Grief and Writing

I lost my partner recently. It has contributed to my struggle to get back into a regular writing routine. Writer friends have forwarded calls for submissions of short stories, flash fiction and poetry, urging me to write as part of my healing process.

But my writing output has gone into a temporary freeze. His death has grown into a huge mountain blocking everything in front of me, and, although I’m not ready to visit this subject, it has obstructed other forms of writing.

What to do?

One friend, a fellow student from a creative writing course at a local university contacted me, asking me to send flash fiction for an anthology she’s editing. I dutifully studied the prompt, wrote the story – and then I couldn’t email it. I had to admit to myself that it was terrible.

I know I should get back to writing. I feel the compulsion to, yet there is this mass of grief blocking my road. Because I’m not inclined to write about what happened (it included trauma), I tucked it away into my box of future writing projects, and tried grappling with fiction and poetry.

I have always been the type of writer who keeps a distance in my writing, rarely adding details of my private life, aside from snippets that sneak their way in. (I marvel at those who have their whole lives revealed for public scrutiny).

Now, having failed at fiction, I tried poetry with better results, or so I thought. I find that I can access my inner thoughts and feelings easier in the writing of poetry than in fiction – even if it causes great discomfort.

But usually, after writing a poem, I edit myself out with the belief that a writer’s duty is to try to turn private agony into some form of art and not just dump it on a poor unsuspecting reader.

Slowly I’ve come to the realization that I have to jump over this hurdle if I want to achieve any of my writing goals. So I’ve settled on memoir but without the details which has led me into the exploration of the lyric essays, poetry and mythology.

At present I have no idea what that is going to look like but at least there is a glimmer behind the mountain. Or is there?