The Weight of Words

"You smell of decayed syllables." -Norton Juster, The Phantom Tollbooth

Author and poet Gertrude Stein believed that words have a very real, tangible weight and that placing words next to each other would create an emotional response for the reader. Coupling this belief with her love of Picasso’s cubism movement, Stein wrote a series of “cubist” poems, in which random words are placed together to evoke a broader image.

The poems are terrible. But I think her theory of the weight of words holds true nonetheless, and other poets have picked up on this idea.

Tony Hoagland’s poem “Dickhead” describes the weight of a curse word to an adolescent boy and the ability to wield it like a blunt instrument.

In her most recent collection of poetry Now, Now, Jennifer Maier writes several poems about the memory of words, as if they are collectible remnants of a former time.

Even beyond poets, the weight of words has made it into fiction. In the children’s novel The Phantom Tollbooth, Norton Juster depicts a dinner scene in which the words spoken are not only real but edible—or in some cases very inedible.

In contemporary literary fiction, David Wroblewski uses his mute protagonist to describe the shape and feel of words in The Story of Edgar Sawtelle.

As for myself, I find the weight of words to be penetrating, especially when juxtaposed (like Stein would argue) with the weight of others. The word kissing sends awkward flutters through my skin, unless it’s used as Joe Wilkins did in his “Garage Sale Daze Meditations,” in which a girl’s shoes are  “kiss-kissing cold cement.” No flutters here. Shivers. The word alone now feels sharp against me, like a cold steel blade. Without a doubt, words have weight.