18 October 2010

poetry break!

while i was cleaning today, i found a stack of index cards that mr. andrew and i had done a long time ago. i wanted to share some:


I remember that night. That night, as the sun began to hang low, it reminded me of the marble I always won with, the
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Dear sir or madam, I am sorry to inform you that you house is on fire. It appears a flat iron was left plugged in. Your family pet, Worcestershire, was badly burnt but is safe in the county animal shelter. We are deeply sympathetic and extend our sincerest condolences for your shit. We also ask that you be more careful in the future.
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Yes, you are quite beautiful STOP
But i find that besides the point STOP
I am writing to tell you that i am not coming to your mother's this thanksgiving, or next STOP

I am staying here in the mountains STOP
please rent out my room END TRANSMISSION


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I took a train to San francisco. PLease dont be mad, but don't try to find me. I am by myself in the city, a place where I can make my own direction, somewhere between North and the rest. Do not fear for me. Do not fear for a nything, for Fear is the tool of the devil. And please, do not try to contact me. I will be home for dinner. Please make corn.
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Oh God, what am i doing here?

I don't know my lines.


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Dear Martha STOP It has been too many days and too many nights since I last saw you STOP I am beginning to fear that this mission is not what they told us it would be STOP I am beginning to fear STOP I am writing this from a place STOP they told me I can't tell you where it is STOP But it is a place where I am not supposed to be STOP But I will say th STOPSTOP
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It felt like rain was coming down on me

but there had not been rai n here for several years
you
you cannot know

the way it rolls your spirit through God's great
fingers.

I was in the hands of God that day
When the rains fell.


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Two cents for a bag of doughnuts? Are you trying to trick me? Fuckin'... Get outta there, Poncho!
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my life line has become disconnected from earth.

16 October 2010

word of the day - 16 october 2010

beard n. probably from proto-indo-european bhar-dha, which begat the germanic offshoots of west germanic barthaz and latin barba (see also: barber; consider also: barbarian (from latin barbarus)).

the interesting thing is that all of these words aren't composites of other words, with roots and prefixes and such - beard is such a basic, close-to-nature thing that it is very fully its own word.

10 October 2010

words of the day - 10 October 2010

these words are not my own musings, but mr. andrew showed me this wonderful article on words from other languages that have no english translation (ie. schadenfreude, wabi-sabi, toska). very cool.

jason wire's '20 awesomely untranslatable words from around the world'.

"Toska

Russian – Vladmir Nabokov describes it best: 'No single word in English renders all the shades of toska. At its deepest and most painful, it is a sensation of great spiritual anguish, often without any specific cause. At less morbid levels it is a dull ache of the soul, a longing with nothing to long for, a sick pining, a vague restlessness, mental throes, yearning. In particular cases it may be the desire for somebody of something specific, nostalgia, love-sickness. At the lowest level it grades into ennui, boredom.'"

3 October 2010

word of the day - 3 october 2010

mag.na.ni.mi.ty n. from latin (surprise!) magnus, meaning 'great', root of mega (see also: magnum opus, magnum p.i.), and animus, meaning 'soul' or 'mind', but finding its roots in ane-, 'to breathe' or, more specifically, 'to exhale'. animus is also the root word of animal, so, at least in latin, animals do have souls!

h'm!