There is a word in Persian (Farsi), بغض (boghz), which encapsulates the physical knot felt just before crying or before letting out deep emotions, or the feeling of deep emotions accumulating in the chest or throat. In English we do not have such a word, or anything approximating it, perhaps because we are traditionally a culture of keeping things quiet, a silent seething or silent sadness chosen as the default rather than a more outward and expressive and vulnerable alternative—here I imagine more externally expressive and stereotypically passionate-sounding languages, like Italian and Spanish, the languages of places where perhaps proximity to the equator and a more constant warmth means that things just boil up and over more easily and naturally. This seems to be a trend, surely, that the colder the place the more contained the language?
I think a lot about the quantity of moments in a life when a person might choose to keep a tender or vulnerable feeling inside, rather than it being released, spoken, and I suppose that for each individual those moments might number hundreds, or thousands, or even multiple millions within a lifetime. Imagining all of those moments, like leaves that don’t ever get a chance to fall, and then the fact that each tree has an average of 200,000 leaves, which I guess means that most people would end up growing their own small forest of unspoken things.
This is actually one thing about trees, real ones, which is that they do in fact seem to say things. Walking in a forest isn’t really such a silent experience at all, although to me it most often feels appropriate to move as quietly as possible through one myself—as in stepping quietly, not brushing too loudly against leaves and the branches holding them, not scaring away or disturbing birds or other creatures that are going about their days and their business (using the word business here feels uncomfortable to me, because the rhythms of nature are the furthest thing from business in a skyscraper-making, keyboard-tapping, money-spewing, time-eating sense).
What seems to happen when stepped away of forests though is that many people do not feel safe enough to speak about those knotted, chest-throat feelings. Surely there is a great deal more strong feeling about worldly happenings than there appears to be, even more burying of unhappiness and stress than anybody cares to admit to? With the exception of the few who are powerful enough to make affecting decisions and who want things to stay fixed on the same wearied and destructive trajectory, surely everyone else is imagining inside during slow moments a more beautiful world—there must be a different way of doing this, all the knotted throats seem to say, there is more and there is less and we would be able to exist so much more contentedly, more gently, less at odds with the things that enable us to live and breathe at all.
It reminds me of being a small child, when one loud individual would designate themselves leader, instructing everyone else as to what games would happen, who would play what part, who was allowed to do which thing or play with any given toy. This is what it feels like, the general state of the planet: bossy and largely infantile individuals shouting at others and deciding what roles they are to play—not wanting to share, not wanting to tell the truth, not wanting to let anyone else take a turn—and then not enough of a group consensus or courage among those being bossed around to voice any ultimate discontent.
I’m certainly not anywhere close to letting all of my own discontents run wildly out into the ether, so conditioned have I been to exist as un-ruffling and convenient at all times. I do feel quite sure though that all of the old stories, all of the predictable advice, all of the proverbs and the dismissed wisdom of elders amounts to the right way forwards—not even necessarily answers, but ways to illuminate that which has forever been so obvious and yet so obscured, the wisdom and knowledge of indigenous people that was so violently smothered generously providing all along the anecdotes to the damage done.
Less damage, that is the thing I come back to all the time—when walking through the world it can be really hard to notice or find whatever is actively not damaging, whether to people or the landscapes. I’d like to do less damage, always, and there are so many tiny reminders of this possibility if you are paying attention: releasing the spider instead of stepping on it; taking the sparrow out of the dining room and holding it in the careful-specific way you’ve seen them do at wildlife sanctuaries; waiting a few extra moments before responding to a difficult question; taking less of what you don’t require; looking out for the people who need to be smiled at in the morning; and on, and on, and on.
WORK-RELATED NEWS:
As I alluded to in last week’s newsletter, a new book proposal is limbering up, currently being stretched through its second stage of refinement and editing. I don’t think I’m supposed to say much about it at this point, but there is significance in that next year will be ten years (!) since Lost in Translation was published, and the book that I’m hoping will see the light of day is a building on top of everything Lost in Translation tried to hold in its relatively small number of pages—it seems so long ago now.
(Illustrations below are from the proposal, and while they wouldn’t be final art they do give a sense of The Feeling of Things.)
I’m hoping that it will be a book which can help ease and make sense of the world we currently live in, provide nuanced and different ways of thinking about the landscapes, the interactions, what it means to be a human trying to navigate all of the information and feeling we are being avalanched by. Along with being visually lovely, and an interesting thing to return to, and a safe papery place to sit yourself for any amount of time.
Timelines in publishing are not a very predictable realm, and it’s also taken me quite a long while to feel ready and excited to a suitable degree for a new, full-length project. There is so much now, wherever you look, for however long you look—everything everywhere all the time loudly—and I’ve been conscious of not attempting another large, published project unless I can wholly feel good about the resources and space in the world it would take up. So, hopefully, more on this in the weeks and months to come.
THIS WEEK I FELL IN LOVE WITH:
Paintings by Leanne Xiu Williams, who lives and works on Gadigal land (Sydney).
A dear friend of mine, Lauren Crux, recently published a book, Difficult Beauty: Rambles, Rants, and Intimate Conversations, which is available in the US via Bookshop or through local bookstores. The book pairs full-colour images from a long standing photography practice with beautiful musings that initially started as a mail art project, and is described as “A visual and contemplative balm to the spirit”.
“The language here is sheer poetry, but these are not meant to be read as poems.” — Camille Dungy, author of Trophic Cascade
From the book:
#62
Last night I asked my dreams for help.
I dreamt a bunch of chickens were stabbing
at a banana peel to get to the fruit inside.
Sometimes dreams can be so mean.
If I lose sight of the shore, if a fire rages
uncontrolled, if I forget that I will never figure out how to live, what then do I need to know to live?
Years ago at a local Irish pub, I went to the bar for a glass of water.
There was a rough-edged man, drunk and a bit crazy, sitting there talking to his voices. As I stood next to him he turned to me and growled, I just don’t know, I just don’t know. With a clarity and compassion that surprised us both, I looked at him and said,
I just don’t know either.
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Paid supporters receive several additional posts each month, including short stories, previously archived writings, and more detailed looks into creative processes. Last Unseen Season is the latest of these paid posts, and an excerpt of this essay is readable below:
Thank you for ALL of this. Oh, how we all know that lump-in-the-throat feeling that aches to break open and spill itself over. And yes to your new paintings...bursting with rich color. If that knot in our throat were to burst that is what the feelings would look like.
I can’t begin to express how much I felt seen and heard reading this newsletter...have always deeply admired your words and art but this one particularly struck a chord during a time when I am struggling to articulate the feelings you talk about. Thank you for the gift of the way you express and share with others