I Don't Want to Write About . . .

Today I don’t want to write about myself.
I don’t want to write about this blank page, this pen or this hand moving across the page.
I don’t want to write about writing or reading.
I don’t want to write about yesterday or today or tomorrow.
I don’t want to write about religion or politics, my menstrual cycle or lack there of.
I don’t want to write about food or how it grows, how to prepare it or what it tastes like.
I don’t want to write about my ancestors, grandchildren or lack there of.
I don’t want to write about children or stepchildren, husbands or ex-husbands.
I don’t want to write about sex – too much, too little, or just the right amount.
I don’t want to write about licking or caressing or inserting this or that.
I don’t want to write about kissing or the difference between a woman’s mouth and a man’s mouth.
Don’t ask me to write about any of those things today.

Why I Write

I write because it pleases me to put words to what thrills or devastates me. This delineation of my life weaves my experience together into a shawl that I can wrap around myself.

This shawl sometimes circles around me to pull me inward in meditation. Other times, its fringe is dancing around me, as I dance a celebration of my life and the circle of life itself.

Feel free to join in my introspection, my terror, my fleeting mind, my sensual delights and my celebration dance. And I look forward to joining your sentences when you share them. Together we write the uncommon greatness of the common woman.

I Hone My Words

I hone my words
on the hardness of my skull
until they shine along the edge,
sharp enough to split a hair-
but that’s not enough.

Then I let them penetrate my heart,
to enliven them
with the DNA of my deep sweet soul-
to mobilize them with tails made of tales—
to soften their hard heads enough to impregnate something into being.

In this way
when they swim into your eyes
your ears—
If you are wet & fertile of mind—
a chosen One might merge with some expectant part of you,
to grow into some new life form,
to take root in the welcome womb of your imagination,
to gestate within you,
until, with the force of your long held in expression,
you open your mouth widely enough
and loudly enough
to give it birth.