Writing, Speaking, Singing Poem by gershon hepner

When I write I use the left side of my brain,
and carefully compose my words, and when I speak,
the right side intervenes and makes me sound less sane,
prepared sometimes to kiss the other cheek
which had been turned away from me, but when I sing
I lose control. It’s taken by the right,
which leaves the left as far behind when it takes wing
as day is left behind by love at night.

Inspired by an article in the NYT Book Review, September 27,2009, by Arthur Krystal (“When Writers Speak”) , and hearing a lovely song:
Like most writers, I seem to be smarter in print than in person. In fact, I am smarter when I’m writing. I don’t claim this merely because there is usually no one around to observe the false starts and groan-inducing sentences that make a mockery of my presumed intelligence, but because when the work is going well, I’m expressing opinions that I’ve never uttered in conversation and that otherwise might never occur to me. Nor am I the first to have this thought, which, naturally, occurred to me while composing. According to Edgar Allan Poe, writing in Graham’s Magazine, “Some Frenchman — possibly Montaigne — says: ‘People talk about thinking, but for my part I never think except when I sit down to write.” I can’t find these words in my copy of Montaigne, but I agree with the thought, whoever might have formed it. And it’s not because writing helps me to organize my ideas or reveals how I feel about something, but because it actually creates thought or, at least supplies a Petri dish for its genesis.
The Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker, however, isn’t so sure. In an e-mail exchange, Pinker sensibly points out that thinking precedes writing and that the reason we sound smarter when writing is because we deliberately set out to be clear and precise, a luxury not usually afforded us in conversation. True, and especially true if one writes for magazines where nitpicking editors with expensive shoes are waiting to kick us around for every small mistake. When people who write for a living sit down to earn their pay they make demands on themselves that require a higher degree of skill than that summoned by conversation. Pinker likens this to mathematicians thinking differently when proving theorems than when counting change, or to quarterbacks throwing a pass during a game as opposed to tossing a ball around in their backyards. He does concede, however, that since writing allows time for reveries and ruminations, it probably engages larger swaths of the brain.
I agree. I’m willing to bet that more gray matter starts quivering when I sit down to write than when I stand up to speak. In fact, if you were to do an M.R.I. of my brain right now, you would see regions of it lighting up that barely flicker when I talk. How do I know this? Because I’m writing! In fact, I’m so smart right now that I know my cerebral cortex is employing a host of neurons that are cleverly and charmingly transforming my thoughts and feelings into words. But if I were talking to you about all this, a different set of neurons would be triggered, different connections and associations would be made, and different words and phrases would be generated. In short, I’d be boring the pants off you.

9/29/09