Musing on Truth and Lying

The task of the poet is to invent lies in the service of speaking truth, which is of course, deeply paradoxical. However, this is the fate, not just of poets, but of every human alive: to attempt to articulate that which cannot be fully known or articulated. 

Kenneth Koch understood this tendency of poets to "have the feeling of knowing things that may be unknowable" and as a consequence, to "make grand pronouncements." He wrote: 

Something close to lying is pretending to know more than one does know, or possibly could know, and/or pretending to have more power than one has or could possibly have. The impulse to so pretend may be highly emotional (Making Your Own Days 66).

Job caught a glimpse of the Infinite when God appeared to him in the whirlwind. He cried out, "I declared that which I did not understand, things too wonderful for me which I did not know"(NASB). His immediate response was to repent in dust and ashes, and ask God for instruction.

The character of Job may have repented of his words, but the author of the book did not. Confronted by an existential crisis, the author created a masterful series of poems exploring the causes of horrific, seemingly random events and our responses to them.

Thus we see that the poet's response is almost always to write another poem. That works for us as poets, perhaps because our work is tied to strong, genuine emotions and because we are trying to discover the truth, not obscure it.

In contrast, language used to deceive and manipulate others is the bread and butter of politicians, what George Orwell called "doublespeak" in 1984. Men and women addicted to power cannot perceive or speak truth; instead, they engineer photo ops and sound-bytes for the poisonous theater of the absurd.

Paul, in 1 Timothy, complained about men who wanted to be teachers of the law yet who "did not understand either what they were saying or the matters about which they make confident assertions" (NASB). Caught up in their own rhetoric, these men - like some modern teachers and politicians - had forgotten that their proper goal was teaching people to "love from a pure heart." Lying to themselves and others, they lost their way, and the result then (as now) was divisiveness and hatred.

Proverbs 15:33 says that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom (NASB). Whatever your concept of God and the universe, it's good to begin by acknowledging that you are small and the world around you immense, astonishing, and too wonderful for any of us to fully categorize, define or explain. Kafka said it beautifully:

You do not need to leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. Do not even listen, simply wait, be quiet, still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked, it has no choice, it will roll in ecstasy at your feet (Goodreads)

Thus we come to the writing of poetry, and the articulation of impossible truth.

My Current Writing Routine

If you’re a writer, you know that your writing routines and schedule change over time. What works for you today may not work tomorrow. Or you come across an idea in a book about writing, or a friend mentions what she does, and you think, “Hey, I ought to try that.” If the experiment helps, you incorporate that new thing into your writing life.

Last January, Melissa and Dave of Journey Sixty6 hosted an online writing workshop about writing rituals, which got me thinking about how I might make my writing time more creative and more productive. Their idea was to use something sensory, rewarding, specific and repetitive to get your writer brain started every day.

"Coffee related (Free stock photo)" by trophygeek 

is licensed under CC BY 2.0.

My rewarding sensory cue is to bring my tablet and my cup of coffee to a comfy chair where I can see trees and the sky. Then I start my daily writing routine:

1. Copy three quotes or interesting phrases onto small pieces of cardstock and put them in the “Magic Cauldron” (an old metal box with astonishing powers) as inspiration for future poems.
2. Read a poem. At the moment, I’m reading The Best American Poetry 2022, but it could be any book or magazine with poems in it. Alberto Rios always told us to “prime the pump” and he was right - when I’m not reading poetry, I’m not writing poetry either.
3. Attempt to respond to the poem in some way. If I’m still feeling uninspired, I read from a book on the writer’s craft. At the moment, it’s Kennth Koch’s Making Your Own Days.
4. Attempt to write a poem. If I’m still uninspired, I shake up the Magic Cauldron, pick three random quotes and try again.
5. If I still can’t write a poem, I free write for ten minutes or go to my desk to revise something. Generally, at this point, I have generated some text of some sort, and feel pretty good about my morning, but if the Muse was elsewhere, that’s okay too. I’ve enjoyed my coffee and fired up lots of neurons. My soul has been nourished on sky and leaves moving in the wind. 

Nobody can write a good poem every day. Heck, no one can even write a mediocre poem every day. But writing isn’t just about publication. It’s also a spiritual practice.

The important thing is to show up, and listen.

To show up.

So that’s what I do.

Time Tracking Tools for Writers - Getting Started

You know you need to keep better track of your time, but how can you do it easily, without spending a lot of money?

