anamnesis y tmesis

the empty signifier: demon of our times; it has no relation to the body or mind, but only a blankness devoid of sensuality. in "verizon" there can be found no tmesis, because there is no notion to grapple with. the value of a signifier is contingent upon its relation to the infinite cache of signs, but inventions such as "verizon" are in effect linguistic singularities, referring to nothing, aspiring only to the pull of the product- a consumer gravity of sorts. tmesis necessarily involves sensuality, texture. "the" implies the positive: "the" + any sign combines into somethingness, and then there is a fabric to work with, to go between, to manipulate. "the" alone even implies the phenomena of "essents" or things in themselves. but "verizon," presumably a riff on horizon, is useful only in referring to itself. that awful "v" disrupts the nature of a sign with potential value. "verizon" earns a place in the text only because a group of people subscribe to the service which it claims to represent, but there is also the feeling that it does not even relate to its own service. horizon has intertexuality, mobility as a word. it has the chance of evolving into myth and of being applied to poetry in poignant ways. its mutation does not.
so empty signifiers are destructive because they are degenerative terms. the more people that subsribe to them, the more destroying power the have. what do they destroy, though? they destroy a fundamental connection with nature. they widen the gap between nature and humans and help us to forget about origins. imagine a language made of "words" like verizon and cingular and then try to imagine "the pleasure of the text." shall i compare thee to a summer's day, or shall i compare thee to a verizon day. see there, any word sounds better there than verizon... shall i compare thee to a trash day, a fickle day, a dumpster day, a crab day.

but how about a sign like this: "Airbus A320." it seems technical, but it's much more useful than other fabricated words. it essentially says what it means--a bus that's in the air. and the A320 is directly related to its construction. one could use it forcefully in a rap lyric, like "i come at you like an airbus A320." Airbus A320 is a variety of useful machines that have been with us for decades, the concept for centuries. ATC's have to identify it for take off and landing. to sum up, Airbus A320 kicks verizon's ass in sign/poetential value arena.