Last night I watched a movie with my children which said every time
someone thinks of you a leaf falls.
Today I laid on the picnic table, underneath the maple watching the wind, thinking I must be completely falling out of someone’s head which is more true than not.
Yesterday I read the manuscript and realized all my secrets are in there. Every last one of them, and if someone really reads the book, I mean really READS the book they will know everything. And somehow they will know nothing. Possession it nine tenths of the law. Do I actually own this?
Today I gave the manuscript to someone and I said: forget everything you know about me, everything you’ve ever read. I wanted to say: pretend you are Louise Gluck, you loved Stanley Kunitz at 17, you wrapped a scarf around your head at 24, you wrote beautifully. You never picked a woman to win anything. Now pretend.
Good thing: My friend read one page and said, now here's a perfect line.
Bad thing: The credit goes to Paul Celan.
I, for the first time have a therapist who treats me as an artist. I was a practicing art therapist for a long time before I went into teaching. A good therapist is hard to fine. She says, writers block is mainly buying into the belief that you have nothing good to say.
I spent last week in session talking about the manuscript. One would think, with all the past relationship turmoil, I could think to bring up something else but I guess I’m sick ;) She said, I think too much…well there’s a fricken revelation. I think too much about what the book needs to be, I go through all the possibilities in my mind without ever letting it take on its own life form. Not all the time, mind you but probably most of time, I need to control the outcome.
When you tell someone all your secrets you give the power to reject you, to think of you, yes but also to push you out of their head. I don’t know how to stop thinking. I know someone who claims I do not move but I am so busy dear, running up every path in my head. I am too tired to make connection with my feet.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
5 comments:
T--speaking of pirates, you should take a look at the pics I posted on my blog. We decorated our house for halloween with a haunted pirate theme. Neil and I were pirates and had MORE fun than the kids. :)
What kind of book have you written? Poetry or novel? Either way, I'm looking forward to reading it. You have such a wonderful writing voice.
Take care,
ljc
http://ljcbluemuse.blogspot.com
It is a new manuscript of poetry though I think me next book will be children's fiction. Maybe a pirate book. Anything has to be easier than poetry. I looked at your photos and now the girls want to live there. You had them at the fog machine.
LOL! 2 fog machines and the thunder/lightening strobe. Not to mention the array of black lights. :) A few years ago we did the house a la Hogwarts complete with a quidditch match suspended above the front lawn.
Yes. We are seriously demented.
xo
ljc
what happened to the other manuscript? did you toss it? I've done that a few times...
a therapist who understands you're a writer is a very good thing.
...you've never picked a woman for anything. Isn't that the truth. Good luck, good luck.
Post a Comment