I can’t just turn the spigot and the words come pouring out into rockets, bells and poetry. I have to sit in an easy chair and THEN turn the spigot.
I have to pick up a pen or turn on the computer and imagine a girl whose mother was an explorer of time and space and dimensions. I have to look out the window and write down what I see. I have to listen to music and feel what I feel and then tell you. I have to read a book about living on Prince Edward Island during a terrible war overseas and process what that was like. I have to jump at the sound of a bird being surprised that the open space into my well-lit room is a barrier he couldn’t see — and hope he wasn’t dashing so fast to get into this space that he’s crumpled and forever gone below. (He wasn’t.)
In short, I have to live and, living, write the life into words.
Everything I see and hear and feel and smell and taste is something to write about. It all collects inside, welling up in the well, until I sit down and turn the spigot.
And so, on a morning when I’m not sure what to write, I just start the fingers to forming words and see what they tell me.
