Jen R.’s Reviews > Dear Memory: Letters on Writing, Silence and Grief > Status Update

More and more, I think writing is not a choice but an act of patience. An act of listening to silence, into silence.

…Osip Mandelstam said: What tense would you choose to live in? I want to live in the imperative of the future passive participle- in the what ought to be? That's where I want to live too—in the what ought to be. I don't know where this is or what it looks like, but I know somehow it begins with language.

I have spent a lifetime believing that the main thing that mattered was being smart. I have spent your lifetime, just twelve years, finding an exit from this corridor.
Yesterday, I heard a noise in the sky and saw birds fighting— two crows against one. And I wondered, does the smarter crow always win? Did you know that crows can count to three and parrots can count up to six? Would a parrot win against a crow?

Writing feels a bit like trying to attach words to things that are moving, that we cannot see, and that we can never fully understand…

I've since realized that it was the art this woman made that resonated with the poet. Not her suffering. Once I could see that, I never envied anyone's suffering again... I began to admire work where language enacted subject matter, not where content overwhelmed or trumped language.

…you thought I was too impatient. You told me that writing takes patience and focus. And that it takes time. And that I should demand more of my poems.
You also told me that writing poems isn't a contest or a competitive sport, that there's no finish line to cross. I thought about this— I knew that there was no finish line, but if there were, I would be tempted to try and cross it first.

I wouldn't take another poetry class for a decade. But because of you, poetry kept on pricking me. Your voice stayed upstairs for years. I could hear it asking me questions I wasn't yet ready to answer. I now know there are no answers. You meant for me to listen to the questions and into the absence.

that chasm between us was filled with poetry instead of misunderstanding. Instead of silence.

… I felt that we each had our own unique stories and that stories could teach us how to begin to unpack the inner wordless experiences we all have. .. (p 37, quoting Michael Silverblatt)

I am seeking whatever is painful in my body, whatever is joyful. While seeking, I may never find myself. While seeking, I have no idea what form I may take or whether anyone, including myself, will ever like what I write. Most of writing feels like walking in the dark. I'm reminded of what Donald Barthelme said: The writer is that person who, embarking upon her task, does not know what to do.