Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Everything Under

The title "Language Body" posted May 11th is still in "working" status. A bunch of the subtitles with separate entries are similar sounding--partially intentional, but not intended to confuse. I appreciate any comments.

Monday, May 18, 2009

THE LANGUAGE BODY


SIX HOLY WORDS

If you conduct a Google map search under satellite view and enter the coordinates: 32.909982,97.04612, somewhere in the vast nowhere of China, you will see a satellite photograph of six Tibetan Sanskrit characters that have been repeatedly carved into a frozen lake. If you walk through the streets of Tibet, you will find this mantra as a visual motif—embellishing the work of metalsmiths and on the walls as sacred graffitti. The characters embody such magnetism that I tattooed them in a wrap around my left forearm . They are considered to be six holy words or syllables to the Tibetan Buddhists. And while uttered—whether they are written, spoken, or heard—it is thought to produce a powerful effect that radiates in ripples throughout the universe. The phrase can be transliterated as Om Mani Padme Hum—“the Jewel in the Lotus.” It is a mantra dedicated to the deity of compassion, Avalokiteshvara. It may also be broken down by each symbol/syllable: Om = mediation; ma = patience; ni = discipline; pad = wisdom; me = generosity; and hum = diligence.

When my arm was still healing from the fresh tattoo, I stood in front of some bulk spinach in the produce section at an East Village market.

“That’s in my language,” said an employee of the market, who happened to be Tibetan.

“What?” I asked.

He repeated himself while pointing to my left forearm, “The only ones who know the meaning of this are the Buddhist monks who repeat it all the time.” He said, “All I know is it’s, ‘six holy words.” Or more precisely the root syllables from which they are constructed. This linking of roots is fundamental in the Sanskrit language. It is precisely the practice of repetition and correct pronunciation that gives any mantra its charge.

As a poet, I was drawn to the idea that these words not only express symbolism, but the words’ sounds and characters embody power within themselves. Over this past summer I took a course in music therapy as part of the Creative Arts Therapy Certificate Program. As a yoga instructor, I was looking for alternative and holistic ways to practice and promote overall health and enrichment. Around this time I met a photographer who was interested in taking portraits of individuals after reading a prayer. We both knew there was something expressive on the face when words affect people. I had been reading The Music of Life by Hazrat Inayat Khan and began to see how the vibration of sound and words affect the body and, arguably, the cosmos. As Carl Sagan said, “We are a way for the cosmos to know itself.” With all this in mind I suggested, “What if we conduct a project where people chant different mantras over an extended period of time while taking photographs of them throughout?”

So we began the project and both the chanter and the photographer were visibly altered in their energy levels and overall appearance. My yoga teacher training was with the Samarya Center for Integrated Movement Therapy and Ashtanga Yoga and the founders, my instructors, were both clinicians—one a speech pathologist—who had documented the effects of chanting on severely depressed individuals. After chanting for several weeks, the subjects showed improved respiratory function and general mood as both an immediate result and over an extended period of time. And without knowing this in the past, I was able to experience these effects as well. It is evident that there is a visible change when using the body to make these sounds.

SANSKRIT

Sanskrit saṃskṛtā vāk or Sanskrta, means, “well put together” or “language brought to formal perfection” (Devavani, Houston 3). This definition does not merely express some form of ethnocentrism, or I might call it linguacentrism, but it refers to the language as a cultivated “technology of sound that was systematically applied to language and phonetics.” It bears close resemblance to the Greek and Latin in its roots of verbs and grammatical forms (Paul 48). Sanskrit is the closest thing to a derivative language from which the major modern language groups in the West have developed—

what linguists call Proto-Indo-European (Paul 46).

Although primarily a “language of prayer”—one that comprises words describing spiritual experiences and concepts that no other language does—it has been chosen as the “perfect language” transferable to computer comprehension, hence used for Artificial Intelligence. With its case and tense endings, it is “the only unambiguous spoken language on the planet” in terms of its mathematical precision. “By the endings added onto nouns or verbs, there is an obvious determination of the precise interrelationship of words describing activity of persons and things in time and space, regardless of word order” (Houston 6). NASA researcher, Rick Briggs wrote an article in AI Magazine stating that the syntax and semantics of Sanskrit is compatible with the essence and form necessary for “transmitting logical data” in Artificial Intelligence and computer processing (Houston 3).

