With all the studying I have been doing lately, I have rarely taken even a moment to appreciate how much I already know. Instead, I have (as usual) become slightly overwhelmed at how much I do not know.
Tonight, as I was sifting through my overloaded email inbox, I found this gem:
Language
by J. Mark
It's tragic
the way that everything falls away
when you name it:
those there, looming over this
here, their darkness,
their ability to catch the light
from that, there, hanging brightly.
It sounds so ridiculous to say it that way,
but there they all are:
the sun in the sky
over the small green earth, the peaks
that pull the horizon so close, so high,
glowing, their valleys blue-black
with shadow.
In our eyes they are the mountains
that we were promised: immutable.
But in word
they may as well be made of sugar.
They melt under their names
as under a hot running tap.
I could say nothing,
I should
give up singing these empty psalms,
hold your face tenderly between my hands
and turn it towards the view
The idea that something as simple as describing something can be so complex in a multi-dimensional way. It may just be deliriousness from sleep deprivation, but this poem reminded me that I know things that other people (or rather, other little people) do not know yet. For that, I should be mind blown. Yes, I am sure children will grow up and learn all about the sun and the stars - but will they know the things I know about schizophrenia, GERD, or animism? They might... but then again, they might not.
My clinical advisor recently reminded me of the quote, "Anything you learn becomes yours." That makes me feel pretty well off.
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