Four Short Statements on the Sentence

Entering the sentence, one feels caught in a trap, a cage, punctuation the catches and latches of entrance and exit that clamps down on our heads and tails, our arms or legs, fingers – when we let out an exclamation point, holding swelling finger up.

Returning to the three persons (me, you, and the other: navigator, driver, and passenger), in a race to the finish, around pylons of periods.

Periods around and around we go, how to begin and how to end, and where to dot the nose, punctuation choices a kind of Mr. Potato Head game.

Returning to the sentence, the idea of the sentence as a measure of composition. “Where Are We Going? and What Are We Doing?” John Cage asked in “Silence.” And not sure of the answer, we feel the tension of certain sentences, we feel the intensity of the sentence, like a taut wire, fish on, pencil bent like a deep-sea fishing rod.