Monday, September 13, 2010

Flying Words


...with debates raging on about commercialism, body image, and what should and shouldn't be termed “yoga,”* I’m pleased to announce the impending publication of my new translation of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras...

...re-titled, for the sake of commercial viability, Patanjali's 196 Secrets for Tight Buns and Rock Hard Abs...

...to be followed, early next year, by my interpretation of the Bhagavad Gita...in which Krishna counsels Arjuna on how to use the Law of Attraction™ to lose dhoti fat, meet attractive virgins of appropriate caste, and avoid paying taxes...

Most people become bankrupt through having invested too heavily in the prose of life. To have ruined oneself over poetry is an honour.
Oscar Wilde

...the longest word in the world is 189,819 letters long.....technically, it’s a chemical formula...it’s not in any dictionaries...and, I would guess, it’s very rarely been written...and, quite possibly never spoken at all...or used in a sentence...almost definitely never used in Scrabble...in fact, after a good bit of google searching, finding only abbreviated versions, I started wondering if it existed only in theory......until I found it here...(at the bottom is a recording of part of it read aloud...sped up...but, apparently, the work of a speech synthesizer...leaving open the question of whether it’s been spoken by a human voice)...I’d like to be the first person to use it in a poem...

…frameworks of the One (derived from mysticism) and the Many (derived from common experience) falsely polarize individuation and merging, which are actually embedded in each other…
Diana Alstad

...might silliness and seriousness be a false dichotomy as well?...isn’t everything we see or do to some extent vitally important and to some other extent ridiculous?...isn’t it all just a matter of degree...or perspective......or could it be that I just ain’t smart enough for none o’ them non-dichotomous paradoxes?...



*see here and here and here...

8 comments:

Brenda P. said...

You should start thinking about your cover art.

Brooks Hall said...

False Dichotomies:
One/Many
Serious/Silly
Important/Ridiculous
Yoga/Not yoga
Chocolate/Peanut butter

Example scenario:
One person: Heyyy…I found your silliness in my serious-butter!

Other person: Whaaa…your serious is covered in my silliness!

Together: Mmm. Good…

Melinda said...

You know what they say, Jay--the view is different depending on where you stand. What's ridiculous to one person may be sublime to the next--it all really depends on each of our personal expectations, past experiences, and desires . . .

Personally, my favorite word is discombobulated. It's a keeper, I'd say!

Take care,

Melinda

Laura said...

silliness is the root of all seriousness....wait, or is it the other way around? maybe silliness is the blossom at the end of the branches of the strong, stern trunk that sipped the seriously serious, sap from the seriousness root tap?

Lindsay said...

Ooh! This post reminded of Bill Hicks, the ultimate in serious silliness. Look up the YouTube video "Bill Hicks - It's Just a Ride"

I just watched it again.

Silly/Serious
Real/Not Real
Fear/Love

It's just a ride ... and a choice ... right now.

the walking man said...

Cynical Yogi no poet or writer would ever use that word which I have playing in another window as i write this. I type at about twenty words a minute and to be honest the reason no one would use it is it would only add one word to the almighty word count. It is still playing as I end this post.

I even did the word Verification which are hard for me because I always have to double check I got them correct and it is still being read out.

Now I saw a couple of spell check red lines in the above and it is still being read. It would make a good rap song if it had a better beat though, still going it is, (pause)(more pause) switch windows...still more than 2.5 minutes left until it is done being read. Lot of work for a single word added to a word count.

good luck with that poem. outta here with 60 seconds left to the reading of the word.

TheRiverWanders said...

Serious needs silly; without one, how would we know the other?

I will *always* know peanut butter and chocolate though...jointly and severally.

Y is for Yogini said...

I, for one, cannot wait for your translation of the Sutras to be released. Perhaps I might receive an autographed copy?

That Patanjali. No one has had harder buns or abs since. We can only aspire to achieve that level of perfection. Sigh.