Sure, there’s winter, spring, summer, and fall. But the seasons in between have even more poetic names. In Alaska, greenup describes a sudden, dramatic burst of green after a long, dark winter. And there are many, many terms for a cold snap...
Language is always evolving, and that’s also true for American Sign Language. A century ago, the sign for “telephone” was one fist below your mouth and the other at your ear, as if you’re holding an old-fashioned candlestick...
In the Eastern and Southern United States, freezing rain that leaves everything covered with ice is simply known as an ice storm. In the Pacific Northwest, this sort of rain followed by a hard freeze goes by a more poetic name: silver thaw. This is...
A delightful new book offers a taste of life in early medieval England through everyday vocabulary of that time and place. It’s called The Wordhord: Daily Life in Old English, by Hana Videen (Bookshop|Amazon). The book includes helpful...
Quiz Guy John Chaneski’s poetic puzzle requires filling in the blank after verses by famous poets. For example, how did Robert Frost complete these lines in “The Road Not Taken”? And both that morning equally lay / In leaves no...
There are places in the world where the walls of reality seem weak and another dimension seems nearer and clearer than usual, leaving you without words. Perhaps you’ve had that experience on top of a mountain, or at the edge of the Grand...