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9. Sentence
An episode inspired by Tadeusz Dąbrowski's poem "Sentence", Nick Flynn's "Tattoo" and Jack Gilbert's "The Answer":
SENTENCE
It's as if you'd woken in a locked cell and found
in your pocket a slip of paper, and on it a single sentence
in a language you don't know.
And you'd be sure this sentence was the key to your
life. Also to this cell.
And you'd spend years trying to decipher the sentence,
until finally you'd understand it. But after a while
you'd realize you got it wrong, and the sentence meant
something else entirely. And so you'd have two sentences.
Then three, and four, and ten, until you'd created a new language.
And in that language you'd write the novel of your life.
And once you'd reached old age you'd notice the door of the cell
was open. You'd go out into the world. You'd walk the length and
breadth of it,
until in the shade of a massive tree you'd yearn
for that one single sentence in a language you don't know.
TATTOO
You do know, right,
that between the no-
longer & the still-
to-come
you are being continually
tattooed, inked
with the skulls of
everyone
you’ve ever loved—the you
& the you
& the you & the you—you don’t
sit in a chair, thumb
through a binder, pick a
design, it simply
happens each time you
bring your fingers to your face
to inhale him back into you . . .
tiny skulls, some of us are
covered. You, love, could
simply tattoo an open
door, light
pouring in from somewhere
outside, you
could make your body a door
so it appears you
(let her fill you) are made
of light.
THE ANSWER
Is the clarity, the simplicity, an arriving
or an emptying out? If the heart persists
in waiting, does it begin to lessen?
If we are always good, does God lose track
of us? When I wake at night, there is
something important there. Like the humming
of giant turbines in the high-ceilinged stations
in the slums. There is a silence in me,
absolute and inconvenient. I am haunted
by the day I walked through the Greek village
where everyone was asleep and somebody began
playing Chopin, slowly, faintly, inside
the upper floor of a plain white stone house.
TOPICS COVERED: Alienation; Analytical preparation; Ashberry's trees; Authenticity; Birth and self-discovery; Boundaries of essence; Communication dynamics; Confinement vs. liberation; Consciousness; Contemplation of existence; Cosmic symbolism; Cultural backgrounds; Daily Mail controversy; Deciphering life's language; Developmental path; Disorientation and discovery; Emotional reactivity; Enlightenment and insight; Estrangement and alienation; Ethical boundaries in therapy; Experience of reading a poem; Exploration of self; Expression and concealment; Fowles' "The Magus"; Genie metaphor; Gilbert's "The Answer"; Goldilocks metaphor; Human existential trajectory; Identity construction; Illusion of continuity; Individuality vs. collective unconscious; Intercostal nerves and pain; Interpersonal misunderstanding; Interpretation of symbols; Introspection and growth; Kabbalah and symbolism; Language as a cage; Language's role in suffering; Liberation magic; Life-defining tattoos; Linguistic clichés; Locked cell metaphor; Masson's "Final Analysis"; Merwin's trees; Misunderstanding as growth; Mystic union with God; Narrative construction; Neurological aspects of communication; Personal biases; Physical and mental isolation; Poetic inspiration; Potential for exploitation; Psychoanalytic dynamics; Ramanujan's trees; Recycled materials of past experiences; Relational nuances; Revelation of self-awareness; Rites of passage; Schiffer's character and influence; Self-awareness dawn; Semiotics of Hebrew letters; Silence and bliss; Social contexts; Spiritual symbolism; Stafford's "The Interior Castle"; Symbolic language complexity; Symbolic realm's labyrinth; Symbols interpretation; Tattoo as therapeutic act; Therapeutic boundaries; Transformation through language; Unraveling of human story; Vulnerability and humility.
[Transcript of episode]
View all episodes
By Free Association RadioAn episode inspired by Tadeusz Dąbrowski's poem "Sentence", Nick Flynn's "Tattoo" and Jack Gilbert's "The Answer":
SENTENCE
It's as if you'd woken in a locked cell and found
in your pocket a slip of paper, and on it a single sentence
in a language you don't know.
And you'd be sure this sentence was the key to your
life. Also to this cell.
And you'd spend years trying to decipher the sentence,
until finally you'd understand it. But after a while
you'd realize you got it wrong, and the sentence meant
something else entirely. And so you'd have two sentences.
Then three, and four, and ten, until you'd created a new language.
And in that language you'd write the novel of your life.
And once you'd reached old age you'd notice the door of the cell
was open. You'd go out into the world. You'd walk the length and
breadth of it,
until in the shade of a massive tree you'd yearn
for that one single sentence in a language you don't know.
TATTOO
You do know, right,
that between the no-
longer & the still-
to-come
you are being continually
tattooed, inked
with the skulls of
everyone
you’ve ever loved—the you
& the you
& the you & the you—you don’t
sit in a chair, thumb
through a binder, pick a
design, it simply
happens each time you
bring your fingers to your face
to inhale him back into you . . .
tiny skulls, some of us are
covered. You, love, could
simply tattoo an open
door, light
pouring in from somewhere
outside, you
could make your body a door
so it appears you
(let her fill you) are made
of light.
THE ANSWER
Is the clarity, the simplicity, an arriving
or an emptying out? If the heart persists
in waiting, does it begin to lessen?
If we are always good, does God lose track
of us? When I wake at night, there is
something important there. Like the humming
of giant turbines in the high-ceilinged stations
in the slums. There is a silence in me,
absolute and inconvenient. I am haunted
by the day I walked through the Greek village
where everyone was asleep and somebody began
playing Chopin, slowly, faintly, inside
the upper floor of a plain white stone house.
TOPICS COVERED: Alienation; Analytical preparation; Ashberry's trees; Authenticity; Birth and self-discovery; Boundaries of essence; Communication dynamics; Confinement vs. liberation; Consciousness; Contemplation of existence; Cosmic symbolism; Cultural backgrounds; Daily Mail controversy; Deciphering life's language; Developmental path; Disorientation and discovery; Emotional reactivity; Enlightenment and insight; Estrangement and alienation; Ethical boundaries in therapy; Experience of reading a poem; Exploration of self; Expression and concealment; Fowles' "The Magus"; Genie metaphor; Gilbert's "The Answer"; Goldilocks metaphor; Human existential trajectory; Identity construction; Illusion of continuity; Individuality vs. collective unconscious; Intercostal nerves and pain; Interpersonal misunderstanding; Interpretation of symbols; Introspection and growth; Kabbalah and symbolism; Language as a cage; Language's role in suffering; Liberation magic; Life-defining tattoos; Linguistic clichés; Locked cell metaphor; Masson's "Final Analysis"; Merwin's trees; Misunderstanding as growth; Mystic union with God; Narrative construction; Neurological aspects of communication; Personal biases; Physical and mental isolation; Poetic inspiration; Potential for exploitation; Psychoanalytic dynamics; Ramanujan's trees; Recycled materials of past experiences; Relational nuances; Revelation of self-awareness; Rites of passage; Schiffer's character and influence; Self-awareness dawn; Semiotics of Hebrew letters; Silence and bliss; Social contexts; Spiritual symbolism; Stafford's "The Interior Castle"; Symbolic language complexity; Symbolic realm's labyrinth; Symbols interpretation; Tattoo as therapeutic act; Therapeutic boundaries; Transformation through language; Unraveling of human story; Vulnerability and humility.
[Transcript of episode]