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Saturday, January 7, 2012

Unparallelled Joy

I've been reading Liz Waldner's A Point Is That Which Has No Part, and I came across this alernative spelling: "parallel llines." It's from the poem "Welling" on page 42.

Look carefully--you'll see it. And please don't tell me this is a printing error; not with Waldner's sense of wordplay throughout the entire poem. It couldn't be.

This delights me in a way that few other things ever have. In fact, from now on I am holding this is my secret place of things I pull out when I am in despair and need a pleasing thought. There is only one other item in that cache, something I discovered when I was 14 years old, and which I do not allow myself to recall very often, only in times of dire need.

That's how much this piece of cleverness pleases me. Thank you, Liz Waldner.

(And yes, I know Americans spell 'unparalleled' with only one 'l' in the second 'l' series, because it's an unaccented syllable, but the British spell it 'unparallelled,' and today I feel like all the double letters I can get.)

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