The Sanskrit alphabet consists of 49 basic sounds. Each letter is individually distinguished by the tongue position and the location and degree of resonance in the mouth and body. The “key component [to speaking Sanskrit] is pronunciation” and the “use of the whole mouth” (Paul 49). There are five distinct mouth positions: (1) guttural (throat); (2) palatal (hard palate); (3) cerebral (where the arch rising behind the upper teeth reaches the roof); (4) dental (behind the upper teeth) and (5) labial (lips). These become important when we discuss the physiological effects of stimulating these locations. In comparison to other languages, Sanskrit is unique in that it requires the speaker to pay special attention to articulating sound and direction of breath in a way that stimulates clear thinking and practice in speaking deliberately. “It is arranged on a thoroughly scientific method, the simple vowels (short and long) coming first, then the complex vowels (dipthongs), followed by the consonants in uniform groups according to the organs of speech with which they are pronounced (Houston 6). The combinations and linking of sounds are produced under strict grammatical laws that prevent the flow from interruption so that the fusion of words and verse becomes euphonic. For example, to greet another person, asking “How are you?” in Spanish, one might say “¿Cómo está?” whereas in Tagalog—a main language of the Philippines greatly influenced by the Spanish—one would say “Kumusta ka?” in which the sounds are similar, but merge to create a rolling effect. In the French, it is similar to the function of a liaison. In Sanskrit, when word boundaries seal together, the term for this is sandhi, where the pronunciation will alter depending on what sounds most harmonious. For instance, Namah te “I bow to you,” becomes Namaste.

In Saṃskṛtā vāk, vāk, more or less translates to “word” in English, but in Sanskrit it refers to the Goddess Vāk or Saraswati. Vāk distinguishes the word as “the power of command” and Saraswati (sr – “to go, “to flow” swati – “auspicious,” also a river in India) is “the Goddess of the endless stream of wisdom” (Frawley 14). Saraswati also represents beginnings and inspiration, which I will use interchangeably as a synonym for inhalation. In a language where words are thought to carry creative capacity, it suits it to be named after this deity because speaking and living require inspiration. Essentially, speakers of the Sanskrit language view it as a powerful and graceful vital force.

The syllable om is considered by some to be the most universal sound and similar sounds form cadences for various prayers, greetings or blessings like amen for Christians or As-Salāmu `Alaykum for Muslims. The sound om is divided into three (or four) parts in a cycle, each represented by the trimurti (three most important gods of Hindu mythology): “A” - Brahma, the creator; “U” - Vishnu, the preserver; and “M” - Shiva, the destroyer; lastly there is an essential silence that indicates the space (akasha) from which all things emerge and to which they dissolve and return. Each god is usually depicted with their respective consorts: Saraswati, Lakshmi, and Kali. Without the consort, the god is powerless as their feminine counterparts awaken their energies or potential.

The practice of Nada Yoga is complementary to this idea of sound as a flow of currents. The word nada means “a loud sounding or droning or rushing,” or “currents of sound” and refers to linguistic or nonlinguistic sounds “that exist in the human body and in the universe. Nada Yoga offers an internal experience of sound frequencies by means of meditation, induced by the external experience sound of vocal and instrumental music” (Paul 118).

“According to Yoga and Sankhya (branch of Indian philosophy) systems, sound is the root of all other sensory potentials.” The sound of the language is meant to “take us back from our gross sounds to their idea content” then “to the perception they represent.” Potentially, if the speaker energizes the sound appropriately over time, then the sound becomes the meaning. This makes more sense when we discuss verbal mimicry as onomatopoeia and frequencies. This is what the Tibetan man at the market was talking about. He could have given me an English translation such as the one I have provided here, but the meaning is not understood until it is physically felt when uttered. Hence the only ones who know the meaning of the words are the ones who repeat it as mantra.

I choose Sanskrit as a topic of discussion, not only because it is the “oldest” traceable language, but also it is a poetic language—inherently embodying elements of rhythm in the meter it is spoken, rhyme, repetition, assonance and so forth. It is as though it were mathematically devised for something beyond Artificial Intelligence. It is ideal for expressing beauty and has an ability to convey and move through its use of poetry.

WAVE BEHAVIOR

In order to understand the mode of this language, we must move away from the definitive approach of the English language to a more perceptual approach of understanding the meaning behind universal sounds. “Apart from the meaning a word has, even the sound of the syllables can bring about a good result or a disastrous result” (Khan 271). Hazrat Inayat Khan, a former master of classical Persian music, was told by his teacher to share an Eastern attitude toward the power of the spoken word to the West.

