Week 19: A Frugal Chariot

There is no Frigate like a Book

To take us Lands away,

Nor any Coursers like a Page

Of prancing Poetry – 

This Traverse may the poorest take

Without oppress of Toll – 

How frugal is the Chariot

That bears a Human soul.

--Emily Dickinson

He called just minutes after taking this picture. He was so happy to have ice cream.

Dear People,

Can I just express how much I love Emily Dickinson? I've talked about her here, on the great wide interwebs, before, but there's just something so magical about her words. And this little known poem is one of my personal favorites. I've planned on writing this particular letter for a while because of the way the words call to me in a manner that is both gratifyingly sweet and suspiciously subtle. There are few things that bring me more simple pleasure than a good, well written book. Than pages of "prancing poetry.'' I spent much of my childhood reading, though in retrospect I realize that my youthful mind could hardly grasp the depth and emotion that goes into each and every written word. In fact, at that time I could barely even understand the book's plot line. It wasn't for a lack of intelligence, but rather for a lack of patience. The only reason I could read Harry Potter was because I had watched the movies. The movies inspired me to read the book, the book required my impatient mind the watch the movies again just go gain even the smallest grain of comprehension.

No, I didn't understand literature back then and nor do I understand it now. Language is a complex and powerful thing- able to move nations and change worlds with far more urgency and prudency than any sort of weaponry. I've always found the scripture found in Alma 31:5 to be very expresatory of the power that language has to connect with people's hearts.  "And now, as the ^apreaching of the ^bword had a great tendency to ^clead the people to do that which was just—yea, it had had more powerful effect upon the minds of the people than the sword, or anything else, which had happened unto them—therefore Alma thought it was expedient that they should try the virtue of the word of God." More powerful than the sword, more powerful than anything else that had happened to the people. The words of the Prophets, the wisdom of God, has done more and will continue to do more for the children of men than any other influencer. So long as we read and study it, anyways.

But there's something interesting about the philosophies found in the holy scriptures, something that my cynical mind has trouble wrapping itself around. You see the Book of Mormon is, as the name would imply, is a book written in the language of men. Now, language, when understood at a personal level, is something so intrinsically beautiful (that's something I'm only just discovering now that my own language has been taken away from me). But language is also an incredibly limited thing. Any author knows that there are some things that just can't be explained within the confines of a while and black page. I've often heard it said that "the hardest thing to write is someone walking from one point to another-" a sentiment which I have found to be eerily profound throughout my own experiences with language craft. Language can't explain what it's like to long for another, to look up at a morning sun, to leave everything behind for a cause that you hardly understand. The only thing that these palaces of paragraphs can do is simulate those emotions, remind us of them. Because words are just that, reminders. Connections in our brain.

I wrote a book before I left on my mission. I don't know how many people know that. I spent a year writing every single day- often for hours at a time. And, no matter how hard I tried, no matter how many ways I twisted a phrase, everything I wrote falls flat when compared to the emotions are stirred up when I read the Holy Scriptures. The emotions that are created on their part. For though the words of man may contain all the wisdom of the generations, though they may send men and women to war, comfort them in times of strive, cause that strive themselves, they are just that: the words of man. They are as Emily Dickinson describes, a frugal Chariot. A chariot that breaks the moment the covers close in on themselves.

I wrote a book. The title of that book is A Fractured Silence. And it was my pride and my joy for a very long time. But, now and days, it's a reminder. It's a reminder of just how insufficient human efforts are, and how much greater the works of God are than the works of men. I would love it if the whole world read the book I wrote because it's something I worked very hard on. It'd love it even more if the whole world read the Book of Mormon. Because those feelings of the Spirit are what's going to save this world, not me.

Elder Brayden Hunter Monson

New companion Elder McCrary

Serving in the city of Coelemu

great missionaries

Good-bye pictures before he left 1st area.

beautiful flower

just waiting for the bus

waiting for the sushi rolls

He loves his fried sushi rolls

Ward Mission leader

A family he absolutely loves