This is Hard to Write,

but I said I'd report on the progress of my play. So here it goes: I've read the play with my husband, read it with an actor Douglas Kenning, and now have gotten it critiqued by my assistant, and they all confirmed this tiny but insistent voice inside of me about certain parts of my play. It needs to be rewritten. I didn't want to cop to it. I wanted to cut to the chase, get it up... But I noticed that all these different points of view often corollated with a slightly nauseous pulling sensation I'd feel inside when I'd read certain sections. So tag I'm it and I have to rewrite. I also realize that part of my reluctance was my nervousness about whether or not I could do it. The play came through me in two weeks. It was a gift. How could I go back and find the inner threads to reweave places where the fabric was stretched too thin? How could I cut some of the imagery without destroying the integrity? Now I know I can do it. I was writing so fast that I skipped stuff. And my listening wasn't quite as acute on some days.

One of the scary parts of being an artist is sometimes you've got to break some eggs and the risk is sometimes you can't put it back together if you don't like it. It's scary, but as the egg breaks I'm going to try and let in the excitement too.

So my plan is to spend the next while listening to my play in as many different ways as I can so I can feel the core and let the core tell me what to write. I find myself taking a deep breath.

A single screw of Flesh

I'm still working on this poem written out in the April 22 post. It has so much mortality in it. I confront it again and again. Finally realized besides my creative nervousness and tension, the poem is creating tension in me. I have to give in to it. She does offer a beautiful bouquet in it. Perhaps what is single most important about being human. She will not relent. She will not let the gods talk her out of the gift and out of the Peril of being human. To know this poem is one thing, but it does navigate you to fundamental experiences if you let it.

I read recently that a poet's breath is in her poems. Of course. What an amazing experience. So today I'm going back and trying to drop into the poem. Let the rhythms take me and the raw words evoke me. I'm paying particular attention to the dashes, the punctuation, and the capitol letters.

Anyone with any thoughts or experiences on this poem, PLEASE post. The poem keeps unraveling and unraveling for me. And every time I think I've got it, something else emerges. My husband pointed out that "new-mailed" probably means armoring with metal, i.e., "nerves of steel". That's probably correct. Or, she might have been playing with multiple meanings/puns: new-mailed (as in mailed a letter) playing off of "Just granted."

Just for the record, I don't think interpretations are essential, but are tools for diving back into the poem and opening up more treasure boxes.

- Christina