About an Absence

“I wonder what absence is deeper. The absence of the object, or the absence of the trace of the object. I suppose the trace of the object still contains a certain presence of what is now missing, it proposes the hope of a reencounter. If I were to walk along the shore and the saltpeter were to engulf my body, would I feel more at ease? Would I gain confidence that the blue above the sand will return to occupy its bed and fill the vast emptiness? And if the seagulls were to return to their flight patterns, to their frolicking ways, would the silence disappear? And if the silence were to disappear, would I miss it? Can silence leave a trace?”

—The Curvature of an Absence