Garaigo
This was originally meant for the love_and_tea community, but then I forgot about it and only rediscovered it just now and realized that I have completely forgotten where I was going with it. OTL
GARAIGO
Japan has many words of his own, beautiful rolling rivers of syllables and strokes flowing soothingly off the tongue and brush like so many paper birds taking graceful flight. But as precious as they are it is not enough. He wants more. He looks at England and thinks that surely a quarter of the world would have enough for him to take and covet and make his, and he does.
Some of the words are too long and unwieldy so he shortens them, pressing them between his hands into neat, compact little phases, folding England's tongue into half and half again, origami in adverbs and letters to be added to his vast and humble collection. England's libraries hold cracked leather tombs containing words he has never seen before, words which have been lost and forgotten by the descendants of their creators. Japan finds it great pity to let words such as these die, so he strings them together into descriptions of his own: renji; danpuka; zubon. Reaching into England's past, he gently draws them back out into the light and dusts them off before bringing them up to his lips and swallowing them, one at a time.
Above all else Japan is neat and organized. His adopted words warrant a name for themselves, so he paints them in bold, sharp strokes, blocky characters resembling their original parents as children would take after the generations before them.
The people in his house are changing everyday, faster and faster. Language has the need to keep up with them, and Japan fulfills that need with more words, heard and stolen and reinvented for his own use, to make them part of him in such a way that they forget their previous masters and belong solely to him and him alone. It is transformation and enrichment. Japan and his people play with the words and letters, one being not enough so grouping four into representations of something much longer: ktkr; kkyn; wktr. Four of someone else's letters for four of his own words. Japan likes the play and symmetry and pure deceptiveness of it and continues, separating and bringing together skillfully, an alchemist for his people.
Japan wonders how much more of the western nation is left for him to discover and use. England has never disappointed before, and the thought makes his hands tremble slightly with anticipation as he stands and allows England to welcome him into his parlor.
-Title source.
GARAIGO
Japan has many words of his own, beautiful rolling rivers of syllables and strokes flowing soothingly off the tongue and brush like so many paper birds taking graceful flight. But as precious as they are it is not enough. He wants more. He looks at England and thinks that surely a quarter of the world would have enough for him to take and covet and make his, and he does.
Some of the words are too long and unwieldy so he shortens them, pressing them between his hands into neat, compact little phases, folding England's tongue into half and half again, origami in adverbs and letters to be added to his vast and humble collection. England's libraries hold cracked leather tombs containing words he has never seen before, words which have been lost and forgotten by the descendants of their creators. Japan finds it great pity to let words such as these die, so he strings them together into descriptions of his own: renji; danpuka; zubon. Reaching into England's past, he gently draws them back out into the light and dusts them off before bringing them up to his lips and swallowing them, one at a time.
Above all else Japan is neat and organized. His adopted words warrant a name for themselves, so he paints them in bold, sharp strokes, blocky characters resembling their original parents as children would take after the generations before them.
The people in his house are changing everyday, faster and faster. Language has the need to keep up with them, and Japan fulfills that need with more words, heard and stolen and reinvented for his own use, to make them part of him in such a way that they forget their previous masters and belong solely to him and him alone. It is transformation and enrichment. Japan and his people play with the words and letters, one being not enough so grouping four into representations of something much longer: ktkr; kkyn; wktr. Four of someone else's letters for four of his own words. Japan likes the play and symmetry and pure deceptiveness of it and continues, separating and bringing together skillfully, an alchemist for his people.
Japan wonders how much more of the western nation is left for him to discover and use. England has never disappointed before, and the thought makes his hands tremble slightly with anticipation as he stands and allows England to welcome him into his parlor.
-Title source.