first course, rummaging around in drawers. . . . . bring me a story

I have an untidy mind. It’s probably woolly too. Felted, curled at the edges, distracted; it’s probably more than a little grubby. Some might call it dirty. Particular moments stick like glue whilst others gallop away before I’ve even finished having them. I wouldn’t have trouble with describing myself as capricious. I want to laugh in your face and say kuh-pree-chee-oh-soh.

I have been rummaging around in what I call my drawers. They’re files really. Little electronic compartments of words. But I like to see them as big wooden oak smelling heavy drawers. To pull open and leaf through; pencil behind my ear, spectacles tipping my nose muttering, hmm, let me see……..and well, I find the strangest of things. Words written that I have no memory of ever writing. Take this as an example…….

“I mustn’t read anything else until I have read this, until I have finished it, until I have devoured it, because I sense it was written to be devoured. But, before I begin I must write some more of my own words. First I must give these ideas form, swell their skin, make their eyes sparkle and their lips as full as they should be. I must give this longing a voice – throaty and delicious. Put into words the battle of stealing and strengthening. Attempt to capture the particular essence of two particular bodies,  fucking, joining , in effect losing themselves. It feels like an impossible feat. To find the words. Because sex is enigmatic, it is both self-centered and dependant. It changes like the weather.”

I can’t for the life in me remember what it was I was reading which sparked such words. I’m half wondering that it could be Little Birds. By writing this, I’m saying it was Little Birds. I want it to be so. And then I follow with…..

“I want stories which will grip me by the heart, written with words to make me sigh, to make me ache, to make me smile. Words to make me think.”

If only I could take my snippets and meanderings and fashion them into something worth reading. Make each word count like a stitch. In the necessary sense, not as embroidery or adornment, but to pull the story together. Stitches thick enough to hold a canvas bag full of letters or strong enough to secure the luff edge of a sail. Good enough to stand the test of time and the elements of fashion and criticism. But too often I am haunted by a line from a poem or novel which in its simplicity manages to convey the whole of what I was trying to write. Sparse, careful words which seem to throw scorn on my own efforts.  The placing of a single word can send me into pleasures I find hard to hold in my own writing. The plumpness of ‘astonishment’ amongst a line of verse can set my heart racing. The cool placing of a metallic word, shiny-hard, laid flat like a knife at the table can catch my breath. Edges.

“Oh, it is so close; a whole world beyond the reach of my own words.”

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