In the ancient languages words were formed by intuition […] words that have come purely by intuition and that form a language which is an action and reaction of man’s experience of life are more powerful than the words of the languages we speak today. Thus they have a greater power when repeated, and a great phenomenon is produced when a person has mastered those words. Every vowel has its psychological significance [as] the composition of every word has a chemical and psychological significance. The yogis use special words that they repeat in the morning or in the evening, and by this they reach a certain illumination or come to a certain state of exaltation (240).


These special words compose mantras. Mantra is a Sanskrit word—the root manas, signifies the “linear, thinking mind” and tram means, “to protect, free or deliver.” Thus, mantras are “sonic formulae” that alter one’s consciousness to “take us beyond, or through the discursive faculties of the mind” (Paul 48). Hindu texts from the 3rd and 4th centuries A.D., claim that a person who chants mantra can apprehend what “cannot be seen,” “impart strength” and “remove doubt” and “leads to inference of an entire matter when only a part of it is seen” (Paul 47). Each mantra is an instrument designed for a particular purpose. Japa is the repetition of these mantras often with the use of japa malas or meditation/prayer beads that are similar to rosary beads, but used in Hindu and Buddhist traditions. Typically, they comprise 108 (or a sum divisible of 108) beads. A meditator will repeat a given mantra for each bead up to any number of cycles of 108 times. Not only are the mantras themselves repeated to increase their power, but the sounds and syllables within them reoccur as if to strike the same chord to sustain its resonance. Repetition also serves to help the speaker “realize” what is said. The following are a few common mantras that illustrate this repetition in the form of roots and vowel sounds:

Asato Ma Sat Gamaya

Tamaso Ma Jyotir Gamaya

Mrityor Maamritam Gamaya


“Let us be led from the unreal to the Real / From darkness to the Light / From mortality to Eternity.” This mantra illustrates the recurrence of various syllables such as “ma,” “sat,” and “rit” as well as a reversal of these such as “ma/am” and “rit/tir.” One might say that these words are anagrams flowing in and out of each other. Manorama, a New York Sanskrit Studies teacher says, “meaning is a function of repetition.” As one chants, the overall feeling precedes the manifestation of the words.

This form is similar to the Gayatri mantra,

oṃ bhūr bhuvaḥ svaḥ

(a) tat savitur vareṇyaṃ

(b) bhargo devasya dhīmahi

(c) dhiyo yo naḥ prachodayāt


Swami Vivekanand translates this to mean, "'We meditate on the glory of that Being who has produced this universe; may He enlighten our minds.' Om is joined to it at the beginning and the end." Gayatri is personified also as a goddess that symbolizes the trimurti as one. This form is composed with eight syllables in the first line, eight or nine in the second, and eight in the last. The phrasing intends to meter out the breath as well so that the thread that holds things together or sutra is an aphoristic formula composed in a concise way for memory retention as these mantras initially were learned only orally.

From this mantra we can see which root is most emphatic.

Om Purnamadah Purnamidam

Purnat Purnamudachyate

Purnasya Purnamadaya

Purnameva Vashsihate


“That is whole. This is whole / From the whole the whole becomes manifest. / From the whole when the whole is negated / What remains is again the whole.” This chant almost visually seems to refer to itself. If we omit the various endings or even a word, the whole of it seems to remain. And another common chant, Om Shantih Shantih Shantih or “Om Peace Peace Peace.”

It seems repetition is a practice common throughout different cultures and religions. “Once we have uttered a sound, we take pleasure in repeating it. We find repetition in magic spells, in solemn oaths, in orations, in ads, as well as in the speech noises a baby makes for its own pleasure.” A poem may also use repetition for whatever its desired effect. Some forms may even call for repeating words, lines, phrases, rhyme scheme and so forth. “When a sound is clearly struck in a poem, it tends to attract similar sounds” when using assonance, consonance, rhyme, or alliteration (Nims 158).

Many agree that chanting mantra is a powerful tool used to heal the body. Dr. David Simon of neurological services at Sharp Cabrillo Hospital has found that “healing chants are chemically metabolized into endogenous opiates that are both internal painkillers as well as healing agents in the body” (Gaynor 18). Khan states, “modern science has discovered [...] that on certain plates the impression of sound can be made clearly visible. In reality the impression of sound falls clearly on all objects, only it is not always visible.” All manifestations are audible first, then visible and “all we see in this objective world, every form, has been constructed by sound and is the phenomenon of sound…. every syllable has a certain effect” (Khan 268).

