the silence depressed me. it wasn’t the silence of silence. it was my own silence. i knew perfectly well the cars were making a noise, and the people in them and behind the lit windows of the buildings were making a noise, and the river was making a noise, but i couldn’t hear a thing. the city hung in my window, flat as a poster, glittering and blinking, but it might just as well not have been there at all, for the good it did me. - sylvia plath.