Many software companies offer a brief free trial, followed by a monthly fee or subscription.  If you are making enough money on your writing to justify an expense of $60 or more per year, go for it.  If you're just starting out, or if you are a poet like me, you might prefer something a little less pricey.  You can always upgrade after you make the New York Times Bestseller List.

I personally use Caato, a free time tracker that lets me know how much time I'm spending on each writing task.  I can enter the times manually, or I can let it keep track of my work time down to the second.

If you were to enlarge this screen shot, you'd see that so far this year, I've spent an inordinate amount of time clearing my desk - which seems low-level but I've gotten really tired of not having room to work, so this really is a first-quarter priority for me.

Another embarrassing insight is that I've spent a lot of time on "NOS" (not otherwise specified) tasks, so in February I'll be watching that category closely, to make sure I'm really using my time well, and not just puttering about at my desk.  It's pretty easy to avoid the hard work of writing by playing at it, and I'm always prone to falling into rabbit holes.

If you don't use a Mac or if you also use mobile platforms, Caato won't be the best choice for you.  Fortunately, there are a myriad of options out there for every computer, tablet, phone and gadget imaginable.  Here's a link to a really useful list from appadvice.com.

Time Tracking Tools for Writers - Why?

  

Effective time management skills may seem more appropriate for a Fortune 500 executive than a freelance writer, but creative people may need good time management tools and habits more than anybody else on the planet.




Think about it - we are busy, creative people with obsessive tendencies who are interested in everything, who may fixate on a new idea or task and forget everything else or who may be distracted by almost anything in our environment.  Most of us have to write in odd moments while holding a full-time job and/or raising a family.

To make things worse, we're writing in a constantly changing environment, with markets that are evolving and an industry that provides less editing and marketing support to writers.  We have to take on many of the promotional and marketing tasks which were previously handled for us by publishers.

Oh, and did I mention that many of us are novices, beginners who are on the steep part of the learning curve, where every task seems to take more time than we expected, and we experience more failures than successes, whether we're writing a first novel, self-publishing the first book of poems, or just stumbling through the revision process?  Even established writers have to be lifelong learners who are constantly experimenting and trying something new in order to keep their writing fresh or to keep up with changes in the market.

If you can't manage your time effectively, how on earth are you going to get your writing done?  You need tools and skills.


CREDITS - Artwork

• "Man Typing" by wesd440. <https://openclipart.org/detail/220395/Man-Typing>
• "busy busy busy" by cactuscowboy <https://openclipart.org/detail/290725/busy-busy-busy>

Want to have a more productive New Year?

Visit Passion Planner's Home Page

Get a Passion Planner.  I'm not kidding - this is a great tool for writers because it gives you a place to:

• Keep track of dates and appointments
• Keep track of both work and personal tasks - on the same page but in separate sections
• Transform a vague goal to a workable plan complete with steps and deadlines
• Reflect on each month and decide how to improve next month
• Has a blank "Space of Infinite Possibility" for you to jot down notes, create mind maps or lists, or even just doodle every week
• Has a place for you to write your daily and weekly "Focus" (boy, do writers ever have to work hard at focusing!  At least, I do - because I am highly distractible and easily entertained).
• Has a space to write "Good Things that Happened" every week, which is awesome if you are have a tendency to focus on the negatives or want to make happy memories.
• Keep a writing log or notes on the blank (plain and graph paper!) pages in the back.
• Has a pocket in the back where you can tuck receipts, photos, clippings, whatever

Not only this, but when you buy one, they donate one to a person in need.  So you're not only helping you be happier and more organized, you're making the world a better place.

Try the Passion Planner for free - let me know what you think.

Want to write daily? Get a free 12-month calendar

You think I'm kidding, right? Nope. What inspired me to try this was Gretchen Rubin's truly life-changing book, Better Than Before. She writes:

“Comedian Jerry Seinfeld advised aspiring comedian Brad Isaac that, because daily writing was the key to writing better jokes, Isaac should buy a calendar with a box for every day of the year, and every day, after writing, cross off the day with a big red X” (page 112).

In 2017, I rarely wrote.

In 2018, I used my calendar to give me a quick visual indicator of how often I was writing. The red circles are days I wrote; the black x's are days I didn't. Simply hanging this calendar next to my desk transformed my writing habit, because I could see at a glance whether or not I had written the day before. And I hate seeing black x's instead of nice red circles.



If I counted correctly, I wrote at least 15 minutes a day for 264 days last year. To put that into perspective, if you work 5 days a week and don't take holidays or vacations, you will work 260 days a year. 260 is a great goal, and I met or exceeded that goal.

