Vow of Silence

I have decided I am going to stop speaking.
It shouldn’t be very hard, what with
the internet
and the way I move my body.
Truthfully, if this exercise had a purpose,
I don’t think it would achieve it;
if it were for protest, for example,
or for penance.
I’d like you to think of me
as an experiment:
How I smile to the barista
in the mornings, and he
already knows what drink to make me.
How I raise a graceful arm
and every taxi in the neighborhood pulls over.
How I speak to you in nonsense syllables
and they all translate to belonging.
The last full words I said out loud
were probably “thank you”—
I take this to have symbolic meaning,
though I wish I had said it more eloquently.










Alex Sarrigeorgiou is an actress and writer based in New York City. She graduated from Vassar College with a BA in drama in 2013. In her spare time, Alex likes to babysit cats and stare at pictures of food on the internet.