Slow Going Plus Writing

I’ve been working on another piece that combines part of an old linocut with gouache paint. It’s been a tough one in terms of design. I’ll post it here once I finish it. Yesterday I said aloud while working: “I should just throw this against the wall.” After that I made some progress! Here’s a detail of the work:

Meanwhile I’ve also started writing again. Years ago I wrote often, but had mostly stopped except for keeping a journal of daily events and dreams. Now I’ve returned to writing as a way to slow the loss of nouns as I age. I find that writing longhand helps me.

This week I recalled an excellent book I used to refer to when I facilitated expressive arts groups. It’s called PoemCrazy by Susan Goldsmith Wooldridge. It’s a very lively book, beautifully written, that offers many, many ideas about writing poems without getting hung up on trying to define what poems are or are not.

I got out the book and am using it to give me jumping off places. Here’s something I wrote the other night that began with the author’s talking about names.

I will write myself into a new name, the other side of Lily, a blue shadow under pines in a night forest where the luna moth flies and I sleep, a bear of a dog by my side. I am covered with needles not of my grandfather’s, but of trees who wish me no harm as I wish them none. It is here I die each night, ready for my last, happy to awaken to the sun and the tiny birds stirring the air with song. Here I am no outcast. I am on the other side of war.