You don't have to limit yourself to writing - you could use this for exercising, or reading, or any other activity you want to do on a frequent basis.

Here's a link to a free calendar you can use for 2019:  Go to www.blank-calendar.com now.

This simple tool has been great for me.  If it helps you too, leave a comment below.

What if you're writing about the last person on Earth?

Not the last person you want to meet at the mall, but really, truly, the lone survivor on a ruined world.  What changes would that person undergo mentally?  What might they see, do, and think?

Often, nonfiction books can give us some clues.  For instance, Hallucinations by Oliver Sacks is about actual hallucinations, their characteristics, and the underlying medical or physical conditions associated with them.  Sacks is a neurologist who writes clear, interesting and informative prose; the book deals with drug- and sensory-deprivation-induced hallucinations as well as those associated with medical conditions such as dementia or blindness.  It doesn't deal with hallucinations associated with mental illness, which is actually rather scary, because you find yourself thinking Anyone, even me, could suddenly begin to hallucinate.  That's not a happy thought.

However terrifying the implications might be, books like this are especially helpful to SF and fantasy writers, because so often we write about people in extreme or unusual circumstances.  Perhaps our main character is the last living person on a spaceship or a dying world.  What would he see and hear?  Perhaps one of our characters has just imbibed an unusual drink given to her by one of the fae.  What would she experience?

Read Hallucinations, and you can make better, more believable guesses.

http://www.oliversacks.com/books/hallucinations/

Learning is an important part of living the creative life.

Most creative people are curious,

and would probably describe themselves as lifelong learners and/or readers.

What kind of learner and reader are you? 

Poem: Trapped Inside

I first wrote this in 1986, when I was taking watercolor classes from Dale Boatman, and was terribly frustrated by the tedium of painting from someone else's photographs.  Just because Mr. Boatman was fascinated by yuccas and palo verdes in bloom didn't mean that I wanted to paint desert landscapes.

Nevertheless, I learned a great deal from that wonderful man about the persnickety medium of watercolor, composition, choosing an effective but limited palette, mixing paint, choosing and using brushes - and in the process, I learned about living, too.

Everyone should meet a happy artist.  It's liberating and refreshing to discover that one need not suffer for one's art, that a creative life can be a joyful one.

This early poem is an attempt to express some of I learned from Dale Boatman.

TRAPPED INSIDE

We paint from photographs
one stroke at a time,
forget to look
at trees.  Our vision
leaves us blind.

We mute the color
of the eye, beguile
fools with guileless lies,
re-making everything
in our own image.

Let's be honest here.
That which is, IS.
Nothing else is clear.

Still, we chip
at marble till we see
the head we believe
to be
trapped inside.

©2013 Tina Quinn Durham.  All rights reserved.

To learn more about Dale Boatman and his work, click here.

Creativity: No such thing as a failure or a false step!

In every discipline, when you attempt something new, you will experience failure along the way.  Success is the result of multiple, persistent attempts.

In science, for instance, Thomas Edison tested thousands of materials, searching for something which would form a lasting filament in an incandescent light bulb.  Vertex Pharmaceuticals "tested over 600,000 chemicals in cells with the defective protein that causes cystic fibrosis" (Drug Fulfills Promise Of Research Into Cystic Fibrosis Gene, NPR, Jan. 2013).

The creative process also requires experimentation, determination, and perhaps even a sense of play.

When I created my second feather metamorphosis, I saved some of my failures along with my steps toward success, and I included those failures in my Feather Vision 2 video.  I'm sure there were dozens more that were so awful they didn't get saved, but were necessary steps along the way.

 from "Crossroads" by Wendy Waldman, as recorded by Don McLean

You know I've heard about people like me,
But I never made the connection.
They walk one road to set them free
And find they've gone the wrong direction.

But there's no need for turning back
'Cause all roads lead to where I stand.
And I believe I'll walk them all
No matter what I may have planned. 

Transforming Ordinary Reality Using A Scanner & Photoshop

That's what creativity is all about, right?  Seeing the extraordinary in the ordinary, believing that we have something to say or make or do, and then having the courage to do it?

My "Feather Vision" video shows how I went from feather to abstract art using Photoshop 7.0 and various filters.  It's part of a series of digital abstracts I titled "Metamorphoses."

It's probably a good thing I didn't come across a dead cockroach during this time, or I might up ended up with something positively Kafka-esque!

Creativity: How can we access an extraordinary reality?

