Meditation is the meal that cannot be eaten because its fulfillment is final. Neither do cops. We have to come to a complete stop, or we'll get a ticket. No rolling stops, no almost stops, no stop and goes. Stop means stop.
Silence is like a stop sign for more than cars and trucks.
It is for the whole universe. Silence is the whole universe completely stopped, unmoving, dead still, no pins dropping, no cells breathing, no synapse firing. This silence makes a tomb's silence sound like a jackhammer. Meditation remains stopped even after the universe starts up again. Meditation is a soundless sonic boom in the silence of the stopped universe.