Seedlings in Stone

On, In, and Around: I'll Be There Wishing Good Things for You

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Sat, 10 Nov 2012 17:16:00 +0000

I took my girl to this castle-ish place (above) when she was a baby. She does not remember it.

Since then, fifteen years have passed. Six of those years (almost half her life), I have been a writer in this space. To her, I suppose, that must seem a lifetime.

Over that "lifetime," I have written almost 1,300 blog posts, both here and at two other personal blogs. Other bloggers would have garnered more page views over all this time, but I feel satisfied that these posts drew over 250,000 views.

Half a lifetime for my girl.

And what is that in blog years? (Somebody said to me yesterday that blog years should maybe be calculated like dog years. Maybe I've been really blogging for about forty years then.)

This week, one of my authors (I'm a small press publisher) sent me flowers, to thank me for believing in her book. I do believe in it. She'll go far. The National Review and World Magazine have both requested copies. She's going to be on quite a few radio shows. I want that for her.

I no longer want these things for me. If I ever did (I'd like to think I wanted these things as an author; it seems like the kind of things an author should want, to gain a certain level of success. I know I want my authors to want these things for themselves).

Anyway, I guess it's not important to settle this question. What's important is how I want things for other people. And how this has become the focus of my life's work.

Why yes, I'll still be a writer. That won't end. It might even grow.

Not that I necessarily want that either. Five books is a lot to care for. (Still, I do seem to have this little compulsion to keep putting things onto pages, where people can take them to bed, or on a picnic, or to their back porch.)

I do not any longer have a real desire to blog. "Forty years" is a long time. Or six, if you want it in human years. Or half a lifetime, if you look through the eyes of my daughter.

My girl is growing up. I want things for her. I want things for my authors.

And look... the sun is going down (or is it, in fact, just coming up). Let's walk into the sunset (or the sunrise), as the case may be. I'm in a good mood (don't let the mini-drama of this post fool you), so if it's okay with you, I'd like us to sing and laugh along the way.

Race you to the castle!

____

You can always find me at llbarkat.com, to see if I do, in fact, keep writing (Oh, I'm sure I will. It's just a question of how and where). And I wish you a beautiful writing and reading journey, whichever you are on (and if you are a writer, it must be both). Thank you for letting me love you so long through the medium of words.

L.L. Barkat is the Managing Editor of Tweetspeak Poetry and co-creator of the quotes-on-photos app WordCandy.me. Give her another six years and who knows. She might be selling chocolate or teas.

WordCandy Wednesday: Behind the Poems

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Wed, 07 Nov 2012 23:25:00 +0000

The poems say
maybe we've figured it.

But if we reach
through the words,

we find the ache
that made the pigment

of sound. We find
the white

we know is asking us
to admit silence.

No words can say.

Want to make Wednesday simple and sweet? Blog WordCandy. Can't wait to see yours.

Grab the WordCandy Wednesday Button :)

On, In, and Around Mondays: Her Biography

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Sat, 03 Nov 2012 17:24:00 +0000

After the storm, walking.

At 5:30 a.m., when the sky is silver and the moon is adrift in a swath of clouds.

Or, having had my caramel apple tea, walking in the still-fast-moving air, seeing the sun peeking through and then being pattered by rain.

Five days later, up the hill where power is still failed, around the corner, and down the hill, I meet Adam McCrane. Never met Adam before. We are both watching the big white trucks and peering at the snapped electrical pole.

"They say 1,000 poles snapped and need to be replaced," he says.

I like the roundness of that. It is probably not exactly true, but it sounds good in the mouth. 1,000. I learn that Adam has been without power—today, at 10 am, it will be five days. Never been without for so long before, he says. I like the specificity of his tellings, even as that specificity has surely been altered by time and misremembering.

We continue to share stories on the road. He extends his hand to shake mine, which makes me smile.

I think of the book I am still slowly making my way through: The Old Ways.

MacFarlane finds that roads, and paths, and seaways have stories. That a relationship with the land becomes a relationship with people, through words and shared imagination. At one point, on an ocean trip with an old sailor, he gets to hear the story of the boat they are sailing.

"He knew her biography as well as that of any long-term lover, and he told it to me as a story," says MacFarlane.

I am ready to walk back up the hill now, my morning passage barred by the white trucks. "Nice to meet you, Adam," I say, and begin to turn. "Laura, yes," he says. "Nice name. Laura."

