You are supposed to go on with your thinking
Saturday, January 30, 2010
"A poem doesn't do everything for you," this NYC step-stone reads (words first penned by Gwendolyn Brooks). "You are supposed to go on with your thinking."
I remembered these words yesterday, when talking with a friend that I call Rachel's Bill about what it is that I try to do with my work–and how for some it's too much (too much language!) and for some it's too little (too little plot!) and for some it's nothing (why, she's practically mediocre!) and for some it is the thing that does somehow provoke or encourage a going-forward with their thinking. I was grateful to Rachel's Bill for letting me talk not about how books get published (and what happens to them afterward), but how I go about making mine—the muscularity of the experience (he understands, I promise), the discovery of the story inside the music of the prose, the eighty drafts, and the waiting to know.
I tend, in real life, not to talk too much, for fear of not being able to stop, once I get started. It's a special thing to have someone stand there at a dance party and nod his head and not make you regret yourself later.
3 comments:
I tend, in real life, not to talk too much, for fear of not being able to stop, once I get started. It's a special thing to have someone stand there at a dance party and nod his head and not make you regret yourself later.
A thousand times, 'YES' to this. I have a wonderful friend who just... gets it, you know? She does. She is an amazing writer and thinker. We email more often than we talk, but the other night we were on the phone from 11pm until 12.30am and it was such a gift. To talk about how we make our own stories.
We talked about the importance of quiet time; time to allow words to lie fallow and work their way to the surface. We talk about Clarissa Pinkola Estes and how she describes writing/creativity as: the river beneath the river.
I could have talked all night.
Oh my word, I love this quote.
At home I can't stop talking. With others outside, I barely say a word. Paul tells me it's a shame as I still speak eloquently despite my deafness.
Somehow I wonder at how easily someone would reach into my heart and wound if they knew what I thought, how I felt and the way I truly see the world.
I've found myself doubly guarded in my writing. To me they are not just words, they are me. Even the fiction verses come from experiences felt by me.
Then again maybe I fear I am good enough.
Us writers are uniquely one of a kind (winks). (Hugs)Indigo
Post a Comment