Sticks and Stones May Break My Bones: And WORDS are their driving force.

Imagine you think in shapes and feelings. You feel the hot sun baking your back. You feel the shifting sand buoy you up only halfway with each step. Your hands dig deep in the ground, diving through eight variations of heat and cold to learn about your surroundings. Food is caught by instinct. Shelter shared by instinct. Children born by instinct. You cover your body with Earth’s fabrics to shield you from the elements. You sleep in Earth’s caverns and bathe in her waters. A guest exploring with your senses.

Suddenly, a figure approaches. You’ve never seen such fur before, dark and neatly matted down with nary a hair out of place. Folded in perfect geometry surrounding a white underbelly. Shiny black hooves appear below its fur as it gets closer, walking neatly on two legs, back erect. The creature has almost no hair, like a child, really. As it nears, it sings a song with no melody. Your soul is not moved by its tone or its notes. Not at all. And the creature holds out to you a thin layer of bark with strange markings. The offering means nothing to you. It is worth nothing.

But with words, oh with words, it is the world.

Somewhere in our culture, we, Earth’s humans started placing more value on the corporeal than on the ethereal or hypothetical. We convinced ourselves…