These words are mine made of me.
They owe no one. They have heartbeats.
Yours do too. Listen. They have cells.
Paragraphs are body parts.
Words Live
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Category Archives: blog writing
On writing
If you want to write, you need to believe your words are valuable enough to put on paper. They are. I’m dead serious. Your words have a right to be written because they are your words. You are real. Your voice, spoken or written, has as much value as any other voice – on the planet.
And try not to fret or wrap yourself in guilt because you didn’t remember to write something down. My history is littered with now forgotten sentences, phrases and words I fell in love with and wanted to use one day, and never did. I don’t imagine mine is a unique experience, other than it is mine, and no one (that I know of) is living my life but me.
I know that none of what I said here will make writing perpetually comfortable. I don’t think it is supposed to be. Writing forces you to be fully alone with yourself, and fully connected with yourself. Not easy. Sometimes I write because I want to, always I write because I have to.
The page is your world
This may be the most efficient way of writing. Simply put words on a page, and have done with it. This is your page. These are your words. Here, of all places, you need answer to not a soul, living or dead. This is a statement of fact, friend. This, the page, is your world. Doesn’t matter whether others read this or not. I know ache fills you at this. It’s only life, each sentence, word, one movement closer to the end.
One writer’s internal dialogue
- It’s time to do some writing.
- Fuck me.
- I’m serious.
- I can tell.
- You just –
- One word down, then another –
- And another, exactly.
- You know what gets me?
- What?
- It sounds so easy. Just sit down, or stand, whatever works, and then just start writing anything. Just set words down and pay attention and the words will just come of their own accord.
- That’s not so easy.
- What – ?
- “Words will just come of their own accord.” That’s an act of faith on your part. Faith that if you begin the words will follow. The weight’s on you to begin, then it’s pretty much stay the hell out of the way. It can’t be the same experience each time you write, is it?
- Now that you mention it, no.
The Possibility of Sunlight
Of another relationship I say, maybe, just maybe. But not necessary. It is the page that draws me stronger now. On relationships I stay open, never pull the blinds to the possibility of sunlight. And while there are many whose hearts are steadfast in their desire for intimacy, few can actually live it. And that is the only landscape for my stride.
There are the array of partial intimacies, connections between two people, where, like two not quite fitted puzzle pieces, some of the edges align, and for that, anyone would be wise to be grateful.
In the meantime, I am drawn to the page, to the book, and, again, finally, to the physical. The long walks, the trails, the summiting moments, to climb back on the bike and break the hills that are like weeds in their prevalence here. And again to the gym, solitary in my task, regaining the vessel’s tone.
Then to the page, the garden, the sweet air, and always with the blinds open to the possibility of sunlight.
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Peter S. Kahrmann - Est. 1953 