A Conceivable Word

Perhaps it's the poetry kick I'm on. Perhaps it's remnants of a GRE test I did quite well on. Perhaps, as an old friend would venture to say, it's my obsession with big words that I want to mean what they actually don't. With either of those options withstanding, I've got a new word.

Several times in the past week I've come across the noun cathedral. Most of you will know that word and what it represents. In these instances I've heard the word used, I've got to understand what it means(I readily admit that much of my enthusiasm for the word might come from my sentimentality towards Catholicism).

The first use of the word that struck my fancy was on this blog by another old friend who frequents this site as well. I was awed by the phrase: I am a little church(no great cathedral). At my urging, she posted on the origins of the phrase, from this e e cummings poem (I'm still not sure why cummings' name is always lowercase). It's a great poem, it really is. I see something new in it each time I go over it.

The second reference this week came this morning in church. Our pastor was speaking on the Sabbath. His sermon was titled "The Sabbath: A Cathedral in Time." He didn't qualify that phrase directly, but he did evidence the notion of the Sabbath in such a way as to make it poetically clear what was meant by the sermon title.

So my word for this week is cathedral. It's a word that carries much imagery and carries much weight. It's a word, much like the building it describes, that has a lot more going on inside it. I think that's the thing about words in general, if we take the time, we can see there's much more going on, much more at stake. Words are poetical.

To quote Walter Pater: The goal of poetry is to renew the finer edges of words.

The thing of it is: I keep using the word "poetical" to describe some of my thoughts. For example, if something strikes me, I say it's poetical.

To quote Inigo Montoya: "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."