Oxymoron.

Two contradictory words put together.

More examples than anyone could wish to list, because the list keeps growing.

jumbo shrimp
bittersweet
small crowd
awfully good
alone together
silent scream
walking dead
deafening silence
seriously funny
cruel kindness
…
…

Those who worry about language and take it seriously try to think about subtle differences and try to explain them, sometimes a full time job, and sometimes they get paid for it.

Oxymoron – contradictory words, just two words.

Paradox – contradictory ideas, an entire statement, or even a whole paragraph.

This muddies the water to clarify, because words are not just sounds, they come with content, ideas. You can’t divorce them like the horse from the rider. They’re not just vibrations in the air. Even rhyme is diversive from identity, and even identical rhyme is not just repetition because by putting the same word together with itself forces us to consider more, to look again, to surprise ourselves with possibilities we never considered in the first instance.

But oxymorons are more than just fun to play with, clever apposition. They get us to respond, to think, and though that’s always dangerous, it’s also necessary to stay alive.

We don’t have to go to the Himalayas to find the ox. And we have plenty of morons closer to home.

And oxymorons are helpful. They help us navigate the vicissitudes of everyday life, especially now when there are more and more vicissitudes.

When you understand something better than you did, you’re in a better position to survive it, deal with it, correct it, transcend it.

Like today. When the oxymoron gives us a whole phrase, like “advance to the rear,” or “rushing ahead at a snail’s pace,” it calls us to action and we can go in the other direction. Forward. Upward. Onward.