Words, words, words

My son will be two years old in about three weeks, and his language is developing at an exponential pace. He is linking groups of words together to form rudimentary sentences, repeating nearly everything he hears and using new words and phrases in unexpected, timely and appropriate situations. It is truthfully a miracle unfolding before us. In juxtaposition to this joy, wonder and mystery of the human use of language, I joined Twitter yesterday- the medium of word sharing limited to 140 characters- poetic, brash, empty, insulting to the genius of language or an homage to it. I have yet to post anything on it; I am usually just getting warmed up by 140. I will experiment with the platform, however, to see if it can be something beautiful, creative, artistic in the sense of attempting to represent a small piece of the divine. Many famous and powerful people use Twitter, and it seems many things tweeted are not well thought out or carefully constructed in the sense of wordsmithing. Will we be able to save language from becoming a dry, corpse-like means to voice or vent an opinion rather than an artful and heartful vehicle to truly communicate? Perhaps we are being given the opportunity to bring language to an even more elevated state by the mediums of texting and tweeting and snapchatting. The future may be asking us to limit our characters, carve them carefully and share them with the world. Rather than full of emotionless arrangements of letters, the future will be full of poetic sharings both between individuals and on a global scale. If we are to take advantage of these tools, we must not sit idly by while public figures draw down the standards and potential of words and manipulate the power therein with harsh, often shallow and damaging sentiments. My son cannot yet write- his language emanates from a voice high and scratchy as he works to exhaustion to form words and phrases. The effort, the determination, the sheer will he exhibits throughout the day to join the human community of language based communication is thrilling, inspiring and beautiful well beyond any adult-created arts. 

Polonius  ....What do you
read, my lord?

Hamlet. Words, words, words.

Polonius. What is the matter, my lord?

Hamlet. Between who?

Polonius. I mean, the matter that you read, my lord.

William Shakespeare

Hamlet, Act II, Scene 2