We dissect nature along lines laid down by our native language.
quote by Benjamin Whorf
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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We dissect nature along lines laid down by our native language. Language is not simply a reporting device for experience but a defining framework for it.
quote by Benjamin Lee Whorf
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Ink (for Theresa Marie)
As I crease each page with the pressure of my point,
Cutting into the flow of each character,
I strive to lay lines to the surface of meaning.
I attempt to make sense of the flow of my thoughts
As I try to define with each separate line
The value that each gesture strives for.
I cut into pieces the correlation
Among the characters in my narrative;
Between scribing and feeling.
But this contradiction between purpose and process,
Between intention and muscle response,
Belies the nature of liquid.
For the amount of flow,
If nature has its way,
Is determined by the size of its reservoir.
So to finish my thoughts
In the context of language
Do I cede to the size of my pen?
Do I rely on the nature of language?
Or the language of nature’s mien?
poem by Dan Ramirez
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Writing The Book I Never Wrote(for Linda)
Pocket notebook
full of poems
written with a green
fountain pen
(in purple ink)
with a calligraphic flourish
left out in
the storm.
The words
run wild
go native
revert to being
just lines
rivulets of words
tributaries of words
all flow and whirl
into purple pools
purple passages
becoming watery
hieroglyphs
a secret language
made only of water and wind.
And now
the hot sun
of noon
bakes the words
cakes the pages
'til they turn and curl
leaving the book
in the position
where words
have thrown off their clothes
and become
as naked as paintings
the unmistakable brushstrokes
of rain and sun
translated into
their own native tongue.
poem by Dónall Dempsey
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The Language I Feel Most At Home In
THE LANGUAGE I FEEL MOST AT HOME IN
The language I feel most at home in
Is not my own.
My own sacred language
Is my second best.
English is too great for me
And I am not like Joyce
Able to contend with and transcend it –
I write my small lines in the language
Shakespeare is the glass of fashion and the mould of form of –
I one more minor actor in a cast of many millions
Play my words upon the page as best I can.
But why mind and remember me and mine
When there are so many and so so much far greater?
poem by Shalom Freedman
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Language from Womb to Tomb
It is heard from mother's womb,
taught and learned through the days
and years; repeated, remembered,
quoted, mimicked, twisted,
spoken to bless and to curse.
It is to make one
come across the border lines
It is to feel a part of the whole
It is to understand and be understood.
It is seed that grows through the years
It is a pen that records the scars and stars
It is present in the years of our life
the years lost and gone
and the years to come.
It is language
from mother's womb
to our own tomb
It is language of jubilation,
of judgment and adoration
It is law and order
It is history-
document and monument.
It is victory and defeat.
It is the language of love
It is the language of hate.
It is the language of life
and the language of death.
_____________
May 7,2010
poem by Elizabeth Padillo Olesen
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The Tribe
Before language there were sounds and lines
Also pictures to explain or present warning signs.
The veracity of wind only by pressure and sound
Angry howls; before the rain strikes the ground.
The sun and its glorious light
Purpose and reason to lift the curtain and take away night
Lines to here and lines to where
Mother of nature created; to share.
A long hot journey with little rest
To seek refuge near water, always the best.
Early in the morning a Mother to proceed
Giver of life and the mentor, of each earthly seed.
The warriors are fed, then the children, and seniors next
She who keeps it all together; and is the last to get rest.
Since time began the creation to sustain life
Elevated titles of Mother and also the wife.
12-29-05 Aho Speaks
poem by AHO Speaks
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The Cross Of Jesus....
I carried the cross of Jesus,
stood inside the Nazi camps.
i fled with many at Hiroshima,
died again and again in the jungles
of napalm Vietnam...
i buried the scattered bones
of Native Americans,
slain by the Bible's swords.
i rotted in a Chinese prison,
where they tortured me with cattle prods.
i marched the famines of Africa,
weeping over the bodies of children.
marching the sands of Iraq,
the mountains of Afghanistan...
but there is more!
the broken down projects,
the trailer park cementaries.
the unemployed lines,
the soup lines,
the picket lines.
i was shot crossing the border,
no one ever knew my name.
i died in your underpaid fields,
buried nameless in your mines...
i lost my soul a thousand times,
on your heroin flesh bartered corners....
i carried the cross of Jesus...
and laid it down on your Senate floor!
poem by Eric Cockrell
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The Language of Translation
What could be a better language than the language of translation
A white curtain on which
All our handiwork stands apart like dirt
All crimes are perpetrated in mother tongues
Which always contain a discourse on innocence
There are times
When translation is the only place that has a remnant of sorts
The sound of tyranny in the native tongue
Is killing sympathy!
(Translated from Hindi by Bharatbhooshan Tiwari)
poem by Asad Zaidi
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For those who intend to discover and to understand, not to indulge in conjectures and soothsaying, and rather than contrive imitation and fabulous worlds plan to look deep into the nature of the real world and to dissect it -- for them everything must be sought in things themselves.
quote by Francis Bacon
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Tribal Women
Tribal Women
Before language there were sounds and lines
Also pictures to explain or present warning signs.