He has the beginnings of my biography. Maybe he will go home and tell his wife a story. But for now I am happy to hear my name, so lovely from the mouth of the old man on the hill.
_____

On, In and Around Mondays (which partly means you can post any day and still add a link) is an invitation to write from where you are. Tell us what is on, in, around (over, under, near, by...) you. Feel free to write any which way... compose a tight poem or just ramble for a few paragraphs. But we should feel a sense of place. Would you like to try? Write something 'in place' and add your link below.

If you could kindly link back here when you post, it will create a central meeting place. :)

This post is also shared with Laura Boggess, for...

WordCandy Wednesday: The Particular Wheel

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Wed, 31 Oct 2012 12:00:00 +0000

Photo by Sonia Joie.

I'm enjoying using these wordcandies as poetry prompts. Good language invites more language, yes? A poem then...

It may take months

to find

the way the wheel speaks
itself in circles,

to understand
the particular language—
a whirring, a come-again
before we're through

it may take months to turn

the silent road to you.

Want to make Wednesday simple and sweet? Blog WordCandy. Can't wait to see yours.
Grab the WordCandy Wednesday Button :)

On, In, and Around Mondays: You Want the One-Star

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Sat, 27 Oct 2012 13:43:00 +0000

"You're going to want the five-stars and the one-stars," I told her.

It is Karen's first book—a poignant and humorous memoir, Booked: Literature in the Soul of Me.

Karen has been an award-winning professor and a writer for a long time. She knows what it is to be read and responded to. Still. There is nothing so surprising as your first one-star review, and I was just broaching the subject before it happens.

The one-star review is a good surprise; of course, it needs to be generously balanced by five-star reviews if your book is truly excellent. But the point is that the best books will garner reviews in two directions. This is desirable. It means you have a strong, distinctive voice, and that people either love that voice or despise it.

Karen is gracious, and she thanked me for the unsolicited advice. It goes without saying... I am wishing her more five-stars.

_____

On, In and Around Mondays (which partly means you can post any day and still add a link) is an invitation to write from where you are. Tell us what is on, in, around (over, under, near, by...) you. Feel free to write any which way... compose a tight poem or just ramble for a few paragraphs. But we should feel a sense of place. Would you like to try? Write something 'in place' and add your link below.

If you could kindly link back here when you post, it will create a central meeting place. :)

This post is also shared with Laura Boggess, for...

WordCandy Wednesday: Metaphysics Laced

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Wed, 24 Oct 2012 14:09:00 +0000

Photo by L.L. Barkat.

This candy is from the On Poets & Poetry category. Perhaps a poem, then...

Metaphysics
laced with poppies

makes me wonder
how I can be

more or less

red
with black
seeds.

Want to make Wednesday simple and sweet? Blog WordCandy. Can't wait to see yours.
Grab the WordCandy Wednesday Button :)

On, In, and Around Mondays: Walk in the Woods

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Mon, 22 Oct 2012 16:20:00 +0000

We stepped onto the pine needles, in a slice of woods barely qualifying to be called woods.

"It's like a carpet," my girl said.

"Yes, I used to walk such woods. My sister and I. How we loved the pine needles so soft under our feet! We could go as far as the eye could see under a thousand trees. It was our secret place."

My daughters' eyes get wider. Is there such a place on earth? They want to believe it, even though we are standing only in a slice, a suggestion of the possible.

They begin to spring up and down, testing a life I can only suggest to them with my tellings.

I can tell of other woods too, like the ones in the photo above. I can give you a slice. This is what I do as a writer. I tell you something you might want to believe. I give you a suggestion of the possible.

It is up to you to go there, if I can just give you a place to spring from. We work together, you and I.

_____

On, In and Around Mondays (which partly means you can post any day and still add a link) is an invitation to write from where you are. Tell us what is on, in, around (over, under, near, by...) you. Feel free to write any which way... compose a tight poem or just ramble for a few paragraphs. But we should feel a sense of place. Would you like to try? Write something 'in place' and add your link below.

If you could kindly link back here when you post, it will create a central meeting place. :)

This post is also shared with Laura Boggess, for...

WordCandy Wednesday: The Soul

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 12:00:00 +0000

Photo by Kelly Sauer.

This candy, from the Sweet Dreams category, is so lovely. It begs for a poem, don't you think?

The soul
bends down
to wait.

The soul
like fragile lace
lays itself
across the white.

