I'm nobody too!

Part I
Today I have a tasty morsel of a poem that I found by Emily Dickinson, which I particularly love because sometimes I feel very discouraged at my own nothingness, but to hear from Dickinson herself that she, and me and we are nothing was a great relief. What is all of this chasing after somethingness about anyway? What makes the contribution of a 19th century recluse/poet more or less then my own? Maybe nothing.

I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there's a pair of us - don't tell!
They'd banish us, you know.

How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!

Part II - Poetry, for my feet!
I really like shoes. They are fantastic little pieces of art, which got me to thinking about poetry and art. I think that poetry is so much more than words on a page. Words themselves are nothing but a medium to get across the true purpose of poetry which is, for me, a process of grasping the disappearing thread or as another poet said "sing[ing] a song for which we haven't quite found the words." Poetry, then, is not bound to the letters and spaces, it is a lifestyle, an aesthetic, a way of looking at things, which makes almost anything poetry. Even shoes, and especially these ones. They are made by the brand aptly named "Poetic Licence"

A poem

Since people are actually inclined to come to this spot every now and again, I thought I should put out another post to bait you into coming back, or maybe let cyberspace know that I'm not dead.
I've been reading/writing a lot of poetry this past year, and I think it is time to share some of my findings with the world. Often poetry is regarded as uninteresting, esoteric, confusing, or some variation on that theme, but I am inclined to side with Leonard Cohen who said; "Poetry is just the evidence of life. If your life is burning well, poetry is just the ash". So I would like to share some of the ashes that I have been scavenging lately.
Here is a poem that enticed me to loving poetry. I couldn't get the last line out of my head for days...

"The Lake Isle of Innisfree"

I WILL arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made:
Nine bean-rows will I have there, a hive for the honey-bee,
And live alone in the bee-loud glade.

And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
Dropping from the veils of the mourning to where the cricket sings;
There midnight's all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
And evening full of the linnet's wings.

I will arise and go now, for always night and day
I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,
I hear it in the deep heart's core.

William Butler Yeats (1893)

While I could ramble on about the imagery in this poem and so on, I won't. Poems rely highly on subjectivity, so use your own!

We Folks Call it a Hoax - Annual Post

University degrees are like some type of fungus. The type of fungus that first covers all possible surface area and then, for lack of anywhere else to grow, grows on top of itself. Though many university degrees are based on very valid subject areas, such as chemistry, or linguistics say, other degrees seem to have been developed ad hoc (to use university-speak). Examples are always enlightening so let me provide one: I recently took an anthropology class that explored methods of anthropological theory in the last couple of centuries. The more I learned about the different methods of anthropology the more I came to suspect that perhaps anthropology does not have an underlying structure. Let me explain. We in linguistics refer to 'underlying structure' and 'surface representation'. The underlying structure is the form of the word or grammar or whatever that exists as a sort of theoretical concept that we exploit when using language (language proper, not that kind of language, although it works for that type as well). The surface representation is the form that shows up when we actually use the underlying representation. All of this is really just fancy terms for theories based on observations of natural phenomena. OKAY SO, back to anthropology. As I studied it I soon felt sure that there can never be a concrete and definitive way to do anthropology because there is no underlying structure! Maybe I am relying too much on linguistic theory for this analogy, but it got me to thinking that maybe anthropology is all a hoax. As I relayed this theory to Kara she told me of how she thought that there is no practical difference between a Physiology and an Anatomy and Cell Biology degree. Two degrees which are essentially they same, but which are separated for some reason. Perhaps to look better because of more degree offering or maybe because two nit-picky individuals couldn't get agree on one small part of the one degree so they created two so that they wouldn't have to work together. Kara also said that she was suspicious about Physics as well. I then told her that just because you don't like it doesn't mean its a hoax. Maybe when it comes to anthropology I should listen to my own advice.