Sabbatical shorts 1 - There is no silence

A year on from a Sabbatical break, here are some selected notes from my journal during that time which may be of help to others, and are certainly a reminder to me. Some is in the form of more reflective thought, as below, other passages are simple meditations from scripture.

There is no silence
On a distant beach, in the shade, almost deserted.
Years of busyness and hurry ceased with a handbrake turn into an emergency stop.
But there is no silence.

I've left all the noise, ceased the talk, stopped walking the walk, 
Turned off the music, turned out the lights
But the rest of the planet continues.
Other voices carry to me on the breeze.
Children cry, a parent shouts,
A metal chair harshly scapes over a concrete floor.
The polythene sails on the boards in the shallows
Snap tight in hot summer wind like orchestral timpani.
A motorcycle revs to pass a car, horns are sounded
Church bells toll lazily in hazy heat.

Then to the under noise of nature.
Birds and crickets, wind and waves
Gentle lapping, suck and surge near to my feet.

And under these notes, the loudest noise of all, my thoughts.
Released by the silence, I am awakened to them,
As though jumping out of bed in the night to an unsecured door banging in a draught.
They demand my attention, but I may not rest here and just attend.
Drawn to a deeper sound yet that is behind all the noise, surface and internal,
The still small voice of The One I seek
The undemanding whisper of The One I must hear above all others.
He won't compete, He has been waiting for me.
There is no silence.