Are we doing magic when we use words?

"Lifting a rush, a burin, a pen, or a stylus is like releasing a bite or lifting a claw." -- Gary Snyder

When you send an e-mail that says, "I love you," do you think the recipient shrugs it off as just so much talk, or does she feel a tingle up and down her spine?

Your words, that tingle, cause and effect?

On a dark and stormy night, you're reading a gruesome novel about a person all alone of a dark and stormy night who seems completely unaware of the fact that zombies are walking out of a near...