Reinhold Marxhauser talked about the need to make all things new:

Nothing I have done has been done in the past.  I am doing my part to upgrade or get rid of old symbols.*

Marxhauser also talks about how Jesus "gave meaning to simple, everyday things and related them to His Kingdom" (ibid).  On some level, all of this keeps coming back to attention and awareness.  Being there in the moment.

If I went through each day of my life with my eyes open, believing that "nothing I have done has been done in the past," and were fully aware, what would my perceptions be?  How would my daily work be transformed?  And how would that awareness translate into art, and poetry?

Or would I simply be, for the moment, fully aware and alive?

Ordinary feather

Ordinary feather transformed

---

Every poet knows, however, what every good theologian affirms, namely that grace is everywhere and that nothing which exists is superficial. Ordinary reality is an oxymoron.

Padovano, Anthony T.   "Rain and Grace."  http://edge.net/~dphillip/Padovano.html  Accessed 14 January 2013.

---

*Marxhausen, Reinhold.  The Door. Mar/Apr 93, #128.  "Interview with Reinhold Marxhausen, the Stardust Man,"  page 13.

Creativity: Art and religion make us whole

To piggy-back on yesterday's post, art (poetry, music, drama, etc.) does more than remind us that we have a soul; creative endeavor is restorative, both for artist and audience.  Because we are created in the image of a creative God, we are meant to create; and when we cease to make art or music or beauty in its myriad forms, in some sense, we die.

I want to carry life, not death, within me.

Artist Reinhold Marxhausen pretty much said it all in a 1993 interview:

Art and religion have much to offer mankind and are partners in "whole making."  Before print, books, film and media came into being, illuminated manuscripts, stained glass, sculpture, vaulted ceilings, majestic music, mosaics, and paintings stimulated the senses to feelings of awe and wonder.  The art forms elevated the spirits and the feelings of worshipping mankind way beyond the power of the abstract words.  We have lost the ability to symbolize, and what I am trying to do is make new symbols.  My things have new meaning.  Nothing I have done has been done in the past.  I am doing my part to upgrade or get rid of old symbols.

Jesus did the same thing, really.  In a sense, Jesus was an artist who used parables, stories, and metaphors to explain the Kingdom of God to the disciples.  He gave meaning to simple, everyday things and related them to His Kingdom.  His stories were understandable, and the Kingdom became available to everyone on earth.  That's why Christianity is so unbelievable at times - it is so simple and accessible.  Jesus talked about farmers, flowers, birds, seeds, rich people, beggars, vineyards, soil ... and the people understood.

Marxhausen, Reinhold.  The Door. Mar/Apr 93, #128.  "Interview with Reinhold Marxhausen, the Stardust Man,"  page 13.

---

Links To and About Reinhold Marxhausen's Work 

(and more - there's always more LOL)

• Unfocused Blog - entry on Reinhold Marxhausen's influence
• http://marxhausen.blogspot.com/ - "A place where his work can live"
• Reinhold Marxhausen on David Letterman, March 25, 1986

What a delightful man!

Link to the [Wittenberg] Door magazine interviews, which are always fascinating.  Even if they haven't published since 2008, the Door interviews are still a great read.

The Healing Power of Creativity

Art reminds us that we have a soul

When I lived in the Phoenix metro area, I discovered that the Phoenix Art Museum was a great place to hang out.  And not just because it was free on Wednesdays, and not just because one summer, the air conditioner wasn't working (that was the year the kids took art classes, joined a bowling league, participated in the library's summer reading program - anything that got us out of the house and into an air-conditioned space.  But I digress.)  I loved the spaces of the museum, the quiet, the works of art that I got to know as if they were good friends.

And I picked up a brochure that had this wonderful quote from Stella Adler:

Life beats down and crushes the soul and art reminds you that you have one.

Creative work can be the "green pasture" that our soul lies down in, whether it's our own creative work or the opportunity to enjoy the work of others.

Stella Adler, acclaimed actress and acting teacher

"The Southland of the Heart", Bruce Cockburn

Creativity: Recognizing where you are as sacred space

Set aside time to become engaged

I've been thinking about a writer's sense of place - an awareness that where we are is important.  I tend to believe that wherever I am, it's boring and insignificant, and if I could just get somewhere else, I could write.

Ken Lamberton wrote an amazing book about being a naturalist while in prison.  He was a teacher who fell in love with a student, and - well, you can guess what happened next.  It's a heart-breaking story, and you can find out more about it here:

• Ken Lamberton - Wikipedia article
• Ken Lamberton's official site
• Ken Lamberton's old official site

 Okay, so what's the point?  How does a convicted child molester relate to sacred space?