The veracity of wind felt by pressure and to hear sound
Angry howls before the rain finally stikes the ground.
The golden sun with its glorious light
Purpose and reason to lift the curtain and take away the night.
Lines to here and lines to where
Mother of nature created to share.
A long hot journey with little rest
To seek refuge near waters their eventual quest.
Early in the monring a Mother first to proceed
Giver and carrier of life and mentor of each earthly seed.
The warriors are fed, then the children and seniors next
She who keeps it all toether and is the last to get rest.
Since earthly time began the creation to sustain the human for life
To acknowledge her God as a Mother; after she became a wife.
11-07-06 Aho Speaks
poem by AHO Speaks
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Different Languages
On the factory floor
Two ethnic women speak
In their native tongue
A language that flows beautifully
Their tongues roll
And the impact of a d or a t can be felt
Amongst all their chatter
The women laugh
That’s when others start to look
The sound of the language
May not be to everyone’s delight
No one cares what they say
Then all of a sudden......
LAUGHTER
And everyone starts to look with fright
What are they laughing at?
Is it me is it her is it him
Looking around
What did I do wrong?
Did I forget something?
Is it my zipper?
The women continue to chat
And laugh
The laughter now becoming too much
For the annoyed man
Of only one language
He goes to the boss
And files a complaint
Please boss tell those women over there
That it is not right to speak in their tongue
The boss agrees
And we are all back to uncultured boredom
As the sound of the
Lovely t and d end
So reigns the simple sounds of
A language that doesn’t flow
And the machines
That continue to sew
poem by James Dylan
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It is not the language of painters but the language of nature which one should listen to. . . . The feeling for the things themselves, for reality, is more important than the feeling for pictures.
quote by Vincent Van Gogh
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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It is not the language of painters but the language of nature which one should listen to, the feeling for the things themselves, for reality is more important than the feeling for pictures.
quote by Vincent Van Gogh
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Also, they don't understand - writing is language. The use of language. The language to create image, the language to create drama. It requires a skill of learning how to use language.
quote by John Milius
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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To be successful in my native France, where people speak the same language and understand me, is nothing.
quote by Edith Piaf
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Dog Talk
and so too
i have a dog
whose only
language is
bow. and
wow.
and true to
the limits of
his language
as he walks
and sways
and rolls
and runs like
a dog, and
true indeed to
his nature
this dog comes
before him
and then it makes
the bow and then
believing in his
power and glory
this patriotic and
loyal dog keeps
on saying: wow wow wow
poem by Ric S. Bastasa
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Language Of Love
Excusez-moi, my pretty mademoiselle,
You are a french girl its easy to tell,
Me, I dont smoke not even a french cigarette,
But I love my pomme de terre,
And always croquette,
I am from angleterre and you are from france,
And you will honour me by having a dance.
Chorus:
Straight away!
Im getting ready for a new sensation,
Never kissed them in another nation,
Internationally Im in clover,
I was a native on the boat ride over,
Straight away!
Im getting ready for my new vocation,
I am the man who will unite the nations,
Ooh la la/how you say it/ca va-this is love,
La la la la la la la language of love.
La la la la la la la language of love.
La la la la la la la language of love.
Weve been together now for more than a day,
And I am waiting to hear what you say,
Come on, come on, I think youre telling me lies,
You are italian, I can tell by your eyes,
I love chianti and I hope youll agree,
That zefferelli makes the movies for me
Chorus repeated.
Instrumental
I try my french, latin, spanish and greek,
This is the language of love that I speak,
I never know if theyre from paris or rome,
We stop the talking when Im walking them home,
One little kiss and then heavens above,
This is the universal language of love.
Straight away!
Are you ready for a new sensation,
Im gonna kiss a girl from every nation,
(rest of chorus as before).
This is love-the language of love.
song performed by by Cliff Richard
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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Thirteen Lines
A brain peered through stoic eyes;
Yet all it saw was rendered into
Flawed interpretation –
No honoured contemplation of a
Gluon, muon, quark of any flavour;
Nor a vision or conception of its world
Within a universe anthropic in its physical laws,
Inside a boundless multiverse.
All it gleaned and modelled
Bore parochialism well beyond belief! –
Delusional perhaps.
Survival only matters here on planet Earth –
Evolution saw to that.
Copyright © Mark R Slaughter 2010
na ture nature nature nature
nature nature nature nature
nature nature nature nature
nature nature nature nature
nature nature nature nature
nature nature nature nature
poem by Mark R Slaughter
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Roses
roses speaks of love in a languege known only too the heart.Colour speak of beauty in a language known only too the rainbow.Beauty speak of sunshine in a language only known too nature.My heart speak of you in a language only known too my love.
poem by Tijani Adebowale Destiny
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The End
Lines on forehead are deepening.
No signs of abatement
of fire in our bellies.
The hunger we inherited
is only comforting
the mouthless.
Broken laughs.
Strange bedfellows
chopping off the murals from the lips.
A body rots,
stinks.
Maggots fly.
Negotiations are still on.
Who will dissect the legend
to find the cause of death?
Like a clay model, a soldier breaks.
poem by Satish Verma
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