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Saying It Best

I guess it must be a common experience and it has happened to me a few times. Say you are gathered with friends at dinner having a good conversation. There is something you try to share - several times and each time you fail to be heard. Just as you start to speak, so does another person and the audience favors them over you - you miss your chance just by a little bit.

You get your turn another time but you and the conversation have moved on to other things by then. There is that small nagging feeling of dissatisfaction you are left with for having tried to say something no matter how trivial and not being able to have it heard. You may even wonder why nature conspired against that thing you wanted to say - it wasn't terribly special or important any way. That would be the prosaic way of describing it and then there is the superlative, heart-stoppingly beautiful Jane Hirshfield way  in her poem ALL EVENING, EACH TIME I STARTED TO SAY IT:

It suddenly seemed to me the kind of thought,
not large, on which a life might turn.
There are many such: unheard, unspoken.
Their blind eyes open and close,
the almost audible valves of their hearts.
But all evening, each time I started to say it,
something would interrupt, the moment would pass.
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LIFE_REFACTORED said…
Oh! i thought long on how I could appreciate the context and say that I've been there too! It finally boils down to
"Tell me about it "
6:18 AM
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