{"id":18641,"date":"2016-12-09T09:34:28","date_gmt":"2016-12-09T14:34:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/?p=18641"},"modified":"2016-12-09T09:37:42","modified_gmt":"2016-12-09T14:37:42","slug":"an-appetite-for-meaning-seasoned-with-words","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/2016\/12\/an-appetite-for-meaning-seasoned-with-words\/","title":{"rendered":"An Appetite for Meaning (Seasoned with Words)"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>\"'Mowing<\/a><\/p>\n

[Image: “Mowing Word,” by user grob831 on Flickr<\/a>. (Used here under a Creative Commons license.) For more information, see the note<\/a> at the foot of this post.]<\/em><\/p>\n

From whiskey river<\/em><\/a>:<\/p>\n

Land of the Living<\/strong><\/em>
\n(excerpt)<\/p>\n

Earlier tonight, a young monk, laughing,
\nsplashed my face
\nwith holy water. Then, just as unexpectedly,
\nhe flew down a banister, and
\nfor one millisecond
\nwas an angel—robed,
\nwithout feet—
\nall irrepressible joy
\nand good news.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Kathleen Norris [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and:<\/p>\n

If one day you become sick of words, as happens to us all, and you grow tired of hearing them, of saying them; if whichever you choose seems worn out, dull, disabled; if you feel nauseated when you hear “horrible” or “divine” for some everyday occurrence—you’ll not be cured, obviously, by alphabet soup.<\/p>\n

You must do the following: cook a plate of al dente spaghetti dressed with the simplest seasoning—garlic, oil and chili. Over the pasta tossed in this mixture, grate a layer of Parmesan cheese. To the right of the deep plate full of the spaghetti thus prepared, place an open book. To the left, place an open book. In front of it a full glass of dry red wine. Any other company is not recommended. Turn the pages of each book at random, but they must both be poetry. Only good poets cure us of an overindulgence in words. Only simple essential food cures us of gluttony.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(H\u00e9ctor Abad [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Not from whiskey river<\/em>:<\/p>\n

Uptick<\/strong><\/p>\n

We were sitting there, and
\nI made a joke about how
\nit doesn’t dovetail: time,
\none minute running out
\nfaster than the one in front
\nit catches up to.
\nThat way, I said,
\nthere can be no waste.
\nWaste is virtually eliminated.<\/p>\n

To come back for a few hours to
\nthe present subject, a painting,
\nlooking like it was seen,
\nhalf turning around, slightly apprehensive,
\nbut it has to pay attention
\nto what’s up ahead: a vision.
\nTherefore poetry dissolves in
\nbrilliant moisture and reads us
\nto us.
\nA faint notion. Too many words,
\nbut precious.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(John Ashbery [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and:<\/p>\n

When you write, you lay out a line of words. The line of words is a miner\u2019s pick, a woodcarver’s gouge, a surgeon\u2019s probe. You wield it, and it digs a path you follow. Soon you find yourself deep in new territory. Is it a dead end, or have you located the real subject? You will know tomorrow, or this time next year.<\/p>\n

You make the path boldly and follow it fearfully. You go where the path leads. At the end of the path, you find a box canyon. You hammer out reports, dispatch bulletins.<\/p>\n

The writing has changed, in your hands, and in a twinkling, from an expression of your notions to an epistemological tool. The new place interests you because it is not clear. You attend. In your humility, you lay down the words carefully, watching all the angles. Now the earlier writing looks soft and careless. Process is nothing; erase your tracks. The path is not the work. I hope your tracks have grown over; I hope birds ate the crumbs; I hope you will toss it all and not look back.<\/p>\n

…<\/p>\n

The part you must jettison is not only the best-written part; it is also, oddly, that part which was to have been the very point. It is the original key passage, the passage on which the rest was to hang, and from which you yourself drew the courage to begin. Henry James knew it well, and said his best. In his preface to The Spoils of Poynton<\/em>, he pities the writer, in a comical pair of sentences that rises to a howl: “Which is the work in which he hasn’t surrendered, under dire difficulty, the best thing he meant to have kept? In which indeed, before the dreadful don<\/em>e<\/em>, doesn’t he ask himself what has become of the thing all for the sweet sake of which it was to proceed to that extremity?”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Annie Dillard [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

…and:<\/p>\n

I could never have dreamt that there were such goings-on in the world between the covers of books, such sandstorms and ice-blasts of words, such slashing of humbug, and humbug too, such staggering peace, such enormous laughter, such and so many blinding bright lights breaking across the just-awaking wits and splashing all over the pages in a million bits and pieces all of which were words, words, words, and each of which were alive forever in its own delight and glory and oddity and light.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

(Dylan Thomas [source<\/em><\/a>])<\/p>\n

<\/a>________________<\/p>\n

About the image:<\/strong> “What a striking — and strikingly odd<\/em> — title for such an image,” I thought to myself. I tried to imagine what symbolism I failed to see, what experience of writing — of language<\/em> — I’d evidently missed which would have connected the dots for me. The Flickr page provided neither caption nor description; no thread of comments hinted at what I was looking at. (The tags the photographer had provided offered some hints — Pembrokeshire, Coast, Arfordir, Penfro, Cymru<\/em> — but not enough to “get” it.)\u00a0 I blew the thing up to what would probably be wall-size if I’d printed it, and examined each section carefully. It made no difference: it’s “just” a bunch of people standing or sitting around, atop a sheer rock face.<\/p>\n

So then I did the thing I maybe should have done right upfront: I searched (without much hope) on the phrase “mowing word”…<\/p>\n

I’ll give you the pleasure of discovery for yourself. It’s still a mystery; I “understand” the photograph’s title now, at least, but of all the references that I’ve seen so far, not one<\/em> explains why these words had ever been joined together in a phrase.<\/p>\n

[back to top<\/a>]<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[Image: “Mowing Word,” by user grob831 on Flickr. (Used here under a Creative Commons license.) For more information, see the note at the foot of this post.] From whiskey river: Land of the Living (excerpt) Earlier tonight, a young monk, laughing, splashed my face with holy water. Then, just as unexpectedly, he flew down a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","h5ap_radio_sources":[],"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"activitypub_content_warning":"","activitypub_content_visibility":"","activitypub_max_image_attachments":3,"activitypub_interaction_policy_quote":"anyone","activitypub_status":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"An Appetite for Meaning (Seasoned with Words)","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1393,250,5,50,251,372,4159],"tags":[295,399,4454,4455,4456,4457,4458],"class_list":{"0":"post-18641","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-whiskey-river-runningaftermyhat","7":"category-art","8":"category-06_writing","9":"category-language-writing_cat","10":"category-poetry-writing_cat","11":"category-style-and-craft","12":"category-essays","13":"tag-annie-dillard","14":"tag-wales","15":"tag-john-ashbery","16":"tag-hector-abad","17":"tag-kathleen-norris","18":"tag-mowing-word","19":"tag-rock-climbing","20":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6kZSG-4QF","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18641"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18641\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18653,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18641\/revisions\/18653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/johnesimpson.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}