Here are many voices. Each one silent though full of words, waiting to be woken. I recognise these names and titles. Many are friends from long ago, beside the newly arrived and unacquainted – quite a few I’ll never know. Nothing so patient as the unread book ready to unlock its store of story – eager description, gentle reflection, anger, sadness, earnest instruction. Some urging laughter. Others just trying to make you cry – sealed up and silent as I draw near I hear in my head this voice of mine talking in various accents. My index finger touching the bindings can open up, unlock, unmute – set free stories and thoughts packed tidy and tight waiting like goods in a hold. There they remain, heavily freighted with authorial intention, their burdens of words bound up and silent, unless another with finger and voice releases those words giving them sound. Until then, inside their covers they wait, weighted with so much to say