Everything I say to you is other

[PrinceMyshkin]

Everything I say to you
is other than what I mean to say!
It starts out as English in my head
but somehow comes out Norwegian!

I fantasize that somehow in Norway
someone is saying exactly what I mean to say
and saying it, to his or her surprise,
in perfectly good, perfectly unintelligible English!

[Sweets America]

Jesus CHRIST!! That is just great, so Princey!! For me, that is so true, what the poem says about us never being able to say what we want to say. But do we really know what we want to say? Often, before saying something, I already have to discuss it with someone somewhere in my head.

[qimissung]

So true. We think of language as a flawless vehicle for expressing our most vulnerable thoughts, our deepest fears, but really it is a very flawed vehicle for expressing the most delicate. You hit the nail on the head with this.

[PrinceMyshkin]

Thank you, Sweets & Gimissung, please note that I've made a change to the last line.

[firefangled]

Ti hs sivry e utre. O nat whimean? Wri welelten, thk ini.

Stmei omes cin't aays wri whimean. Ip tisses em ffo.

[CdnReader]

^^^ Hahaha. The funniest part is.... I think I understand! Oops. That's bad, isn't it? :(

[PrinceMyshkin]

Ti hs sivry e utre. O nat whimean? Wri welelten, thk ini.

Stmei omes cin't aays wri whimean. Ip tisses em ffo.

In some parts of the world this would pass, no doubt, for wisdom!

[PrinceMyshkin]

^^^ Hahaha. The funniest part is.... I think I understand! Oops. That's bad, isn't it? :(

Mi yimallel g'vurot Yisrael?

[Virgil]

Everything I say to you
is other than what I mean to say!
It starts out as English in my head
but somehow comes out Norwegian!

I fantasize that somehow in Norway
someone is saying exactly what I mean to say
and saying it, to his or her surprise,
in perfectly good, perfectly unintelligible English!


I really like this. :D

[CdnReader]

Mi yimallel g'vurot Yisrael?

Um..... YEAH!!! Order one for me too. :D

[blazeofglory]

Everything I say to you
is other than what I mean to say!
It starts out as English in my head
but somehow comes out Norwegian!

I fantasize that somehow in Norway
someone is saying exactly what I mean to say
and saying it, to his or her surprise,
in perfectly good, perfectly unintelligible English!


I am also in the same quandary, as I am a Nepali, and grew in Nepali culture and now I am writing in English, a borrowed language. I am poor at it, and run short of vocabularies and have no craftsmanship in this at all. Yet I am tempted to write in this medium thinking that I can come larger audience.

I have no choice but to yield to reality. Nepali is a better language for me, and it is child of Sanskrit, a very rich and scientific language. English is comparably poor.