Words and Symphonies

I. Ellipsis — the things we don’t say…

Photo by Brett Jordan on Unsplash

I want to write a novel about silence; the things people don’t say. But the difficulty is immense. - Virginia Woolf, The Voyage Out

When Virginia Woolf started her masterpiece ‘The Voyage Out’ in 1912, she suffered long periods of depression and even made a suicide attempt during the course of the work due to its intensity and the social conditions surrounding the discourse. She could not say many things. She struggled to say many more. The Voyage Out is an arduous journey of self-discovery, sexuality, death, consciousness, love, unsaid words, and the way in which people relate with the world around them. The novel is stacked with conversations at sea as 24-year old Rachel Vinrace travels from London on a boat, to Santa Marina, South America. While there are many people aboard and different conversations ongoing as the novel unravels its parts, there is Richard Dalloway — the man who struggles to communicate with Rachel because he couldn’t find the right words to say.

I am writing about a voyage and ellipsis because these stories are the building blocks of our lives, our being, our existence, the hope we cling unto and keep our arms outstretched for. Some days I want to tell you about the uncharted waters and possibilities of a wreck, but you’ve already been to the deep sea and know how to guide a sail. You know how to stay afloat and pull a body along with your body. You are familiar with the wind and the tossing of waves. You have been beyond; the depths of your eyes are audible of your valor. The first time I looked you in your eyes it was an ellipsis in motion; you were so moved that our hearts sync and you understood the language of my soul. You held my hands and rolled my fingers over in a way that says I understand — blessed assurance. I wanted to say I love you yet couldn’t find any utterances but stuttered and casted my gaze upon your cheeks, then submitted to the blistering silence at the table. The steams escaping the coffee creating stains on the windowpane on its way out. The muffins untouched. Your lips, still untouched too. Rain. Lighting. Thunderstorms. Lowlights. Soft-melodies. And two lovers at a table without words but electrifying gazes.

How many times have we been here and how many more will we? Will there ever be words enough or always a prevalent…