The Spark is Lit Once More

Many times in the past I have fallen off the write-something-every-day wagon, advice many aspiring writers try to follow. Often real life does get in the way of the life of the mind for most of us. I used to feel guilty about this. When I was teaching literature and writing to high school students, I found it ironic that by encouraging them to read and write I wasn't reading what I wanted or writing anything other than remarks on their papers and grocery lists. Or grades, which can hardly count as writing especially since they were inked into tiny squares in the gradebook to be transferred to the computer. No, that was not writing; neither were the comments I sprinkled their papers with. I used to fantasize my retirement: sunshine flowing through my windows, cup of tea by my side, writing for a couple of hours early in the morning, working out, riding my bike, preparing lovely gourmet meals and then more writing deep into the night. Ha! Now I am no longer in the classroom but not entirely retired. Retired enough to have a lot of time for good stretches, however, and not much of the fantasy has materialized. That's why this blog is important to me.

Finally, I am writing. Well, I did co-write a book with my cycling buddy so I suppose that counts as writing, but I haven't written much poetry except for a poem about the death of a good teaching friend who died too young. As for the daily journal or working on another book - not so much. Not at all. Real life has been fun and I do have time to just pick up and do something unplanned occasionally which is heavenly after 31 years of a working life divided into 57 minute time slots every day. And the guilt about not writing receded into the minutia in the back of my mind. I sometimes thought about the feminist writer whose name escapes me at the moment, who opined that after a lifetime of serving others as wife, mother, daughter, worker, many women writers lose that creative urge. They must indulge the urge to keep it alive. Or they just lose their spark, their creativity. I certainly understand that. I was sure that is what had happened to me. I had lost the light of creativity. I had the time but I didn't take it for writing. I did so many other things instead. And they were necessary or fun or educational. But they weren't writing.

I suppose I had fallen prey partly to the thought that 1) What could I say that hasn't been said before and said better? and 2) Who would want to listen to anything I had to say anyway? Those are deadly thoughts to a writer who has to have the confidence to write despite them. I keep telling a good friend to get rid of her internal editor who makes her try to write perfectly so much that she doesn't write at all. She was a real editor before her retirement so I am sure it is very hard for her to lose that judgmental devil on her shoulder as she writes. But I was under the influence of another devil when I listened to it saying, "You have nothing worthwhile to write about. No one is interested in what you have to say."

Here is where the blogging phenomenon did me a colossal favor. People are writing about everything, anything and nothing. Many are being read and many more don't care if they are ever read. Well, I can't quite believe that. I think the reason we write is to be heard as well as to express ourselves. I secretly hope that my blog catches on and spreads worldwide. I don't expect it, but it would be pretty cool. Writing a blog is an interesting way of expressing yourself - of finding your voice.

So I am writing again and it feels so good. Writing also makes me pay more attention to the details of life. I'm looking for things to think about and write about. I pay more attention to people and situations and colors and scenery and buildings and conversations. And lots of other stuff. Writing adds another dimension to my life. So even if no one reads my blog, it is making me more alert and interested in life. And that, as Martha Stewart says, is a good thing.

The following poem, not one of mine, seems appropriate.

you don't stop writing girl, go girl go

You don't stop writing girl
You cannot stop, It is part of your nerves now.
Each vein looks for the proper word.
Each red blood corpuscle has become a syllable
For an imaginary poem in your mind.

Each beat of your heart recites a rhyme
A rhythm. A sonnet. A couplet.
Each curl in your cerebellum thinks of
An imagery. Another metaphor comes
And you grasp them with each breath.

You are alive girl. Go girl stop watching
The snow and make your imagination
Run wild like a snowstorm.

The sound of a snowfall. A snowflake
Layering on the side of your window pane
Speaks to you about this coldness
This beautiful sound of a very lonely song
Harking for Love.

Far away from your homeland
You weep for a while and then recover
Compose yourself and see your face in that mirror.
You are strong. You are as vast as the ten thousand miles
Away from us.

Go girl. Another poem knocks at the door of your heart.
Write it. Write about a chaff. The grain. The wheat germ.
Go girl. You are one of us, chosen not to speak
But to write.

I am waiting for your next poem. Gladly, I am.

RIC S. BASTASA

http://www.poemhunter.com/