I note
the filagree.

Want to make Wednesday simple and sweet? Blog WordCandy. Can't wait to see yours.
Grab the WordCandy Wednesday Button :)

On, In, and Around Mondays: Writing Landscapes

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Mon, 15 Oct 2012 11:55:00 +0000

He walks the old ways and pays a toll in skin. The paths are chalk, and his body writes itself onto the landscape, even as the landscape writes itself onto his body.

MacFarlane has taken a fall along The Icknield Way, and somehow I think of my own skin, and the way I sit, on this day, near my daughter's warmth, and our bodies are making a memory—her landscape writing itself on me, mine writing itself on hers.

She listens to my cadence as I read: magnesian limestone, Permian mudstone, Middle Lias, Great Oolite, cornbrash and, yes, London chalk.

I remember when she was tiny and loved to draw on asphalt—chalk in her small hand, colors and visions set down, now long washed away by rain.

"I could see you doing this," I interrupt my reading, bringing memories forward and on into her possible future. My chalk girl. I can see her walking The Icknield Way.

"You can?"

"Yes, I don't know why. I can see you walking this path."

And I know that in this moment, whether or not she ever walks MacFarlane's London Chalk way, that she could. It is within her.

"Take me with you," I want to say.

But I don't.

Her head is on my shoulder. I lean down to kiss her warm face, let the moment write itself onto my skin.

_____

On, In and Around Mondays (which partly means you can post any day and still add a link) is an invitation to write from where you are. Tell us what is on, in, around (over, under, near, by...) you. Feel free to write any which way... compose a tight poem or just ramble for a few paragraphs. But we should feel a sense of place. Would you like to try? Write something 'in place' and add your link below.

If you could kindly link back here when you post, it will create a central meeting place. :)

This post is also shared with Laura Boggess, for...

WordCandy Wednesday: Proper Tea

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Wed, 10 Oct 2012 12:00:00 +0000

Photo by Claire Burge.

I am loving the new Tea category at WordCandy. This one is great wisdom from Winnie the Pooh. How do you make your tea proper?

Want to make Wednesday simple and sweet? Blog WordCandy. Can't wait to see yours.
Grab the WordCandy Wednesday Button :)

On, In, and Around Mondays: Walking to Love

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Sat, 06 Oct 2012 14:44:00 +0000

I am supposed to be reading The Old Ways: A Journey on Foot, by Robert Macfarlane, to review it for Books & Culture.

So of course I've only gotten as far as chapter one, and instead of continuing to read, I began walking every morning.

Macfarlane's journey began in winter, and he claims you can't go anywhere without walking. I am already in disagreement. You might know why.

It's okay. He could be right, in his way. It doesn't change the fact that I went somewhere without going anywhere. Two things can be right. This is something I had great fun exploring in The Novelist.

Anyway. I began walking every morning, and whereas Macfarlane quotes Emerson, "the ground is all memoranda and signatures," I am noticing that the ground is a cradle for love.

And I, like some kind of wandering mother, have the chance to embrace what the ground is holding out to me, if I want.

One morning, the ground gave me an ivory-coated terrier. This little dog would not move until I came to greet him. I held his face between my hands and looked directly into his melty brown eyes. "I see you," I said to this tiny creature named Tiger. "I am so glad you are saying hello to me."

Another morning, the ground gave me a brown-haired girl, skipping her way to the school bus. She raised an eraser to her nose and sniffed hard. "I love the smell of this eraser!" she shouted to the wind. "I love this eraser!" I gathered her words.

This morning, it was two old men. Jamaican, I think, if I heard their deep, throaty sing-song correctly. "You gonna buy this house?" one of them asked me when I walked by. "Oh, just stretching near the driveway," I replied. "Great house, isn't it?" I added. And he nodded yes and turned back to his friend.

Macfarlane is right about walking. It takes you somewhere.

In my case, I feel like I am mother-walking to love.

_____

On, In and Around Mondays (which partly means you can post any day and still add a link) is an invitation to write from where you are. Tell us what is on, in, around (over, under, near, by...) you. Feel free to write any which way... compose a tight poem or just ramble for a few paragraphs. But we should feel a sense of place. Would you like to try? Write something 'in place' and add your link below.

If you could kindly link back here when you post, it will create a central meeting place. :)

This post is also shared with Laura Boggess, for...