These “certain plates” refer to experiments conducted by Hans Jenny (1904 – 1972) was a Swiss physician, who founded cymatics (the Greek root kyma means “wave”)—a field of study that refers to the “visual representation of the relationship” between “sound and form.” In his experiments, he used pure tones or “simple sine-wave vibrations within the human auditory range” in order to move materials such as “powders, pastes, and liquids into lifelike, flowing forms that mirrored patterns found throughout nature, art, and architecture” (Paul 12).

Among other phenomena, light and sound demonstrate their presence in the form of waves. A wave is “an oscillatory disturbance that moves away from the source and transports matter over large distances.” Our senses are receptors for perceiving various frequencies of vibrations. Radio waves are the lowest, then microwaves, then light waves all the way to U.V. rays to x-rays. Ancient Indian Rishis were like synesthetes whose faculties of sight and hearing became cross-wired as they “saw” and “heard” mantras, Mantra Dhrista, in their meditations. Therefore perceiving sound waves as light waves and vice versa. We can only perceive a small range of these frequencies through various instruments and measuring devices, but no matter what the frequency, these forms are manifestations of sound vibration. Although the human ear can only perceive a limited range of frequencies as tones, we often still sense waves that are beyond our auditory range. And the fact that a wave “moves away from the source,” or the speaker in the case of speech, and “transports matter over large distances” could hypothetically explain why one might utter a mantra and the effect can be far reaching. Thus, a person who chants mantra actually believes that the words spoken have the power to create an intended reality—in essence, generating and shaping sounds to create physical forms or affect existing ones (Paul 12). John Frederick Nims, who wrote, Western Wind: An Introduction to Poetry, says that “we can think of words as having not only a mind (their meanings) but also a body—the structure of sound in which their meaning lives” (151).

SOUND SHAPES FORM

“Words above everything else, are in poetry, sounds.” – Wallace Stevens


The importance of this esoteric language moves beyond the scope of its technical mastery. The impact of words is not merely based on the meaning behind them, rather the spoken words are perceived as “creative living things” that “penetrate to the essence of what they describe. They give birth to meaning” (Houston 5). The primary stuff of the universe is vibratory, hence sonic in nature. It is the creative power of the word that initiates many creation stories across cultures. The book of Genesis reads, “In the beginning was the Word; the Word was with God, and the Word was God.” And later in John 1:14, “And the Word became flesh, and dwelt among us.” In the Bible, God only had to say, "Let there be light"; and there was light. Figuratively, the “light” is the illuminating power of the word—distinguishing objects and articulating “what is/truth” in a realm of “darkness” or ignorance and lack of communication. Similarly, at the opening of the Hindu Rg Veda’s creation hymn, Nasadiya, where “There was neither non-existence nor existence.” Everything was water and “the life force” known as prana or breath “was covered with emptiness,” but “that one arose” from the tapas or “the power of heat” and:

4 Desire came upon that one in the beginning; that was the first seed of mind. Poets [Kavi designates a poet or saint] seeking in their heart with wisdom found the bond of existence in non-existence.

5 Their cord [bond or a kind of measuring cord by which the poets delimit—and hence create the elements] was extended across. Was there below? Was there above? There were seed-placers; there were powers. There was impulse beneath; there was giving-forth above.


The initial “seed of mind” was the Desire to create something out of nothing. It is from “the desire of Poets” that any distinguishing features of life arose.

According to the developing scientific field of string theory, “the entire universe may be made up of infinitesimally small subatomic strands of energy vibrating at different frequencies” (Paul 121).

A SOUND BODY

Many ancient cultures viewed physical illness as a lack of harmony in the body; they used sound and music to restore this natural condition. A “sound body” literally produces harmonious music (Paul 10). Russill Paul claims that “sound is powerfully linked to our feelings; it causes our cells and tissues to vibrate, activating a range of experience far beyond what the sound can heal on a cellular and physiological level” (Paul 10). “The hard and soft palates are a blueprint of the body’s nervous system. Sound yogis use this knowledge to manipulate the body’s spiritual channels in much the same way that a reflexologist uses the hands and feet to stimulate the body’s meridians” There are at least 64 meridian points on the hard palate, and 20 on the soft. “Stimulating these points, especially through the rich phonetics of Sanskrit, affects powerful changes in the pituitary gland and the hypothalamus, which govern our immune system, our emotions and our moods. This is why medical research continues to confirm the assertion that chanting produces beneficial chemicals in the body, releasing ‘feel-good’ hormones and endorphins, the body’s natural painkillers.” Paul says that “chanting yogic mantras particularly in Sanskrit,” also “stimulates the vagus nerve, which is situated near the jaw and is considered to be the single most important nerve in the body; it services the heart, lungs, intestinal tract, and back muscles” (Paul 48). In addition, Khan iterates this great effect on the human body “the whole mechanism, the muscles, the blood circulation, the nerves are all moved by the power of vibration. As there is resonance for every sound, so the human body is a living resonator for sound….[It] has an effect on each atom of the body, for each atom resounds. On all glands, on the circulation of the blood, and on pulsation sound has an effect” (Khan 269).

