I Want To Write.....
Posted on 2003-04-18
It's frustrating. The only thing I feel I'm even slightly good at is writing, yet the only thing I know I will certainly never be good enough at is writing as well. No matter how hard I try, I cannot weave my words the way I want.
I want to write words the way Mozart wrote music. I want to command someone's attention. I want my work to control their heartbeat, take their breath, and be the moment for just a minute. I want to make someone know, for just a speck of time, that the world is so big, and wild, and real.
I want to write the way the wind blows - telling everything about me without ever speaking my name. I want to touch everything I encounter, change it, rough or gentle, depending on my mood. I want to be effective, forceful, but almost intangible. I want to make the trees quiver.
I would like to write about bliss and bereavement and beauty. I need to be more, have more, say more. I want to create things so real in my words that you will almost be here beside me. I want to trap someone in the language of my brilliance.
If I could write the way I want, I wouldn't have to stop and think. The words would come, flow, like a waterfall, cascading; crashing and all in the moment. Words like drops of water, words like the touch of a lover, words like the only truth you'll ever know. If I could write the way I want, I wouldn't have to try to be better. I already would be.
If I wrote like I need to, there would be words like splendor and glory. And they wouldn't mean my hope for the future, they would be my grasp of my own, present soul. If my writing were what I really want it to be, I could bring this to a heart wrenching close and make you cry, make you tremble and weep, and hide your face in your hands, overcome by my gift.
But it's not, and I can't and I'm sorry.