Words From A Work In Progress

Oh my gosh, I nearly forgot I had a blog.

I remember when I used to have semi-decent content here (humor me, please.) I apologize for the lack of things. I really do.

The days are full and, when I do have time, I use the minutes to write. I'm revising a book I've been with for years. I'm dreaming of another book that's always been there, thumping its way into my heart.

I do read all of your blogs and endlessly scroll facebook and twitter posts while nursing (and I do nurse for many hours in a day) but I don't always reach out, fumbling as I do to type on a tablet or mobile device. I don't know, something has changed for me in the virtual space. I'm paying attention. I'm engaged. I'm just less certain of my place within it. I have a habit of retreating to the sidelines in many facets of life. And, so, I find myself there, here.

While I work through that (ha), I wanted to post some words from a work in progress (the book I'm dreaming, not the one I'm revising.) There's freedom in putting work out there, no matter how imperfect. Sometimes it's best to let go. Thanks for letting me do just that.

My knees crush the ground. Pebbles pinch the skin. I kneel at the stump of the abandoned oak and try to see Adare there. The bark is like the cloak of her rusty hair and the rings are dreams within dreams. All the years I have tried to know her collide towards now and against the smooth cut, the crass slice of wood, stunted roots still extending invisibly into the dirt, I can imagine her mind’s eye. 

This is her portrait. Not the kind Mrs. Paulson wanted me to paint, on a smooth white canvas, perfect rainbow pearls dotting the palate, dipping my brush into colors I can not match to this life. It’s the angle of things I want to capture. The dimensions. The spaces we occupy, etched into the world as we are, growing out of the earth, in spite of ourselves. I want to sculpt it out of the silence and grace of a tree.