An Untitled Rough Draft

He whispered to me softly,
"Silence is a gift."
I may have missed
the means for the end,
waiting silently for my reward,
that delicate touch,
that still small voice,
when all along
the silence
was the answer
to the questions
I never spoke,
choking them back
because the words come out so messy sometimes
like a rogue fingerpainting
on the white bedroom wall,
like the human condition,
like men and women and love and heartbreak.
I want to scream threats
into the silence
just to say I tried,
but I'd be lying if I said
breaking the silence
made it any better,
made my heart mend any faster,
brought me clarity any quicker.
The thoughts race
like semis on the runaway truck ramps,
placed strategically
where the damage would be most severe
if they veered off into that ravine
or chasm.
Veer right is only good advice
when you're headed to the ditch on the left,
otherwise they're just directions,
meaningless,
like math word problems I never could solve,
or a recipe I never got the hang of
no matter how many times I tried.
In the silence
these anxious thoughts sound louder than before,
nothing else to drown them out,
except the beating of my own arrhythmic heart,
which sounds strangely like the dryer
on the other side of the bedroom wall.
Maybe my heart is just a replica of man made machinery,
breaking down just as often,
needing costly repair work,
on the verge of simply giving out.