love, z.s.

{reference points}

there never would have been enough strength. what you needed me to do, be, threatened to break my back.

so i walked.
walked fast, far and long.

i found a place for myself.
a small, simple, pretty place i love.

i had no choice but to make it home.

i found other ways to love.  but none that awakened. none that stayed weekends, cooked breakfast, or drew baths.  none that fed me soup or wrapped me in blankets when the chill came.  none that laughed, cried or moaned with me.  none that kissed me in the rain.

i loved in cool, collected ways.  ways that earned gratitude, friendships and laughter.  ways that danced, sung, prayed sometimes.  it was not passion, but it was often joy.  most of the time, this was enough, this open, public love.

most.

i manage.
i survive.

my heart is a kind of desert, one that remembers itself as rainforest: lush and fertile, plush with brilliant flowers and technicolor birds.

yes, there is beauty in the desert: a stark palette of necessity, utility.  the sky is still its blue; some cacti flower.

life just under the surface...love buried in sand full of dormant seeds and preserved pollen.  the arid blessing that maintained the bodies of ancestors for thousands of years.  a whispering love, praying the wind will serve as audience.  the occasional, elusive oasis fed by hidden waters.

it is there.

it is still deciding what to be.

brash as an explorer, excavating buried realms?
skittish as a lizard?

it survives, though.

like so many things that shouldn't, but do...it survives.

because it is, i am.

and i go on.

in my little home
in the desert

with
a love
that
awaits
a monsoon.

z. soledad

i have been opening to the blessings of solitude
since, in some ways, i have no choice.

i thought again of names.

zefina soledad

she that god has blessed with increase
yet who is often alone...

some part of my soul has named herself.

and it is good.

progress...

the manuscript is up to 50ish pages, total.  but much of that is appendices, the intro, stuff like that.

i'd say maybe 40 pages is pure content.

excerpt posts coming...maybe?

inception

Sat., Aug. 23, 1986

Dear Diary,  

I just got you today. I'm going to write a [sic] lots of stuff in you. 
I can't sleep tonight so I took you out, unlocked you and wrote in you. good night. 

Lesley :-)

come, dambala...

mama nina
workin the ancestral antenna

givin the downpressor
somethin he can feel
in the heart and soul
he act like he ain't got

...til he gets where he's goin.

you slavers will know
what it's like to be a slave...



 

post-retrograde flow...

this project has begun to write itself.  

it definitely needs polishing; the words aren't where i want them to be, but that's all right.  right now it's about laying the foundation.  drafts, drafting and more drafts ain't nothin but methodology.  

there's an outline now.  it's always been difficult to start with one.  instead, i enjoy letting the work independently shapeshift.  when it tells me what it is, then i can sketch a skeleton. 

if anyone's actually reading this, i know i'm being vague about the specifics.  although i've gotten quite a bit done, it's still gestating.  womb-darkness is the best thing for it.

off for some freewriting...

an aside

dear life,

you are throwin a sista a SERIOUS curveball right now.

i don't think i like it.

i'm trying to accept it. you know i have a bit of a control thing going.

i suppose...i'm just trying to understand. full circle i get. this? this is...beyond that.

gimme a clue?

thanks,

o.

status report

the project is blossoming.  i'm fairly settled on the topic/tone, a format is emerging, and i've found a good voice.

i've learned to pace myself. i can get really excited about something only to wind up really burned out. i remind myself that i am crafting something, painting a very particular picture.  none of the books i love were kicked out in a month just because.

it will be finished when it's finished, and winter is a fantastic time for gestation.

there is no rush.

this is the part of the game where i congratulate myself for holding on to bits of "nothing" writing, even when i have no clue where it's going to go and it bugs the organizer in me. 'cause this bit of nothing is surely turning into something.

above all: i am grateful.

i thought about working tonight, but i realize i need to deal with some messages from last night, and get into my evening journaling.

plus it's the first full day of my moon cycle, and when that falls on a weekday, i try to take the evening to decompress.  getting too cerebral wouldn't be comfortable.

onward and upward...    

so...it's nanowrimo...

and i will not be writing a novel this month.

i've already committed myself to an inner check-in and a 100 day gratitude exercise beginning in december, so i'm easing into winter in a different way.

but there's a vision taking shape...

however, i did make some micromovements this evening.  might do some actual tweaking / writing / editing this weekend.

chills in the air slow me down considerably.

what am i doing?

so i took another look at "the project" last night, and read a little more Fruitflesh this morning.

all that brought me to this: what am i trying to write, really?

am i capable of writing a novel right now?  should i stick to short stories? i think any ambitious works of fiction would take some real workshopping to come to fruition.

am i fighting a proclivity towards memoir, diarist prose, and/or some kind of instructive / inspirational work? 

maybe i'd be better off kicking out a screenplay?

do i need to mix all of the above into some new stew?  

i'm thinking, not repressing.  still, i wonder what i might be doing since this thing isn't taking any discernible shape or form beyond characters introducing themselves at length.

i've also become aware that i haven't truly tapped into the essence of my writing or my identity as a writer since adolescence.  mainly because i spent so much time trying not to write.  there's some juicy issues in there...  

whatever. 

back to scribbling...