Books Incarnate

Confession Tuesday - Fallen Away Confessor Edition

Dear Reader:

I feel like a fallen away Confessor. I've not been really good about Confession Tuesday lately. I suppose that's where my confession should start.

I confess that  I feel like I should be in bed right now. I came down with a cold yesterday and it was full blown today. The sniffles, chest  congestion, that burning  feeling in your chest and a cough that gives me a headache. When I cough like this I feel like my brain is being battered around inside my skull.

I confess that Diabetic Tussin sucks. It advertises on the package no sugar, no alcohol, no Sorbitol, no fructose and gluten free. I has nothing in it to give it any kind of flavor - and that would be okay if I feel like it was doing me any good. But no, it taste crappy and I don't feel any better for using it.

I'm in a pretty crappy mood to. My wife has maintained for years I do not do sick well. I will acknowledge I get pretty grumpy.

Historically I have often denied sickness as long as I could. I resist  taking a break and work through it. The past few years I have had chest colds the have settled in my lungs and have really knocked me down. Because if this, I tend now to take these kind of things much more seriously.

I confess that I want to be writing tonight and yet I will forgo it because I'm pretty sure I'm just not going to get into it. I never like going long without writing.  Writing keeps my mood balanced. I like getting lost in my writing.

I think I am going to call it a night and go read a couple poems from a book I just pulled out of my book case. Forms of Intercession by Jayne Pupek.  That will be my concession for not writing tonight. Then head to bed a bit early.

Mag 237: Snow Blindness

The shear delight in soft white.
A burst of morning on my horizon.
Dangling, delicate, delicious.
Woven  intricacies of light and space.
I am lost in the bright blight of colorlessness.
Entranced in my own snow blizzard




Michael Allyn Wells


Mag 237

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.