The Value of Journaling to a Writer

"Keeping a Diary all my life helped me to discover some basic elements 

essential to the vitality of writing." -  Anais Nin

SEPT 17 - DAVE SMITH - MIDWEST POETS SERIES

Wednesday, September 17, 2014 @ 7 p.m.

Dave Smith is the author of over 20 books of poetry, fiction and non-fiction, His recent books include Hawks on Wires (poems, Louisiana State University, 2011); and Afield: Writers on Bird Dogs (edited with Robert DeMott, Skyhorse Press, 2010).

Smith has served as editor of The Southern Review, The New Virginia Review and the University of Utah Poets Series. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Guggenheim and Rockefeller foundations and has been a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, twice. He recently joined the writing faculty at the University of Mississippi, after 11 years with Johns Hopkins University’s Writing Seminars program.

Admission to the reading is $3 at the door. Books will be available for purchase at the event. A reception with book signing follows the reading. For more information, call the Center for Arts and Letters, 816-501-4607.

Confession Tuesday - I HEART Adjustments Edition.

Dear Reader:

It's been #&*@ weeks since my last confession. Actually I don't recall my last one. I'm thinking it's been over a month.

I don't know how many of you have routine chiropractic treatment (generally called adjustments) but they are a routine in my instance. This because I have a back condition that I've had since adolescence.  For years I endured the pain - trying mostly to treat with various pain medication. These were generally only moderately helpful. Once I started seeing a chiropractor several years ago, my periods of pain relief significantly improved. But I know that this requires ongoing  adjustments to keep my back skeletal structure aligned.

If I may metaphorically speak for a moment (as poets will at times do) I've come to look at my writing in much the same way as my back. I will be writing along and suddenly I become disenchanted with my results. When this happens I begin to question my writing in general. Last year, and the early part of this year I enjoyed a good deal of success with acceptances of submissions to journals. The last few months however have been dry. This too has coincided with  some hyper criticism by myself of what I've been writing over this same period. Then there comes a convergence of past, present and future. It looks something like this:

• I'm not happy with what I am currently writing
• I begin to question my earlier successes as flukes and conclude the work is not that good
• I project all of this negative crap into the future and begin to think I'll never write decent stuff again

I'm sure others may recognize this because I suspect I'm not the only one indulging in this pitiful self-assessment.

There are times in the past when I've gone through this (not the first time) and I have found it helpful to get an adjustment. Not at my chiropractor but by working  with another poet for s brief period of time. I find that it's an excellent way to learn things that will help me and reinforce things I know but begin to question because my anxieties are telling me I must be doing things all wrong.

It's been two years since I've had such a tune-up and I confess (thought I'd forgot the confession part didn't you) that the self doubt has been pretty intense lately and I've decided it's time do make arrangements to readjust  my attitude, work habits and approach to my writing so I've contacted someone who has coached me in the past and plan to get my act together this fall.

I know that I feel better as a person when I'm writing and satisfied with what I'm writing. I confess that when I go through a block or feel the quality is diminished I tend to feel something significant is missing in my life and I'm just not whole.

The good news is that I realize there is help for this too, just like there is help for my back condition.
Good to know!

Amen!

Before The Rain

Something is coming.
Over the hill. 
Through the dark
green nomenclature.

Daylight is inverting.
The sky swells.
Blues darken.

The ambiance shifting.
A quiet calm.
Then air stirs 
right through us. 

Magpie #234: Starry Night

Starry Night By Alex Ruiz

Where have I hid from the wonders.

All above me the night is Calypso.

I am Odysseus transfigured.

I, Odysseus am caught by this night,

by each star's twinkle; jewels 

of adornment in your blue hair

flowing all about the shoulders 

of the earth. I am awestruck.

I the captured cannot

capture you on canvass.

My paints, my brushes

are unworthy of such beauty.

Michael Allyn Wells

Mag 234

Magpie 233: Leaving

Yell Sound, Shetland, 2014, by R.A.D. Stainforth

Overhead the sky is an accordion
as we make way on gentle waves
like a slow dance sashaying
side to side and watch the shoreline
grow thinner like it is starving
for our return...




Michael Allyn Wells

Magpie Tales

Barry - May 20, 2003 - July 31,2014

Barry - a long-hared Dachshund, became a part of our family in 2003. He was just a stinking cute pup that you could hold in two cupped hands. 

He was a beautiful redhead - his parents were both long-haired AKA registered Dachshunds, one also red and the other cream colored.  

Barry learned at a very early age to offer his hand to shake at the snap of my fingers. He became so proficient at it he would later often come to me and offer it on his own. He especially liked to come ou on the bed beside me when I was putting on shoes and socks in the morning and initiate the hand shake ritual - perpetually offering it even as I had already shaken it. I think he must have believed he could keep me from leaving for work by doing so.

To the left is a younger Barry in Jammies.  He really did not like clothing on - I don't recall how we managed to get this picture. I look at his face on this picture and I can almost hear him saying, "this shit ain't funny."

He slept in our bed at night - sometimes sleeping on top of the blanket between my wife's extended legs. At other times, especially towards morning would come over an burrow under the blanket next to me or if I was on my side he would sometimes sleep resting his front paws and his head on top of my legs,.

If one of us was home sick in bed, he always would come and lay with is as if he was obligated to make sure we were ok. He was a great caretaker.  Below he is seen napping with Mo.

From time to time he would come and sit in my writing studio as I worked. But when I came home from my day job he was always hyper-jubilant and could not wait for me to acknowledge that I knew he was at my feet.

In winter, Barry would move through snow by sort of hopping with his little legs over the white stiff as opposed to walking through it.  The sight reminded me of bunny hops. 

As seen above, with age, Barry would trade some of his red face hair for a cream  or whiter hair.  During the past year he was failing in health - losing weight badly  and we discovered that he had developed Exocraine Pancreatic Insufficiency.  This was a life threatening condition but with an enzyme additive to everything he ate it was manageable. This however resulted in something that would break my heart routinely and the other dogs would get treats he would not be able to. He ate canned food that required to sit with the enzymes while they cultured in the dog foot before feeding. 

Thursday evening - he simply crawled into a kennel in my writing studio where normally Silas would sleep or be crated when necessary. That is where he passed away. 

Berry was survived by two adoptive brothers Klaus and more recently adopted Silas.  He joins Mo another brothers who passed away this past year. 

There is a tremendous hole left in my heart.