I wander in this forest of words. I seek. I squander. I unleash.

These are my words: strong, guileless, unkempt, earnest.

Sometimes they are the meaning of life; other times, the scrapheap. They can be the way forward or the exquisite distraction. Just so much hot air, the elixir of love or the blood of life.

They may be taken seriously or swept out the door like so much dust.

Wordplay is addictive. Words are so powerful, so explosive. It is like standing side-by-side with God at the creation and dipping one’s hand into the most essential pieces of who we are: virtue and vice, desire and dreams, the tragedy and the triumph. You never know when a combination of words will explode, say something earth-shattering, reveal too much about one’s inner workings or galvanize a people.

Words are like that: unpredictable, volatile, willful.

A poem of words can open a cold heart and make it feel again. Or it can upset our careful balance, release the pent up vigor, resuscitate a life.

But words are also the weapons which wound and tear at fragile flesh that cannot protect itself. They are the purveyors of ulterior motives and insidious ambition. They are the stuff of fine print and too-good-to-be-true offers. They are the never-ending babble of the TV newscaster.

They hold our dreams and our nightmares, our best and our worst intentions. Our slithering impulses and our brightest promises.

There is a torrent of words running through the world. Well-used, they are beauty and truth; misused and abused, they are the twisted messengers of lies and deception.

Words encompass everything, offer hope and presage disaster, usher in the revolution and defend the status quo. They are the past and the future, the dream and its destruction, the veil and the light.

Words are everything.