Listening for the Song

I’m working, as usual, on a manuscript inspired by and dependent upon history, so I’ve collected lots of facts and sorted them into what’s interesting, what gets in the way, what’s interesting but gets in the way, and what order will make sense to readers. Then I pare down, keeping to some chronology, orderly as someone laying bricks. And when I get facts lined up, they seem to have bricks’ weight.

I remind myself then that the point isn’t the walkway, but making a place to look at the sky. Bricks and mortar are necessary, but for a book that wants song as well as a story, there comes a time to put down the tools and call in the ghosts, or if you prefer to call them imagination. It’s time to play with the broken bits of bricks, slosh around the mortar, and let colors or textures remind me of one moment I can hold up to another.

Holding up the broken pieces can take a long time. We might sift through hundreds before finding the right one. They get heavy. They look stupid. The whole project starts looking stupid. This is a time when doubt creeps in, away from the steady brick laying, when I can get nostalgic even for boredom. When we’re purposefully looking to the side, not on the lookout. When we wonder what’s taking us so long, and by the way, why haven’t we heard from that editor about our last piece.

But what might make everything come alive usually comes from rubble, past the ghosts and lack of hope. Perhaps a slight or temporary break from realism or an offbeat angle makes you and everyone else see something in a new way. An impossibly placed ear of a dog. An out of character remark. The odd sound of a window or sunset at the wrong time of day. Look. Then look away.

For the roundup of Poetry Friday posts, please visit Carol’s Corner. 




And happy new year!