words

i think a lot about language and words. i could blame it on my job, but the job followed, though perhaps also amplified, my unabashed and somewhat nerdy love of words, languages, and linguistics. tied to those things come the questions of meaning and connecting and feeling and how as humans we attempt to use words as the ends to our communicative means. these are some works i've read that struck this vein in me. there's no real point to this post, just to ponder my favorite things in the world: words. and it just so happens my favorite word is ineffable, the word for that which has no words. 


"Maybe sorry’s the only sound

to offer pointlessly and at random
to each other forever, not because of what it means
but because it means we’re trying to mean,
I am trying to mean more than I did
when I started writing this poem, too soon
people will say, so what. This is what I do.
If I don’t do this I have no face and if I do this
I have an apple for a face or something vital
almost going forward is the direction I am headed.
Come with me from being over here to being over there,
from this second to that second."
      --bob hicok


"SADNESS OF THE INTELLECT: Sadness of being misunderstood [sic]; Humor sadness; Sadness of love wit[hou]t release; Sadne[ss of be]ing smart; Sadness of not knowing enough words to [express what you mean]; Sadness of having options; Sadness of wanting sadness; Sadness of confusion..." 
      --jonathan safran foer


"i love you both and i know i'm drunk but i mean it and i know love is a meaningless word to some but i can't think of another one."


"I distrust the incommunicable; it is the source of all violence."                                  
      --jean-paul sartre