Shail delves into language, genetics, and health, discussing the Oxford Word of the Year 2024, “brain rot,” and the unique genetic condition “werewolf syndrome,” exclusively for Different Truths.

Digital shotgun

Oxford word of the year 2024, like models
in a competition, the winner this year
is the word, ‘brain rot’ in sync with
the digital crop where a word sprouts
like a sapling out of the eternally flowing
trivial, unchallenging content we absorb
like octopuses on a vengeance spree
gobbling every cell, it sees leaving in its
wake a brain drained, inactive, failing.
Chosen from a shortlist of six words,
demure, dynamic pricing, lore, romantasy
and slop, ‘brain rot’ is the backstop.
First recorded as a term in 1854,
a quirky name then, for, superfluous
content- real, imagined or digital were
next to none. The winner this year is
a warning with a digital shotgun.

Werewolf on the prowl

Genetic defects fall like a flash of lightning
on lives least expecting existence to
overturn from normal to suddenly embarrassing,
hurtful or even life-threatening. Hypertrichosis
the villain, where hair grows unwarranted
and undesired. ‘Werewolf syndrome’ makes
a human look like a wolf in the making.
A genetic defect justifiable but not when
carelessly invited into lives with the usage of
over-the-counter medicine,
a deadly specimen
of a drug minoxidil used by parents
handling a baby, infectious it seems
destroying rosy baby dreams; the
condition reversed if the drug is
not used around placed in the background.

Opening ears to wisdom

Wax in the ear, ‘gross’ I whisper hear.
Isn’t that the reason why the ear bud
lightsabers are used to get the wax
out of the ears? Not anymore. There’s
research out there that states certain things
need to stay where they are made.
There’s a logical reason, you see!
It prevents dust, and dirt from seeping in
and, every jabbing with cotton earbuds
only pushes the wax in further
making hearing seem farther.
ENT specialists recommend letting the
ears be. Until there is oozing out of the
ear canals, wax is good for the ears.
Do you hear?!

References:

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/technology/tech-news/brain-rot-chosen-as-oxford-word-of-the-year-2024-what-it-means-and-how-its-relevant-in-digital-age/articleshow/115937724.cms

https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/babies-in-spain-develop-werewolf-syndrome-after-parents-use-hair-loss-drug-report-7171421

https://www.pennmedicine.org/news/news-blog/2022/october/time-to-quit-removing-wax-from-our-ears?utm_campaign=fullarticle&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=inshorts#:~:text=According%20to%20the%20American%20Academy,a%20need%20to%20remove%20it

Picture design by Anumita Roy

Shail Raghuvanshi

Shail Raghuvanshi is a poet, freelance journalist, copyeditor, voice actor, and artist with 30 years of experience in various media. She has worked as the Cultural Correspondent for India's first integrated media company, PLUS Channel, and has written course material for Madurai Kamaraj University's Post Graduate Programme in Advertising and Public Relations. She has also been a coach of Communicative English. She has published poems, short stories, and articles in leading magazines and anthologies.

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