An Attitude of Noticing

Every morning

the world

is created. 

Under the orange 

sticks of the sun

the heaped

ashes of the night

turn into leaves again 

and fasten themselves to the high branches ---

and the ponds appear

like black cloth

on which are painted islands    - Mary Oliver

Poet, Mary Oliver believes in an "attitude of noticing." When she opens her senses, nature reveals its details.

Writing-as-mindfulness requires full presence in every moment. It requires an act of curiosity.

Focus on attention, awareness and an attitude of noticing.  Reveal nature's wonder in your writing today.

A View of Uncertainty

“The most precious thing in life is its uncertainty.”  Kenko

In the 14th century, a poet and Buddhist monk named Yoshido Kenko wrote thoughts on life, death, nature, manners, humility and simplicity.  He lived in exile at a cottage where he composed his essays.

Kenko believed in 'zuihitsu' - follow the brush - as a method of composition.  He painted thoughts as they came to him on scraps of paper, then attached them to his cottage walls.  They survived through the centuries by chance.  A poet friend collected them from the walls and Tsurezuregusa (Essays in Idleness) became a part of Japanese literature.

He believed leaving something incomplete gives room for growth. Kenko disliked perfection, believing asymmetry and irregularity became better goals in life.  His imagery included moons in the clouds, cherry blossoms strewn and faded on the earth.  He admired the uncertainty of a branch about to blossom.

Here are three of Kenko's views.
                     How will you follow the brush today and write about them?

A certain recluse, I know not who, once said that no bonds attached him to this life, and the only thing he would regret leaving was the sky.

Are we only to look at flowers in full bloom, at the moon when it is clear?

To sit alone in the lamplight with a book spread out before you, and hold intimate converse with men of unseen generations—such is a pleasure beyond compare.

The Networks and Writing

Shakespeare, Montaigne or Dante probably would have used Facebook or Tweeted. They might have caused their languages to evolve with their own varieties of text-speak.

Do you believe our social network of communication improves the quality of thinking and writing? Or, does it compromise syntax and grammar?

How has "instant communication" affected your writing?

People Watching

"What saves me from the tedium of another day is falling hopelessly in love with the people I meet: the curly-haired barista at the coffee shop who hands me my change as if dipping his fingers into holy water; the elderly couple who grow giant bubble-gum-colored puffs of dahlias; the toddler across the street who bleats,"Mama, come see?" 

- Bobbie Willis

Don't watch the news for a day.  Instead, watch for an amazement or amusement in humanness.  Look for the greatness in others and discover a few precious moments.

Share them with us.

Endurance: Looking for the Capo d'astro bar

Back in the sixties, Bud Robbins was hired to write advertising copy for the Aeolian Piano Company.  The ad would appear in the New York Times for their grand piano. Robbins knew nothing about pianos and couldn't even play one.  He had no idea why someone would spend $5000 (back then) when they could purchase a Baldwin or Steinway for the same amount.

Bud toured the factory for two days.  Just before leaving, the national sales manager escorted him into the showroom.  The Aeolian piano appeared alongside the Steinway and Baldwin, in an elegant setting.

The sales manager mentioned, "Even though all pianos look alike, ours is heavier. "

"What makes yours heavier," asked Robbins.

"We have the Capo d'astro bar," the reply.

The sales manager asked Robbins to get down on his knees and look under the piano.  He pointed to a metallic bar fixed across the harp that bore down on the highest octaves.

"It takes 50 years before the harp in the piano warps.  That's when the Capo d'astro bar goes to work. It prevents that warping," the manager explained.

Bud Robbins searched under the Baldwin and Steinway but didn't find the same bar, only a toy-like version.

Robbins asked, "It doesn't go to work for 50 years?"

The manager said, "Yes, that's why the Metropolitan Opera House in New York City uses this piano. Their bar should be working by now."

Robbins went to the person in charge of moving the Metropolitan Opera House to the Lincoln Center, Carmen Rise Stevens.  She told him the only item they took with them was the piano because of its tone and quality that only gets stronger with time.

During his advertising career, Bud Robbins searched and discovered the Capo d'astro bar in all his clients and products dedicated to excellence and endurance.

Everyone has a strength that kicks in when most needed.   Search for your own Capo d'astro bar. It will enable you to outlast challenges during times of stress.

After you locate your Capo d'astro bar, describe what it looks and feels like when it goes to work.

Possibilities and Open Spaces

It is generally a good thing to carry possibilities in your pocket: you never know when you might need them - unknown

Consider the possibilities we need as writers. We write ourselves out of and into holes and spaces. Openings appear.

We learn to break open to our process and discover it's vital to, "Open all your pores and bathe in all the tides of nature," as Henry David Thoreau observed.

How do we also remain open to the changes and transitions in life and avoid the traps? We need to observe nature's ways and watch the unfurling of a rose. The times of twilight intrigue when the sky opens to light and darkens at dusk. The trill of birdsong out of silence awakens us at dawn. What occurs within the fissures where water sneaks and bubbles form?

Our awareness pushes our eyes, ears, noses and taste buds to the next curiosity. Do we dare fall into an opening, like Alice? Will we permit our pens and fingers on keyboards to explore with courage and risk?

When we look for openings, we risk the chance to make mistakes. If closed, we miss opportunities and all the wild and wide open places.

Celebrate the season and spring into possibilities today.

Creative Write: What does it mean to become open and receptive to possibilities?

Choose a metaphor for how you might expresss openness. Explore possibilities in freewrites. Consider what represents an opening of awareness: Write about a missing piece.

Short Story Basics

Setting:  Where does it occur?  Show it in a room, a natural setting, or within the inner reaches of the character's mind.

Character(s):  Something happens to someone who is called the "protagonist."  Someone or something else (the weather, an unknown force) is involved to provoke the action called the "antagonist."

Conflict: During the course of the story, something (action) has to happen.  What is the initiating incident or the set up of the problem)  The protagonist wants something and struggles to get it.

Crisis:  The short story has only one pivotal point.  Something intensifies the struggle creating tension.  The dam is filled and about to go.

Climax: The dam bursts.  The protagonist makes a choice.

Realization and Resolution:  The protagonist changes.  What is learned?  What is left behind?

Begin the story in the middle of something. Something happened before and something will happen after.  Don't tell the reader everything.  Intrigue the reader and move to a stopping point that begs the reader to continue wondering . . . and then what?

Leave the reader with an image.