Night before last I woke abruptly, flailing from a dream -- not just knocking over my glass of water but spilling it; not just spilling it but breaking the glass; not just breaking the glass but gouging a digit on a jagged shard in the dark. My glass isn't half-empty -- it's ALL empty, because I spilled it and broke it and stabbed myself in the process.
True story. Metaphor, too? I hope not.
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But I managed to work it into this writing exercise -- nicked from someone's MySpace blog. Write your own bio, in 500 words or less ... without using the letter "e."
Today my glass not half full but fully vacant, as I not only spill it but I bust it and jab a thumb on its shards to boot. But I want this not as my soul’s symbol. Shit occurs; glass shatt’rs. This fight stops not, and that glass will fill again. (Though might I should switch to plastic?) I stand again at my tap, awaiting my fill, soothing my own thirst from what flows down low. I'm of a mind to start acclimatizing, but it's such an uphill climb. Want world’s crossroads in my sights, its junctions in my grasp. I’m short and – why not admit it? – I’m spunky to match. Want my man but won’t wait 'round. Why, I find I’m strong as I start cultivating my own ground. I’m kind, though I too oft' unwind, ruminating my past. Now wild with might and not afraid to right wrongs, forging my own trail, dancing, vacillating, to drums of my own choosing. And if I mix my imag’ry, if I contradict my synonyms, what of it? Walt wouldn’t mind. Walt would start that party and stay to its last. Conjuring my gut’s Whitman to call out his song as my own; as with him I won’t stop for nothing, no holds barred and no bars to hold onto. Privy only to my thoughts I find it all, with and without rhyming, with and without rhythm, but always, always with spirit intact. At my last, that’s all I can ask. I'm my own vision; I'm why I stay.
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When it comes to fight or flight, my first tendency is still flight. But I'm finding that's nothing more than old habit. The fighter in me is, well, fighting to get out.
Another of the Deep Thoughts I've been journal-jotting as they come to me in the past couple of days.
Mostly, they make me sleepy.
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6 comments:
Dreams are cool. Any time you wake up from one wet it's good.
What a challenging exercise. It changes your writing voice entirely, making it a bit more poetic and reflective, adding an immediate presence, like being inside your mind when as your thoughts occur.
Relying as much as I do on your tremendous proofing skills to help make my writing better, supplicating myself at the feet of the greatest copy editor of my time, I humbly and regretfully point out to you that "often" has an "e" in it. Could you not, however, tweak the word to "oft?"
Dang, thought I got 'em all. That's a good suggestion, and I've already fixed it.
These have not been good dreams. And waking to cut yourself isn't good, either.
And I don't want to know about dreams that leave you wet!
fabulous. such poetry.
Okay. So now I'm obsessing on it. Do you write what you want then change it to take the "eeeeee's" out, or do it as you go?
Either way, it doesn't sound easy – get it?
Did you kill anybody last night? Because remember, OJ cut his hand on a glass he broke, not on the knife he killed Nicole and Ron with.
Craziness. I've injured others in my sleep, but never myself ... Oh wait. I just remembered I gave myself a black eye once in my sleep. Yeah, that made for an interesting conversation piece until the bruising disappeared.
I marvel at your "e"-less writing. The thoughts of me doing it hurt my head (of course I'm reading this at 3 a.m., so that could have a little to do with it).
As for the fight or flight, funny I was thinking of taking flight a few days ago.
nealy
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