Mirror Images

  

Mirror image photo by Laurenz Kleinheider on Unsplash

 

I’m a big fan of symmetry. You know, balance--one might even say “matchy matchy” (tastefully done of course.) It bothers me when there’s a side table and lamp on one side of a sofa, and a floor lamp on the other. Symmetrical hairdos, flower arrangements, food on a plate--they appeal to my sense of order.

 

Needless to say, I LOVE chiasmus (chiasmuses? Chiasmi?) ANYway, these are the rhetorical devices in which the first part of a phrase is reversed in the second phrase (sorta mirror image). Examples abound:

 

It’s not about having what you want, it’s about wanting what you have.

Those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter don’t mind.

Do what you love, love what you do.

Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.

Eat to live, don’t live to eat.

 

Capisce?

 

Chiasmus gives any random statement some extra class, and a deep, Eastern wisdom. I can picture an elderly yogi in an ashram, sitting for years in total silence, then suddenly uttering these immortal words (probably in Sanskrit):

 

“I am stuck on Band-aids, cause Band-Aid’s stuck on me.”

 

Pretty profound!

 

Ardent wordsmith that I am, I thought I’d try my pen at a few chiasmi(muses) myself. Get a load of these beauties:

 

I can’t wait to leave, and I can’t leave until I wait.

Not quite right. Let’s try again.

 

The child walked the dog, but the dog walked the child.

You see, it was a small child and a really big dog, and…

Hmmm. OK.

 

Last month, I had a booking to read. Now, I have a reading to book. 

Cause I get bookings for readings from my books. Get it? Better? 

 

To make my literary life a tad bit easier, I remind myself that chiasmus does NOT have to have the exact same wording in both parts. Of course, that would be antimetabole, wouldn’t it? The two parts just have to have reverse sentiments. So this opens things up. I can do this!

 

Saint George may have killed a dragon, but the dragon seriously wounded Saint George first. (Can’t you just picture it?)

 

It may be hot in Miami, but it’s freezing in Antarctica. (Truth.)

 

If you don’t stop crying, I’ll give you something to cry about. (swear to God, mediocre mom though I was, I don’t recall ever saying THAT one).

 

Whew! I’m struggling, gang. I thought this would be a piece of cake. Or a cake in pieces. But it’s hard! 

 

Let me think of an appropriate way to end this post, and leave with my dignity intact.

 

Back to our yogi in the ashram. His pupils sit cross-legged on mats before him, and the silent hours tick by. But then, suddenly, from the wise man’s lips, here come the life-changing words they have been waiting for…

 

“Starkist doesn’t want tunas with good taste. Starkist wants tuna that tastes good.”

 

If you remember nothing else, my friends, remember that.