We are “instruments of flesh and bone” with the greater portion of our brains concerned with the mouth and hands (Nims 151). And we know that “sound is ‘heard’ not only through our ears but through every cell in our body,” so that “vibration touches every part of our physical being” (Gaynor 17). Mitchell L. Gaynor, M.D., author of Sounds of Healing: A Physician Reveals the Therapeutic Power of Sound, Voice, and Music says, “the rhythm of poetry can entrain our voices and be felt in the entire body (Gaynor 17). Entrainment is a phenomenon illustrated in this classic example of two or more metronomes or pendulums beating at different rhythms in the same room. At some point, they will synchronize with each other. This also tends to happen with the rate of respiration of people in the same room. Poetic and musical rhythm can provide a controlled space for creative expression and relaxation. This rhythm also allows people who have problems articulating speech, such as stuttering, to entrain to a song so that they can sing it. People with limited control over motor function are able to keep a beat on a drum and mirror a facilitator who is playing with them. Oliver Sacks says, “for people who have motor problems, music acts as a catalyst. Hearing a beat can be enough to carry a person from thinking to moving. (Gaynor 87). Beth Israel Medical Center in Manhattan has an entire program called the Louis Armstrong Center for Music and Medicine “to complement medical treatment for children, teens and adults with asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).” One of the therapist/musicians uses wind instruments to help improve the heart and respiratory rates with patients who have these chronic diseases.

LYRICALLY FELT

After WWII, music and sound became recognized as a legitimate medium for therapy in the West. It was a successful approach for physical, mental and emotional conditions of wounded servicemen. There was a clear result in “decreased depression, greater socialization, enhanced morale, increased emotional expression, and improved contact with reality” (Gaynor 77).

The advantage of sound and music is that it bypasses analytical thought. Instead of taking a scenic route through receptors and electrical impulses to the brain, it directly affects the emotions and nerves. Instead of explaining a feeling to someone’s rational mind, the use of sound vibrates our cells and tissues, “activating a range of experience far beyond what the eyes are capable of perceiving by themselves.” The perceptions of the ear are “ten times more accurate” than the eye. Humans can hear “between 16 and 20,000 Hz” and “can register sounds that spread across a greater dynamic range, than the eye can perceive without damage” (Paul 8 and 118). Perhaps when we become better listeners and more receptive to our surrounding sounds, we can find ways to use sound to our advantage. Here are some ways that music can change physiology:

Mark Rider Southern Methodist University found that sound has an influence on protective cells of the immune system, which fight invading pathogens and perform the task of regenerating injured tissues.
Dr. Jeffrey Thompson California Inst. for Human Science Center for Neuro-Acoustic Research uses sound frequencies to treat learning disabilities and a wide range of physical disorders.
40 patients who suffered heart attacks showed reduced anxiety, heart and respiratory rates decrease when they had been exposed to “relaxing music” -lowered systolic blood pressure
Reduced blood pressure and heart rate, systolic and diastolic blood pressure
Conversely noise can initiate fight or flight response and increase blood pressure by 10%
1993 MSU scientist- found levels of interleukin-1 (an immune cell messenger molecule that helps regulate the activity of other immune cells) increase 12.5 to 14% when subjects listened to music they preferred
25% lower level of cortisol – a stress hormone that can depress immune system
when produced in excess

Boost in natural opiates. Opiate chemicals induce sense of joy mediated by
endorphins- the brain’s natural pain killer makes for stronger immunity

(Paul 80 – 82)

POETRY IS ANOTHER FORM OF MUSIC

Based on the frequencies within sounds, we could devise a vowel scale much like a musical scale in which the “vowels are like musical notes and chords.” The high frequency sounds will have shorter waves, hence a higher frequency of waves per second. This increase in activity gives the ear more information to process, which “suggests greater vitality, speed, littleness and excitement” (Nims 155). So shortwave sounds are shrill like the ee of a whiny “please,” or complaining “geez!” The pronunciation of this vowel requires the tongue to rise slightly and the mouth opens narrowly in order to restrict the amount of passing air.

