It seems our own plainspoken mother tongue had not the pow’r to capture in a word the essence of a concept so subdued, and so it stole the phrasing from the French and, hence, the term (not meaning) found its way into the trendy parlance of our day. Ambiguous gradations so obscure they often fade beneath the zeal of claims— especially now, when lines are drawn so sharp, and patience yields to haste and nuance drowns. When circumstance and context have no sway, we cast in black and white a world of gray. But what of Rothkos, memories, and poems? What of the dim-lit sheen of rain at dusk? For even black admits degrees of shade. Light is not fixed, but dances, splits, refracts— both particle and wave, with motion hued, and what it is depends on how it’s viewed. The very shape of space itself is curved; it bends and folds.
This poem is an absolute masterpiece. You put words to the concept of nuance in such a moving, meaningful, and powerful way. Thank you for this!
Thank you so much, Jared.
This needs to be on my walls. Thank you.