Passion radiates. You can see it roll off people in waves, like haze from a locomotive engine. Like that heat, passion doesn't do much in a vacuum, and most of it gets wasted as entropy.

Manage it properly, though, and heat becomes flame, flame becomes fire. Fire can warm the needy, lift rockets to the heavens, and light the way through temples, tombs and libraries.

Fire brings light. Cast wide, it can bring knowledge and safety; focused coherently, in can carry words and thoughts to the other side of the world, or on into the far future.

Passion - gathered, directed, encoded - powers the world.

My passion is for the written word. I use it awkwardly, but I love it dearly. Thought, inspiration, hard-fought wisdom and brilliant insight live on and leap from person to person, across generations, as simple words. Used well, words uplift and ennoble us. They are the crowning achievement of humanity.

That gleaming potential is all too often tarnished by poor use. Bad language is wasteful and frustrating, like a stubborn sneeze or an unreachable itch. It can be mundane; it can be tragic. And it can be avoided.

Every word is an opportunity to do well, and to do good; to strike a chord and hear it richly resonate; to drop a stone in a pond and watch the ripples spread. Every word is a chance to stoke the embers of our passions and pass on a little warmth.

We can all choose to have our words be slow and calm; fierce and torrential; strong and bright and beautiful.

We can all do better.

We can all do better.