Conversely, lower frequencies create slower and deeper sounds consisting of longer waves occurring fewer times per second. For example, “when a 78 rpm record is slowed down to the 33 1/3 (LP) speed” the record will have a deep downtempo sound. A low-frequency sound could be the oo like a deep “lagoon” or the slow-minded “buffoon.” These sounds remind us of largeness and great volume with slow vibrations. “Avalanches and stormy seas have deeper reverberations than hailstones on the roof.” Likewise, a bass has longer strings and a larger cavity than a violin, thus reverberates deeper (Nims 157).

Therefore, we can determine the resonance of a vowel sound depending on the size and shape of the bodily cavities in which the vowels resound. “The larger the hollow in which a vowel sound vibrates, the deeper the sound and the more clearly our nerves and muscles tell us that we ourselves are embodying largeness, hollowness, darkness” (157 Nims). Our body tries to emulate the feeling of largeness by producing the sound ah, which emerges from the whole space of the mouth— “a large resonating chamber near the brain.” And just as our voices mimic the sounds of what they see, the patterns and shapes we see in nature are physical constructions of “vibrating entities, each with a different frequency and wavelength.” The size and speed at which an object vibrates contributes to its particular sound” (Paul 121). In essence, a sound’s energy organizes shapes the forms that we perceive with our eyes. Biologist Rupert Sheldrake calls these “organizing principles ‘morphogenetic fields’—blueprints that organize matter and energy into their final intended forms” (Paul 12). Perhaps the intelligence of vibration that organizes the radial growth of a fern is the same principle that determines the growth pattern of a starfish. There is an overall visual pulsation when we look at other natural forms such as fractals. It is also possible for the sound of a poem to dictate its form.

Language can be euphonious, both pleasant to hear and to pronounce—involving muscular activity. “Eurhythmics is the art of moving our body in harmony with music or the spoken word; euphony might be thought of as oral eurhythmics.” This uninterrupted flow, the rhythmic nature, the combination and sequencing of sounds in a poem can be similar in form and effect as that of mantra. Its opposite is, “cacophony, the harsh or inharmonious use of language—harsh to listen to because harsh to pronounce,” (Nims 188) but these lines in poetry may also please us because of their effect on meaning. In Jenny’s plate experiments, we see that the harmonious pure tones shaped matter into beautiful geometric forms whereas dissonance created chaotic formless matter. Similar to the effect of dissonance, ultrasound products keep pests out of homes because these vibrations have a negative affect on their nervous systems. These frequencies are so powerful that ultrasonic weaponry has been actively used and researched by the U.S. military:

[The U.S. military] has recently developed the loudest sound in history—ten thousand times louder than the sound of a space shuttle taking off—to detect the presence of submarines in our territorial waters. This Low Frequency Active (LFA) sonar technology is known to cause fatal brain hemorrhaging in whales and dolphins, not to mention its effects on human divers (Paul 13).


However, this destructive capacity in anything is necessary and not necessarily negative—just as the role of “the destroyers,” Shiva and Kali to Hindu mythology. For instance, the Lithotripter is a medical machine developed in Germany that can dissolve gallstones and kidney stones without surgery by bombarding them with sound waves (Paul 13). Also, expressions like a moan, groan, or scream can cause a release just as a hum can calm.

BODY AND LANGUAGE

“The reason poets like to unite sound and sense speaks not merely for the brain but for the whole human being, body and mind” (Nims 179). Nims claims that when the sound complements the sense, “the meaning of a poem becomes physicalized” resisting “the authoritarianism of the intellect,” which races to assert a meaning on sound regardless of its nature. “This figure of speech, far from being the exclusive property of academics, is really best understood by people who live physically, in their bodies” (Nims 175). “Appropriate sound invites the body to participate in the being of a poem, just as the poet’s body participated in its creation” (Nims 179). The poem is a physical body itself and is energized by the speaker. In a literal way, the breath of the poet, the speaker, and the listener all enable the poem to manifest in space. And paying attention to the “quality of individual sounds,” one can “participate more completely, or physically, in the experience of the poem” (Nims 159). In this way, the sounds can simulate the desired effect. Even when we read silently, the speech mechanisms and “areas of the throat pick up electrical currents,” showing that the muscles are stimulated. The body will sympathize with what the mind experiences. We know that colors can affect us physically. For instance, “pure red can raise blood pressure and accelerate heartbeat, whereas fixing the eyes on pure blue can have a tranquilizing effect,” so the effects of sound may be no less visceral (153 Nims).

