One often calms one’s grief by recounting it.

The line suggests that grief can be eased through narration: putting sorrow into words—especially in the presence of a listener—organizes chaotic feeling into a coherent account, which can lessen its intensity. Recounting grief also externalizes it, turning private pain into something shareable and therefore more bearable. The insight anticipates later ideas about the consolations of confession, conversation, and even therapeutic “talking cures”: speech does not erase loss, but it can transform raw suffering into remembered experience. Implicitly, the quote also recognizes a social dimension to mourning—relief often comes not from silence, but from being able to tell one’s story and have it received.