No matter how screwed up your life is, no matter how limited your options are, you can still observe, create, redeem and restore.  Corrie Ten Boom was in a Nazi concentration camp; Ken Lamberton was in a state prison.  Creativity and sacred space depends, in part, on you - the meal becomes a feast because of what you bring to the table.

Ken Lamberton included a wonderful quote from Richard Nelson in his book, Wilderness and Razorwire, and I wanted to share it with you:

"I wonder," Richard Nelson writes, "what it would mean if each person, at some point in his life, set aside some time to become thoroughly engaged with a part of the home community: a backyard, a woodlot, a pond, a stretch of river, a hillside, a farm, a park, a creek, a county, a butte, a marsh, a length of seacoast, a ridge, an estuary, a cactus forest, an island.  How would it affect the way each person views herself or himself in relationship to the natural surroundings, or to the earth as a whole?"

Nelson, Richard.  Quoted by Ken Lamberton,  Wilderness and Razorwire:  A Naturalist's Observations from Prison, pp. 144-145.  San Francisco:  Mercury House, 2000.

Become alive, become aware, become engaged 

with the place you live.  It won't just affect how you view yourself.  It will change how you see everything - including your writing.

Creativity: Work space is sacred space

Sacred space is not just a garden or a place we come to pray.  For the creative person, our work space may be the most sacred location in our lives.

http://myimaginarybrooklyn.tumblr.com/post/22821147449/writing-desk-with-typewriter

     "Sacred space is a space that is transparent to transcendence, and everything within such a space furnishes a base for meditation....  When you enter through the door, everything within that space is symbolic, the whole world is mythologized.
     "To live in a sacred space is to live in a symbolic environment where spiritual life is possible, where everything around you speaks of the exaltation of the spirit.
     "This is a place where you can simply experience and bring forth what you are and what you might be.  This is the place of creative incubation.  At first you might find that nothing happens there.  But if you have a sacred place and use it, something eventually will happen.
     "Your sacred place is where you find yourself again and again" (145).

Campbell, Joseph.  Quoted by Lawlor, Anthony, AIA.  The Temple in the House:  Finding the Sacred in Everyday Architecture.  New York: Putnam, 1994.

Poem: The Accident of Sacred Space

I wrote this poem in 1996 while landscaping the front yard of my unremarkable suburban home. I suppose that the title of this poem is ironic, because all who seek transcendent spiritual experiences know that, in modern life, sacred space is rare.  It must be deliberately sought, or carefully created and maintained.

The Buddhist meditation garden evolved as a way for people living on a very crowded island to experience serenity and nature, no matter who or what was next door.

In the aesthetics of a meditation garden, I found a way to survive as a poet in conservative Mesa, Arizona.

---

The Accident of Sacred Space

The square rocks are Buddhas
which cannot be moved.

Water, which purifies, runs
east to west through the garden, 
trailing the river of the sun.

If there is no water, use small rocks.
They crunch underfoot.
The sound is like water.

Or place a bowl by the door.
Chip the edge of the bowl.
Wash your hands in it.

Permit surprises. 
Bring the mountains into the city. 
Listen to the stones.

Reuse what you can.
Make your own mountains.
Make your heart a square stone

beside water.

©2013 Tina Quinn Durham.  All rights reserved.

Creativity and Prayer: You must create a space for both

I first encountered Robert Benson's amazing book, Living Prayer, on a public library shelf at a particularly dark time in my life - it was undoubtedly a divine appointment rather than mere chance or coincidence.

What Robert Benson said about workspace, prayer and writing rings as true for me today as it did then.  I hope it will encourage you to create a space in your home and in your heart for creative endeavor and for time with God.  It need not be a large space, or a magnificent one, but if you are to live creatively, you need a place and a time set aside for spiritual renewal.

Remember that Jacob encountered God only AFTER he sent sent his wives, children and all his men on ahead, and spent the night alone in the desert.  To receive a blessing, he had to step away from the people he loved, and be willing to risk his life in a dark and lonely place.

Maybe that's why, sometimes, we're so reluctant to work, to pray, or to make room for the transcendent Other in our lives.