In his book Lyric Poetry: the pain and the pleasure of words, Mutlu Blasing explains that, sound and “language is emotionally charged because it has to be acquired” (13). The ear is the first organ to develop in utero and the last faculty to fade as we die (Paul 14). Even anesthesia or a coma does not block auditory input (Gaynor 87). In the 1960s, researchers found that the ear is fully evolved at 4 ½ months old and hearing may occur much earlier. The fetus is able to hear a wide range of low-frequency sounds (Gaynor 91).

Although their specific characteristics vary, every culture socializes its infants with language by teaching them “to hear and communicate emotion and thus intentionaliz[ing] acoustic and muscular phenomena.” Verbal mimicry of natural sounds are thought to “account for the origin of language.” We see this when comic book illustrations convey action, and at some point in our lives we have called an object by its corresponding sound (like cricket, slush, or the boom of fireworks) .The chosen combination of consonants and vowels reveals an object’s intrinsic quality. “Beyond simple onomatopoeia,” there have been named “two subtly appropriate classes of words: those in which movement of lips, tongue, and cheek, together with suggestive sound, simulate the action described and those in which sounds are not imitative, but suggestive musical equivalents” (Nims 178). “But learning language is both an emotional training and a physiological disciplining of the organic body,” in which we control “oral muscular activity” in order to produce articulate sounds in a linguistic code or “recognizable phonemes.” As we develop, we must isolate different “noises produced in the larynx” as a response to “auditory and multimedia reception” then we interpret these blocks of code into “symbolic value.” Our use of linguistic code threads the gross body to “symbolic language. The oral zone is a sexually charged zone because it functions as a tool of survival and sustenance. Infants are “seduced into discipline” by becoming an individual who is socialized into a “crux of pain and pleasure.”

Poetry formally returns to that crux, to the emotionally charged history of the disciplining and seduction into language; it affirms the seductions of laws and the pleasures of discipline, always keeping in view the alien code and the pain of language.

And the lyric is grounded not on the body but on its history, which is what we hear in the materiality of lyric language. Poetic language reveals that machinery and the constitutive alienation of the “human,” as bodily produced events are “meta-phore” or translated into signifying units and come to circulate as social currency (Blasing 13).


We express lyrically in order to exchange or convey a physical experience of life—a way for speaking people to resonate with a shared experience.

ODE TO THE EAR

“The ear, in ancient cultures, was associated with the conch shell, which also resembles the gateway to the female reproductive organs. The ear is feminine and soul-like because of its receptive, deep, interior, mysterious qualities” (Paul 8). Dr. Alfred A. Tomatis, a French medical doctor and philosopher, discovered that learning problems often stem from listening problems. The voice can reflect the ear’s ability to hear, a phenomenon known as the Tomatis Effect (Paul 209). Tomatis found that voice only contains harmonics the ear is likely to hear. When working with factory employees

who had poor speech articulation and opera singers whose own voices had damaged their hearing he, found that there is a way to bring the ear back into homeostasis. There is even a method of simulating sounds similar to those we hear in the womb in order to ground hearing to an infant state. Music like that of Mozart or Gregorian chants have charging sounds that “nourish” the brain with a large range of frequencies, hence a greater number of vibrations (Gaynor 95). These rhythms reflect own physiological rhythms when we are in calm relaxed states.

The ear also is responsible for informing the brain and body, as well as our ability to balance—managing our sense of equilibrium. “It is the only human sense organ able to perceive both numerical quantity and numerical value. For instance, not only can the ear recognize numerical proportions in music, as in the octave I:2 or the fifth 2:3; but at the same time it can hear values that it perceives as specific notes: C,G,F, and so on. In other words, the element of sensing (the tone) is fused with the element of thinking (the numerical proportion.)” (Paul 8). The ear is a primary organ for multiple physical, emotional, and neurological development responses.

As a poet I am interested in the essential sound of poetry—the resonance of its words in the body, how it echoes in the cavities of our souls and how the words haunt us as our lives revolve. We encounter each new situation, sometimes with a lingering message and a recurring rhythm in our individual heartbeats, drawing us toward the poetry of others—our bodies in conversation. Our lives drafted and revised and sometimes sung.

