I find it curious that the artificiality of the Ceyx puppet is more pronounced in the Ovid. "These words spoke Morpheus and that, too, in a voice she might well believe her husband's; he seemed also to weep real tears and his hands performed the gestures of Ceys." (Ovid 671-672) The 'seems,' 'performed,' 'real,' 'might well believe,' etc all work to ensure that the reader doesn't lose sight of the 'possession,' for lack of better word, gripping Ceyx's body. Alcyone also goes on to clutch at empty air, further highlighting the falsity of the apparition. She notes that he "had not, to be sure, his wonted features, nor did his face light as it used to do." (Ovid 688-690)

Chaucer's omission of any reaction on Alcyone's part is striking. That we only see that he called her by her very name (Chaucer 201) implies that pseudo-Ceyx's words have been thoroughly convincing to his very wife; in other words, that verbal tics alone can, perhaps, constitute the self in the eyes of the rest of the world, to the point that the actual origin of the voice ceases to matter. Even the physical presence of the corpse is waved aside, while in Ovid, the corpse conspicuously comes to shore before the Alcyone/Ceyx reunion.