Poets and writers will devote endless pages—even entire lifetimes—to capturing love with words. Or defining fear, greed, or the passion to follow one’s dreams. Someone who lives from the heart and knows love needs no words to describe it to someone else who lives from the heart. His or her communication is direct, from one heart to another. When heart-to-heart communication is difficult, we turn to words. Our communication becomes symbolic rather than direct. If we all lived from the heart, there would be less need for symbolic communication. Poets could find themselves short on work and novelists might have to scrape by writing news stories.
Wow — what you just said right there is truly profound. Thanks for that.
As a poet, I often say that if I could have said ‘it’ in plain language, then it wouldn’t be a poem. However, I agree with you about the communion we experience when we see each other through our hearts. I don’t know if I’d give up my poetry if the day came when we could simply communicate heart-to-heart, but until then in poetry I will try to find that.
Hi Isaac,
When the subject of expressing the language of the heart in words is brought up, the lyrics to an old Mamas and Papas song come to mind: “Words of love, so soft and tender, won’t win a girl’s heart anymore. If you love her, then you must send her somewhere where she’s never been before.” Like you, I see poetry as vital for expressing what plain language cannot. If and when the day comes that we can all share heart to heart, the term “poetry” may disappear only because there is no longer any other form of communication.
I agree with what you say about words of love. But good news storytelling is a craft, no one who chooses to do that should have to scrape by.
Hi Rick,
I think you’re right about the importance of storytelling, and I would suggest that we include bad news along with good. I can’t imagine the craft dying out, as I think our draw to the storyteller is imprinted in our genetic memory. In days past, story was an important teaching tool and a way of passing down the clan knowledge. Little has changed, as everybody still likes stories of one form or another, whether they be in the form of books, movies, or friends catching you up on what’s going on.