Even Ground

Like most sensitive and interesting people, before I was twenty-two, I had got me to a therapist. I was not getting out of bed, and sticky with unhappiness about the end of my growing-up love affair, and I was ready to have someone talk some sense to me. She said, “If you don’t want to […]

Eating Your Words

There is a difference between kissing and talking about kissing. There is a difference between dating and marriage (apparently). And there is a difference between reading and memorizing, which is actually what I’m considering here. I took my students to a writing workshop last week, and one presenter explained the importance of memorizing poems. That […]

The Creature

There are many, many things that happen I would never write here. Some bits are too delicate. If I opened up my hands, they would blow away. I would lose them. And many of my judgments are too painful for the interested parties. Too painful, and also ridiculously temporary, as fallible as all human conclusions. There’s no sense in upsetting people with one moment’s verdict. They might come out not guilty the next time, and then nobody’s better off.

I do like to pluck up a weed in my brain and try to praise it. Or smack down an insect of my own dervish craziness. Nonfiction is good for examination. Maybe someone else can look at it, as awed as I am by its construction and its invasiveness.

Fiction is different.

Send Off

A hospital is an exciting place: some people are there to sprout new people; some people are there to die. The post office is clearly a less dramatic location. Still, as I stood in line, I was cradling my stack of papers like I held a state secret. There were three people ahead of me. […]