Tag Archives: words

Opposes/Supposes

11 Dec

I shared this with close friends exactly a year ago, and the question still haunts me, so I thought I’d put it out there for you guys to shed light on. Not your typical cheery holiday fare, I know.

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American rhetoric is littered with war words on a daily basis. The nation’s lexicon is so charged with conflict–the war against smoking, the battle against cancer, the fight to save a marriage–that every act, no matter how innocuous, is verbally militarized. So deeply entrenched are these cultural references to violence, that those raised in the country barely appear to notice. Is there anyone else who sees this? I can’t be the only one! Why don’t we question it? Is there any literature or research on this that would help me understand the phenomenon?

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Chocolate for Brekkie, Starlight for Din

18 Apr

Language can be a beautiful thing. You can stack up phrases and bite into them like a sandwich of plump shrimp. You can twirl sentences like I curl hair around my fingers, gazing absently at its tensile brownness against my skin. You can dip into it like the soothing jasmine green tea I have recently discovered. It bubbles and warbles in a kettle and the words spill over as you lie on your back, high on the sound they make. Language is the quiet of California rain. The cacophony of Bhendi Bazaar. The little shiver that tingles down your back when he looks at you that way.

Language is a new chaise lounge from Ikea. I’ve been curled up on it and refuse to vacate. Language makes me reach for grey skies and wrap them snugly around the shoulders. Eat a doughy chocolate cookie for breakfast and warm tortillas for lunch. Language makes me unrecognizable to him. I prefer you, he says simply. And OJ bristles. Shifts uncomfortably on her cushion for a while, then goes back to watching steam fog up the window. The landscape shuts itself out and she turns inward again.

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