Fiona writes: I found a lovely essay by Linda Gregg this week (The Art of Finding), whilst doing research for my 'Writing as Spiritual Practice' course (next running Mar '12).
I wanted to share this paragraph in full as it fits so perfectly with what we're trying to do here.
Do share your experiences of writing small stones so far in the comments section, and with each other. Do visit each other's blogs. Do remember that this exercise is to help us enjoy the world - and to help us get right up close to it, so close we can see the hairs on its paws.
"I am astonished in my teaching to find how many poets are nearly blind to the physical world. They have ideas, memories, and feelings, but when they write their poems they often see them as similes. To break this habit, I have my students keep a journal in which they must write, very briefly, six things they have seen each day—not beautiful or remarkable things, just things. This seemingly simple task usually is hard for them.
At the beginning, they typically "see" things in one of three ways: artistically, deliberately, or not at all. Those who see artistically instantly decorate their descriptions, turning them into something poetic: the winter trees immediately become "old men with snow on their shoulders," or the lake looks like a "giant eye." The ones who see deliberately go on and on describing a brass lamp by the bed with painful exactness. And the ones who see only what is forced on their attention: the grandmother in a bikini riding on a skateboard, or a bloody car wreck. But with practice, they begin to see carelessly and learn a kind of active passivity until after a month nearly all of them have learned to be available to seeing—and the physical world pours in.
Their journals fill up with lovely things like, "the mirror with nothing reflected in it." This way of seeing is important, even vital to the poet, since it is crucial that a poet see when she or he is not looking—just as she must write when she is not writing. To write just because the poet wants to write is natural, but to learn to see is a blessing. The art of finding in poetry is the art of carrying the sacred to the world, the invisible to the human."
10 comments:
I've just posted my second week of Small Stones - I've been doing them as a weekly round up.
But at the top of today's post, I felt compelled to write the following:
I didn’t realise how much this little project would feel like a meditation. Just a handful of minutes of my day observing and then later, writing down my thoughts. Nor did I realise it would quietly draw me out from the fuzzy little cocoon I still live in sometimes.
These words might seem like tiny things, but each observation represents a magical moment in time that I could’ve missed, had I not been paying attention.
The world, in all of it’s mysteries is a fascinating place if only we let it in…
svasti - so happy to hear that. Exactly what we hope for with the River. It's so easy to miss those moments, isn't it? Keep writing...
The small stone project has truly made a difference in my writing. I notice that my writing becomes more "open" when I write about the physical world. But it doesn't seem to affect my ability to share the spiritual or the emotional. Thanks again Fiona.
This post speaks volumes to me, Fiona, about seeing in a natural and poetically authentic way. Writing stones has perpetuated this beating, poetic heart of mine. Thank you!
Elizabeth, wordrustling - *verypleased*
A long blog for me. Just a final note on a great day. A big thank you to Fiona and Kaspa over at Writing Our Way Home (www.writingourwayhome.com) for encouraging and motivating me (and so many others) to write, practice presence and therefore gain insight into my own circuitous yet whole and tender process.
This is at the end of today's post. Unfortunately, I posted it to an alternate blog rather than my daily smallstone space. Here it is if you like to read it all. Once again, thank you for the motivation. Andrea Grillo
www.woodlandrose.blogspot.com
Thank you for the thanks. Gratefully received.
I started a new blog specifically for Small Stones. I'm finding a lot from this and it will become a year-long practice instead of only the month of January.
Being open to at least one intense experience each day has made a stressful month into a month of calm and pleasure for me. I plan to continue collecting small stones when January is over. The way this poet talks about it a a simple experience is exactly right for me. The similes and metaphors can come later, but they need a substratum of real feelings and seeings to make them connect to the spirit and the emotions.
thanks! Laura Hoopes
Love the words- "active passivity"!
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