let the spirit move your lips and direct your tongue

You talk when you cease to be at peace with your thoughts;

And when you can no longer dwell in the solitude of your heart

you live in your lips, and sound is a diversion and a pastime.

And in much of your talking, thinking is half murdered.

For thought is a bird of space, that in a cage of words

may indeed unfold its wings but cannot fly.

There are those among you who seek the talkative

through fear of being alone.

The silence of aloneness reveals to their eyes

their naked selves and they would escape.

And there are those who talk, and without knowledge

or forethought reveal a truth which they themselves do not understand.

And there are those who have the truth within them,

but they tell it not in words.

In the bosom of such as these

the spirit dwells in rhythmic silence.

~ Kahlil Gibran

from The Prophet

art by Andrea Dezsö

with thanks to The Marginalian 

by Maria Popova