They should have been more discomfited by the movement, but the idea that was in their head was pressing at them.

"The verb in the symbols I keep coming back to. It has flourish to it, here, and here," they pointed at the first and last symbols, to the chevrons in each shape. "If it's to indicate action, why the gestural looping? It's not English, it's not the loop of a g or a y in a poem. But..."

How to explain this? They didn't even know if they were on the right track.

"There's something... playful, to curves. A curve is relaxed, unlike a stark line, which implies strict law. If form matches function... does this verb relate to something like play? So the meaning of the first symbol, it's a person who plays, perhaps?"