, no ability to weave myself around others and confuse them of my own direction. I question my decision to linger. Perhaps, deeply, I want this. Perhaps I revel in it.

I am left open to myself, and can excuse no longer the fact of my body and its deficiency, its gross lack of my usual adornment. Not something I wish to contemplate, I fill my hours with words written by others on a page, words spoken by others on a screen, words crooned by others in a darkened room which I have filled with smoke and regrets. I would rather construct a ransom note for my stolen words with those, would rather dissect the pieces of their completeness than my own would-be defense.