Why this word is great
AGALLOCH — [Noun] The soft, aromatic, resinous wood of Aquilaria malaccensis, prized in perfumery and incense for its rich, smoky sweetness. From Ancient Greek ἀγάλοχον (agálokhon), of uncertain further origin, possibly via an Indo-Aryan intermediary. Unlike "agarwood" (a blanket term for resinous woods of multiple species) or "aloeswood" (a historical misnomer tangled with medicinal aloe), agalloch is precise—a single tree’s surrender to fungal invasion, its heartwood transformed into something rarer than gold. It is the dark resin weeping from a gash in the bark, the slow burn of incense coiling like a prayer in a temple, the faint musk lingering on skin hours after the incense has burned to ash—proof that beauty often begins in rupture, and that the sacred is born of the scarred.