Ard-bwrbwynt-jahz-an-flstyn

When I whisper ard , I am in a field, holding a plough that cuts through bedrock. When I stutter bwrbwynt , I am standing in a gale that tastes of rust and honeysuckle. Jahz forces me to confront beauty that has decayed but refuses to die—a saxophone player with tuberculosis playing one last note for a room full of ghosts. An is the pause where you realize you are not alone. And flstyn … flstyn is the ground giving way.

That’s the thing about invented language. It doesn’t describe reality. It creates a new one, if only for the three seconds it takes to speak it. I don’t know what ard-bwrbwynt-jahz-an-flstyn means. But I know what it feels like: the moment before a sob turns into a laugh. The sound a glacier makes when it calves into the sea. The first word a newborn AI speaks before its creators delete it for being too strange. ard-bwrbwynt-jahz-an-flstyn

An. (Just air. Just permission.)

Bwrbwynt. (Let the wind catch the second syllable. Don’t fight the stumble.) When I whisper ard , I am in

What did you see? A coastline after a flood? A child’s toy melting on a radiator? A door that has no handle, but is slowly opening? An is the pause where you realize you are not alone