poem

 Foreign Language Requirement

The final assignment was to learn an alien tongue using only a giant dictionary containing all the words comprising the language. Flip to a random page. You see an arrangement of strange glyphs boldfaced to indicate another entry—the word where it will all start for you. The definition that follows will contain a series of equally unfamiliar morphemes . Each of these will need to be looked up. Since nothing is “alphabetical” at this point, finding each successive word in the definition can sometimes take hours. Each of these will be similarly defined, using another series of inscrutable words you have never seen before. This process repeats itself over and over, ad infinitum, splashing through the pages back and forth like a March wind. The paper thins to translucence. Eventually you will begin to recognize the repetition of specific words and infer embryonic connections from the patterns of their combinations. At some point you even cross paths with the word you started with. A web begins to weave itself, thin wisps of silk spanning the hint of something solid just off the edge of perception. Eventually you will have mapped out the structure of a language without any meaning. A vast scaffolding ascending to the heavens. Some linguists call this the skeleton. The flesh is what we bring. When words become Word. And join the pantheon of the living.

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