words, words...

today, some thoughts on words...

first, images from angela banner's ant and bee books, in this one, she tells a story with words moving from a-z (ant to zoo), and i really love these pages with a single word facing a single image...

last night i was still in the midst of reading tarjei vesaas' the boat in the evening. i'm really taking my time with this book, which has got me reading each small chapter at least two or three times before moving on to the next. chapter 9 is titled words, words. here are a few gems:

words can cause trouble like large rocks in one's path.
wrong: words can clear the largest rocks in one's path.
wrong again: words can turn into dark chasms unbridgeable for a whole lifetime.
we know very little about the power and destructiveness of our words.

___

he said to himself: perhaps that's what i must remember more often. but did i ever speak about what i really knew? far too difficult. far too extraordinary to be blurted out in words.

___

he thought: words, words.
no more words now.
here is my thirsting hand.

as it stands in the memory...

"there he stands in sifting snow. in my thoughts in sifting snow. a father - and his winter-shaggy, brown horse, in snow.

his brown horse and his face. his sharp words. his blue eyes and his beard. the beard with a reddish tinge against the white. sifting snow. blind, boundless snow.

...

the boy stands inside his ring of wild animals, shovelling snow.

who is singing?

the horse is singing his song somewhere deep inside himself, and the man and the boy are dreaming their dreams. it has to be. the potent melody that the boy feels is coming in waves from his secret ring is another matter. he hears it as he shovels until his arms grow stiff.

...

the snow starts to fall again. the mist thickens.

and the ring of animals?

at this moment the whole ring of animals vanishes. they cannot be kept back. no use calling them. they will not be conjured up again.

the boy bears the hurt instead, a shapeless burden, but one that will settle for good.

the horse bears the burning hurt.

without a sound, like the others.

i am with man,
and no other than man.
i am with man
all day long.
i am the horse,
and this is my song."

three short passages from the first chapter of tarjei vesaas' 1968 novel, the boat in the evening. this first chapter is one of the most beautifully written texts i've read in a long time. i am trying to read it slower and slower and perhaps at least a dozen times before i go on with the book. i can only imagine the norwegian orginal being even more stellar...

when chapter titles form a poem...

as it stands in the memory
in the marshes and on the earth
spring in winter.

daybreak with shining horses
the drifter and the mirrors
the wasted day creeps away
on its belly.

washed creeks
fire in the depths
words, words
the dream of stone.

the heart lies naked
beside the highway in the dark
the tranquil river glides
out of the landscape
beyond one's grasp.

just walking up to fetch the churn
the melody
the rivers
beneath the earth.

the titles of chapters in sequence, from terjei vesaas' the boat in the evening.