Is language just for conveying ideas or does the sound count? Can it create a feeling within your being that you could not possibly declare in everyday speech? Often some say “There are no words to explain.” or “A picture is worth a thousand words.” However, a painting or photograph may just be another frequency of vibrations that our eyes receive in the form of light wavelengths, but the depiction of colors composed is synonymous to the linking of iambs in a poem. The relation of space to substance and composition to thought is relative. Poetry enables us to use language in an unconventional way and break through everyday speech or the conditioned ways of writing in order to paint with words. We could analyze a painting and ask, “what is the meaning of the relationship between this object in the foreground and that in the background and what is the purpose of this choice of palette or why this choice of medium?” But these questions sometimes take us farther away from what is initially felt. Or perhaps the feeling deepens when we investigate the smaller movements within a work—recognizing brushstrokes or noticing Jackson Pollock’s frantic handprints buried under splatters of paint.

“A poem comes to us first as speech, on sound waves that register as barometric changes against the drums and gauges of the ear, an apparatus so sensitive it takes notice if the pressure against it varies by 1 part in 10 billion. Johann Gottfriend von Herder said, ‘A breath of the mouth becomes a picture of the world...everything that man has ever thought and willed depends on a moving breath of air’” (152 Nims).


And the breath is both the sustainer and impetus behind each action and movement—the act of birth, speech, experience of the natural world. It determines the difference between feeling small and spacious. When breath is shallow and lung capacity decreases, the world immediately shrinks and our existence loses significance. It marks the end of life in our bodies. The materials and the words we leave behind make a liaison with the earth and all of its surrounding elements. Whether in thought, written or spoken, the record of our poetry can resonate into the future as its sounds carry a life of its own.




Sources


Blasing, Mutlu Konuk. Lyric Poetry: the pain and the pleasure of words. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, c2007.


Coulson, Michael. Teach Yourself Sanskrit. Chicago: McGraw Hill, 2006.


Devavani The Language of the Gods: A collection of essays, articles, and quotes on Sanskrit. New York: The American Sanskrit Institute.


Gaynor, Mitchell L. M.D. Sounds of Healing: A Physician Reveals the Therapeutic Power of Sound, Voice, and Music. New York: Broadway Books, 1999.


Kenny, Molly, M.S. C.C.C.-S.L.P., C.Y.T., Raphael Bernier, Ph.C., and Carey DeMartini, M.A. “Chant and Be Happy: The Effects of Chanting on Respiratory Function and General Well-Being in Individuals Diagnosed with Depression.” International Journal of Yoga Therapy, No. 15 (2005): 61-64.


Khan, Hazrat Inayat. The Music of Life: The Inner Nature and Effects of Sound. New Lebanon: Omega Publications, 2005.


Manorama, “Apah: The fluidity of life” (workshop, Sankalpah Yoga, NY, NY, February10, 2009).


--. “Fundamentals of Yoga.” (workshop, Virayoga, NY, NY, February 24, 2009).


--. “Chant to Kundalini, Feel Pulsation.” (workshop, Lucky Lotus, NY, NY, March 04, 2009).


--. “Vishuddha Chakra & Saraswati Ma/ Saraswati Devi: Sanskrit Language of Vibration, Virayoga, NY, NY, March 24, 2009).


Matthews, P.H. Linguistics: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003.


Mishra, Ramamurti S. M.D. Nada Yoga: The Science, Psychology & Philosophy of Anahata Nada Yoga, 3rd ed. New York: Baba Bhagavandas, 2007.


Nims, John Frederick and David Mason. Western Wind: An Introduction to Poetry, 4th ed. Boston: McGraw Hill, 1999.


Paul, Russill. The Yoga of Sound: Tapping the Hidden Power of Music and Chant. Novato: New World Library, 2004.


Perrine, Laurence and Thomas R. Arp. Sound and Sense: An Introduction to Poetry, 8th ed. New York: Harcourt Brace, 1991.

Monday, May 11, 2009

Sunday, May 3, 2009

the smallest sumatran


after
a new elephant walks
aptly as infant mammalia
arrive in self-awareness
eager with teeth and tusks
digging earth
and automatic heaviness
transporting robust grace
under her mother
over another
grazing
bathing
in an estuary zoo
to zimbabwe
and the smallest sumatran
in circus
warfare
sri lanka bulk
jaipur mud sun
grey forest and grassland
exposed soles
lie down
injured unless indian
crush watermelon
on a four-pendulum gait
always one foot on the ground
without aerial phases
marked by grief and making music
the art of altruism, and allomothering
play
use of tools
compassion
bellow roar and trumpet
across the alps
in high-quality captivity
keepers
handlers
teenagers attack
in an unexpected bout of rage