I like to think I have a way with words.
Words are my playthings, and oh how I love them dearly.
But sometimes I wish they would go away. Sometimes I think there are too many words. They are all around me, floating in the air and pasted over surfaces and bouncing inside my brain. They are crowded together and imprisoned inside books, pouring into you when you crack open the covers and let them loose.
There is a word for everything, for every object and emotion, for every action and idea. There are words for other words, words for anatomies of words and arrangements of words. Every culture has its own set of words, and splinters of people form splinters of sets of their own.
Words can move faster than wind, now. Words can cross the ocean, float in the sky, be hurled into the upper atmosphere and flung back to the earth, all in the blink of an eye. They can spread faster than a virus, infect minds faster than any epidemic.
There are words in my head. They appear in my consciousness whenever I see something or recognize something or recall something. They rattle in my mind when I close my eyes, they haunt my dreams and my memories. Word spill out of me whenever I attempt to articulate my thoughts. They are flowing out of my fingers as I type this, flowing out onto the computer screen before my very eyes, and they will flow into you, resounding in your head as you read this.
Is there any escape from them? Words are transcribed on the fingers of the deaf, and those who speak to the deaf. We are born with words grafted to us, and words define us throughout life, within the printed prisons of resumes and application forms, profiles and testimonials. When we die, words are uttered and words will mark our grave. We frame our deepest thoughts and most profound philosophies in words. We make them and they make us. Words are the sum of us.
I like to think I could do away with words. To be free of them, to escape to a place where there are no words. Where I can watch a sunset or hear the buzz of a bee or smell the scent of a flower, all without having to describe them in my mind. Where I can communicate with another person through expression and gesture, without the need for words to convey our thoughts and feelings. Where silences and blank spaces are all the more profound, because there would be no words to depict the emptiness.
Where
___there
I like to bend them, fold them, crush them, squeeze them, and twist them out of shape. I like to tear them apart, letter by letter, and stitch the pieces back together. I like to force them into order, making them march in a sentence one after the other. I like to scatter them in scrawls across the page, abandoning them to chaos and confusion. I like to teach them to do tricks, to do things for me they wouldn't ordinarily do. I like to deform them and reform them, mutate them and mutilate them. I like to remake them and reshape them as I see fit.
Words are my playthings, and oh how I love them dearly.
But sometimes I wish they would go away. Sometimes I think there are too many words. They are all around me, floating in the air and pasted over surfaces and bouncing inside my brain. They are crowded together and imprisoned inside books, pouring into you when you crack open the covers and let them loose.
There is a word for everything, for every object and emotion, for every action and idea. There are words for other words, words for anatomies of words and arrangements of words. Every culture has its own set of words, and splinters of people form splinters of sets of their own.
Words can move faster than wind, now. Words can cross the ocean, float in the sky, be hurled into the upper atmosphere and flung back to the earth, all in the blink of an eye. They can spread faster than a virus, infect minds faster than any epidemic.
There are words in my head. They appear in my consciousness whenever I see something or recognize something or recall something. They rattle in my mind when I close my eyes, they haunt my dreams and my memories. Word spill out of me whenever I attempt to articulate my thoughts. They are flowing out of my fingers as I type this, flowing out onto the computer screen before my very eyes, and they will flow into you, resounding in your head as you read this.
Is there any escape from them? Words are transcribed on the fingers of the deaf, and those who speak to the deaf. We are born with words grafted to us, and words define us throughout life, within the printed prisons of resumes and application forms, profiles and testimonials. When we die, words are uttered and words will mark our grave. We frame our deepest thoughts and most profound philosophies in words. We make them and they make us. Words are the sum of us.
I like to think I could do away with words. To be free of them, to escape to a place where there are no words. Where I can watch a sunset or hear the buzz of a bee or smell the scent of a flower, all without having to describe them in my mind. Where I can communicate with another person through expression and gesture, without the need for words to convey our thoughts and feelings. Where silences and blank spaces are all the more profound, because there would be no words to depict the emptiness.
Where
___there
______________would
___________________________onl y
_________________________________________b
____________________________________________e
I have been quoted. I feel all warm inside. And I would really, really like to see you go a day without words. Would the universe stop making sense?
ReplyDeleteAlso, on the Quotations panel: Desmond! Jake!