Noise Floor
Compiled 2026
Photography (B/W)
Headphones on, between stations, I thumb through tracks. Sound spills from speaker to eardrum, an intravenous drip, learning, judging, agitating. The carriage holds us like a waiting room.
There’s a frequency underneath this noise. I find it in stages, on the elevated walkway between Shun Tak and IFC, the lanes of the municipal pool, the harbour front in the morning, within my partner’s laugh. A resonance in the ordinariness of things felt.
There’s a moment in the Catholic liturgy when the congregation turns to one another and offers a handshake, and the words ‘peace be with you.’ I remember this moment breaking through the tedium of a school service, our nine-year-old minds thankful for the activity.
But looking back, there’s something beautiful about this collective breath. To wish someone peace. It’s one of the nicest things to wish for another.
In those small moments, between breaths and handshakes, we tune into it without even knowing.