---

from Living Prayer by Robert Benson:

     Every writer I know writes in a different place and in a different way from every other writer I know.  But they all have a place to write.  A place that has been set apart for it.  They do it because they know that to live the life of an artist, you must produce art.  Otherwise, you are just cleverly avoiding the curse of the dreaded day job and maintaining an excuse to be shy and wear funny clothes.  Having a place helps produce art, if for no other reason than that you at least have a place to go and hope such a mysterious thing will take place.  To live a life of prayer, one must produce prayer.  Which is harder to do if you have no place in which to do so.  "We can talk to God anywhere," we say, and it is true.  But more often than not, because we do not have a somewhere to talk to God, we talk to God nowhere.  One can build an altar in one's heart, of course, but it can take some time, according to the saints.  Most of us could use the reminder that might come to us if we would put an altar in our house while we pray for the day in which we ourselves become the living sacrifice such an altar deserves.
     Any place can be more or less sacred, depending on what we ourselves bring to it.  Our own attitudes and expectations and actions can contribute or not to the sacredness of the place.  A temple can become a den of thieves, or so I have heard.  A picnic rug can become a sanctuary, or so I have found.

Robert Benson. Living Prayer, pp. 158-159.  New York: Putnam, 1998.

Creativity: Start as you mean to go on.

But above all, start!

'Nuff said.

Creativity, Attention and Focus: YOU make something interesting

Living the ADHD life is a bit like being jerked around on a rollercoaster:  I'm always in motion, it's always exciting, and the view is always changing.  Hold on tight!

My personal attention span has a limit of about 11 minutes.  If I've set a timer, I can probably stay with a task for 15 minutes, but the last four minutes is really, really hard.

I got through college and graduate school literally 15 minutes at a time.  My writing and creative processes are punctuated by periods of intense physical activity - the need to calm myself, to burn off the energy stored up while sitting still.  Housework and tedious tasks are often accomplished in spurts, between writing or drawing (if I can stay away from video games).

Thus I am fascinated by Annie Dillard's insights about artistic endeavor and creativity.  I like this quote, because it reminds me that no object or task is inherently interesting - it's really what we bring to the table that makes the experience worthwhile.

At the beginning of the year, this is a great thing to remember!

---

When Annie Dillard was a child, she discovered The Natural Way to Draw by Kimon Nicolaides, and began to sketch her baseball glove every day.  Looking back from an adult perspective, she wrote:

   One thing struck me as odd and interesting.  A gesture drawing took forty-five seconds; a Sustained Study took all morning.  From any still-life arrangement or model's pose, the artist could produce either a short study or a long one.  Evidently, a given object took no particular amount of time to draw; instead the artist took the time, or didn't take it, at pleasure.  And, similarly, things themselves possessed no fixed and intrinsic amount of interest; instead things were interesting as long as you had attention to give them.  How long does it take to draw a baseball mitt?  As much time as you care to give it.  Not an infinite amount of time, but more time than you first imagined.  For many days, so long as you want to keep drawing that mitt, and studying that mitt, there will always be a new and finer layer of distinctions to draw out and lay in.  Your attention discovers— seems thereby to produce—an array of interesting features in any object, like a lamp.

Dillard, Annie.  AN AMERICAN CHILDHOOD.  PILGRIM AT TINKER CREEK/AN AMERICAN CHILDHOOD/THE WRITING LIFE.  Camp Hills, PA:  Harper and Row, 1990.  Book of the Month Club edition.  Originally published 1987.  p. 79.

Creativity: "Ex Nihilo" by Tina Quinn Durham

I wrote this prose poem in 1991, when my family was flying into Washington, D.C. at night to visit my sister.  If you're familiar with the city, you know that Pierre Charles L'Enfant modeled it after European cities "avenues radiating out from rectangles" ("Washington, D.C." - Wikipedia).  The original plan for the city looked like this:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:L%27Enfant_plan.jpg#file

Imagine this a few hundred years later - radiating avenues pulsating with electric lights like a constellation of earth-bound stars - and you'll get the central image of this poem.

EX NIHILO

They want me to write poems where everything flows together until love and lemonade are a single, contradictory celebration stinging my tongue - but it’s not like that.  Everything fits together and you can see it the way you see roads coming together into the airport.

It’s all one star raying out into a night that dances with small clouds, and one day we won’t wonder why parts of the expansion pulse bright then dim, because then it will be all light, illumination forever, not surge and brown-out but light pure and simple.

It’s more than positive paranoia, it’s a rush of everything caught in the strobe of truth - we hang poised for a moment before plunging back into the dance - we're going to dance it forever until we come to the place where forever begins.

©2013 Tina Quinn Durham.  All rights reserved.