The Compleat Linguist—John-Boy Walton Collateral Descendant of Lingua Pranca Contents English on the edge—Terence MacNamee

When I Heard the Learn’d Linguist

Sophrosyne Enchiridion

After Kruck,
“When I Heard the Learn’d Syntactician/Phonologist”

When I Heard the Learn’d Computational Linguist

When I heard the learn’d computational linguist;
When the stats, the rules, were ranged in tables before me;
When I was shown the chart-parsers and the dynamic programs to crunch them;
When I, sitting, heard the computational linguist,
        where she lectured with many algorithms in the lecture-room,
How many times—uncountably!—I became dazed and confused;
Till rising and gliding out, I wander’d off into a crowd,
In the many-voiced night-air, and from time to time,
Comput’d in perfect silence the meaning of their words.

When I Heard the Learn’d Documentary Linguist

When I heard the learn’d documentary linguist;
When the vow’ls, the cons’nants, were ranged in charts before me;
When I was shown the word lists and the example sentences,
        to show, compare, and describe them;
When I, sitting, heard the documentary linguist,
        where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,
How soon, unaccountable, all became blurry and strange;
Till falling and falling, I woke up by myself,
In the mystical moist night-air, knowing it was a dream,
Realiz’d in perfect silence that there is no learn’d documentary linguist.

The Compleat Linguist—John-Boy Walton
English on the edge—Terence MacNamee
Collateral Descendant of Lingua Pranca Contents