Dryadic Lesson 1—Don't Drop Leaves Too Late

Winona throws a dryad proverb at Sierra in the beginning of Digital Dryad. Here's what it means, word by word.

Lakita chut palak pfistlak pfoluksänöpiñ.

Advice from a dryad. “Don’t drop your leaves too late.”

At the beginning of Digital Dryad, Winona says to Sierra:

“What is this, your fourteenth year? Lakita chut palak pfistlak pfoluksänöpiñ. Your leaves drop too late.” Winona’s eyes narrowed…

She quoted an adage that dryads with deciduous bond trees strive to follow.

Sierra, at 14, was old to not have a bond tree. Many of the more traditional dryads found this disturbing at best and dangerous for the grove at worst. And Winona was one of the most traditional dryads in the grove. She believed that Sierra not having a bond tree was evidence that she wasn’t a dryad. She was a mere human.

The adage demonstrates both the word order of dryadic (typically verb-subject-object) and the way compound words combine affixes to create new words. This adage is a command, so the subject is dropped (assumed to be “you”).

Here are the individual words defined:

• Lakita is the verb. It means “to drop” or “to lose.” It comes first in the sentence.
• chut is a negative. It means “not.”
• palak is an intensifier. It means “very.”
• pfistlak is an adverb meaning “later.”
• pfoluksänöpiñ is a compound word. It is made up of a base word and several affixes connected to it:
  • pfoluk means “limb.”
  • Adding the suffix -sän extends it to mean “leaf” or “branch.”
  • The suffix -öp makes that word the accusative direct object.
  • And -iñ means plural, more than 16 items.

Dropping leaves is something dryads think about in fall around Halloween or Samhain. Drop too early and the tree can’t store enough sugar. If their trees haven’t stored enough sugar in the roots, they might not survive the winter, but if they hold onto their leaves too long, they might shade other, younger trees beneath them. This would hurt the forest as a whole.

Humans often forget about the roots because they are hidden underground. But they are vital to trees, plants, and the dryads who care for them. That’s why the swear word chakjos (pronounced “chak yos”) is so bad.

It means “root rot” and references one of the bigger fears in the fall—that the soil gets waterlogged with rain and corrupts the roots with decay. A plant with moldering roots is a plant that risks death.

Most dryads use chakjos the way Americans say “damn.”

Are there other Dryadic words you’d like to know? Let me know. You can learn more of the features of Dryadic on this website.

Klifal, Dear reader and Tsitwash for Reading!

Note: Klifal and Tsitwash are words in Dryadic. Klifal means “Hello” and Tsitwash means “Thanks.”

I hope you enjoyed this article! If you liked my unique perspective, you’ll love reading my full story in the novel Digital Dryad by Jennifer Kyrnin. Digital Dryad is available where all books are sold, in print and ebook formats.

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Sincerely, Sierra