Published January 22, 2013
What to write
Whenever I start writing it seems aimless. I tell myself that I don't see where this is going. But I never do. Am I lost in the abyss of this white page and this blinking cursor?
Is this even making sense? Probably not, but whatever. I'll just let my hands run free around this keyboard. And fight sleep. And sip flat sparkling water. And be lost in my own writing.
Most people sip drinks, but I sip words. I taste them the same way you taste that chocolate milkshake. Or that Cherry Coke.
I chew them up and spit them back out, like Orbit gum. Sometimes in person, most times on paper. I Write and people's brows knit, like “How did she just do that?”
When I start to write I just take off. Like a jet off the runway or a train on a track. Like a knot, my mind unravels and my thoughts start to flow. My hands move like lightning as I put them down on paper.
My hearts skips with fear when my mind outruns my hands. This is not normal fear either. This is the fear that one precious word may be lost inside the many nooks and crannies of my mind forever.
My eyes hurt and wrists throb, but I go and go and go, until it's perfect. Every letter, word, sentence and paragraph.
I soak in every sentence as I read it. My mind takes to the good ones like a fish to water. It also reshapes and smooths over any imperfections, like a potter does with clay.
When the bad ones cannot be reshaped. I remind myself that these strings of words are not set in stone, but can be erased, taken back and rewritten. Once again the fear takes me, What if I erase something that really turns out to beautiful?
Still I bring myself to erase the words, and not think about their potential. I write new ones, and scrutinize them, until I'm sure that they are perfect.
After my words are honed to perfection, I quickly shift my attention and thoughts to something other than what I've just written.
Because I know if I linger on the page too long, a word or sentence will catch my eye and strike me as wrong or out of place.
Then my fingers will itch and make their way towards the backspace button. And my eyes will be frozen on the screen as I watch sentence after sentence disappear. And I'll ask myself where this is going, and shake my head because I never quite know.
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141,423 Literary Works • 674,400 Reviews
Hey Sonnet,
This is the first review I've done that isn't prose! I'm not much of a poet, but I'm going to give this a shot.
Your topic is very relatable, yet unique. I'm used to hearing about the love of writing rather than the pain of erasing what has been written and the need to make what is there perfect or get rid of it all. But every writer has experienced what you're speaking of.
I want to say this isn't what you're calling it. It has the feel of a short story or even more of a monologue. I'm not sure it could even be considered 'free verse.' Though I don't write poetry, I read it often. Even free verse has a reason for the breaks that may seem random. The breaks you have are because you had no more room in that line.
However, what does it matter, what we call it? What you've got it a very nice piece of literature.
I'm just going to point out a few little nitpicks I've got.
I think that's what you mean.
Be sounds awkward. Perhaps get?
A period causes this weird break that makes the flow weird.
The ending was a little sad, but very nice.
I liked the bit about tasting words as a chocolate milkshake or cherry coke the best I think because I know what you mean, and, even if I was going to take my writing hat off and be a normal person, I would still know what you mean. For me anyway, there's that bubbling feel of soda that is the words as they cry for freedom and what not, but I'm not going to turn your review into a poem of my own.
If you have any questions, feel free to PM me or hit my wall up.
If you want another review I do have a WRFF thread.
Megsug
Hey Sonnetandvignettes,
I'm guessing that the reason this piece is entirely in bold is because of a formatting error and not an intentional thing?
But in other words, I felt this piece was pretty neat insight into the process one goes about writing, and I think it shows that through the honesty in which you go about writing it -- the words themselves are searching and probing and wondering, and your thoughts are laid out here in the open and they're trying to organize themselves. This piece reads like more like a free-write. Something you would touch-type as you're thinking it in your mind, and that's all okay, but it's not particularly interesting.
Less so, it's not a particularly interesting topic. I've said this in a review before and I'll say it again, there are 2 things that you can bet EVERY writer is going to write about and that's 1) love and 2) writing. I'm by no means saying that you should avoid writing about writing, but if you're going to write about writing, you're going to have to work extra hard to keep your readers engaged and interested, otherwise it's just going to sound like something we've read a hundred times before.
Upon revision, I would work towards precision and cutting about 70% of this further, or if you're going for a longer piece, then develop your idea. You ramble a lot, saying a lot of the same sentiments (writing is aimless, you try to mull over the words, you try to organize your thoughts, you try to perfect the words you've written), and then you just use different words or different metaphors to say them. Oh, it's like sipping, it's like chewing gum, etc. and even though you talk about writing the whole time, your metaphors go all over the place and seem random, so that's probably part of the reason why this reads more like a free-write.
That being said, there's a lot to salvage here. You have a creative mind and you know how to use it. Now, turn on that editing gear.
I hope this helps. Let me know if you have any questions and I wish you best of luck on your writing future endeavors!
~ as always, Audy
I'm sure a lot of us go through this. Too much self-critique will surely leave you with a blank page
This was great!
Usually my reviews would be longer and find tidbits to scrutinise but this piece is just so succint and blunt that I really can't do that.
Extremely economical sense of writing: say what you want, help the reader interpret it and move on - simple but effective!
Apologies for not being more verbose, but I really can't; it's a short, but sweet, piece