WordCandy Wednesday

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Wed, 03 Oct 2012 12:00:00 +0000

I am so pleased about the new Chocolate category over at WordCandy. Too fun.

This new category is only equaled by—okay, maybe not quite—the new Tea category.

Either way, it's yummy tea and chocolate for me!

Photo by Kelly Sauer.

Want to make Wednesday simple and sweet? Blog WordCandy. Can't wait to see yours.

Grab the WordCandy Wednesday Button :)

On, In, and Around Mondays: What Do You Have to Write?

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Sat, 29 Sep 2012 21:26:00 +0000

"The Novelist is a work of fiction L.L. Barkat had to write."

That's what she said.

And I believe her.

This morning, I would have slept past 9:30 a.m., had it not been for my alarm. But while I was writing The Novelist, I woke unassisted every day at 4:00 a.m. and wrote until 8 a.m., and then I went back to sleep for an hour before meeting the day. I did this... until I had finished writing the book.

You could say that my body knew I had to write.

People have their theories about why I wrote. And I will let them have their musings. Isn't it part of the fun for readers? To try to figure out a writer's motivations?

But I will say this. I have a friend (or two) who needs to write fiction him (or her) self. I know this. I have been watching this friend (or two) struggle to set something to paper.

And that is why I had to write The Novelist. Because, to this day, I write to love.

And if loving meant I would need to tackle my own fears and struggles with fiction, to help a friend (or two), then so be it.

What do you have to write? Do you know yet? Does your body know?

Think about something (or someone) you love. And see what wakes you.

________

On, In and Around Mondays (which partly means you can post any day and still add a link) is an invitation to write from where you are. Tell us what is on, in, around (over, under, near, by...) you. Feel free to write any which way... compose a tight poem or just ramble for a few paragraphs. But we should feel a sense of place. Would you like to try? Write something 'in place' and add your link below.

If you could kindly link back here when you post, it will create a central meeting place. :)

This post is also shared with Laura Boggess, for...

The Novelist Giveaway

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 13:11:00 +0000

"Her story makes me think hard about who I am—about who I want to be."

—Laura Boggess

Win The Novelist over at Laura Boggess's place? Winner will be announced on Monday.

More words about The Novelist

"she embarks on a process of discovering herself, the strength of her own center, and the power of both yes and no"

"This book is clever, very clever"

"a masterpiece"

"this work of fiction L.L. pulls off is like nothing I've ever read"

"Such a clever book that highlights some of the tried and true rules of writing fiction and then breaks them all. Wonderfully"

"a stunning, tightly woven delight for the intellect and heart"

"laser-like reflection"

"Barkat reminds us we are not alone"

WordCandy Wednesday: As If

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 12:00:00 +0000

Photo by Sonia Joie.

Want to make Wednesday simple and sweet? Blog WordCandy. Can't wait to see yours.

Grab the WordCandy Wednesday Button :)

On, In, and Around Mondays: Waiting for Anne O'Sullivan

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Sat, 22 Sep 2012 15:34:00 +0000

Closed.

The house, yellow with green shutters. The porch, in sun and shadow. The spirit of Emily, somewhere. I had hoped to see the inside, to touch the walls and feel the floors under my feet.

"Is there a tour?" asks a slight, warm woman in a white shirt. She's peering through the screen door; she's hoping too.

"It's closed," I say.

And we are both disappointed.

Until Anne O'Sullivan begins to speak.

I discover she is an actress who has played The Belle of Amherst. I discover the spirit of Emily Dickinson, as felt in the body and mind of this here-and-now woman.

We talk for a long time, and I find an Emily I never would have otherwise found. I find, too, that the Emily I came to see is buried somewhere nearby.

I would not have known about the cemetery, but for Anne O'Sullivan. Nor would I have known that the nearby Amherst College had one of only two replicas of the latest possible daguerreotypes of Dickinson.

Closed is a hard thing. We think we've missed what we came for. But sometimes it is exactly what is needed as we wait, unawares, for Anne O'Sullivan.

On, In and Around Mondays (which partly means you can post any day and still add a link) is an invitation to write from where you are. Tell us what is on, in, around (over, under, near, by...) you. Feel free to write any which way... compose a tight poem or just ramble for a few paragraphs. But we should feel a sense of place. Would you like to try? Write something 'in place' and add your link below.

If you could kindly link back here when you post, it will create a central meeting place. :)

This post is also shared with Laura Boggess, for...

WordCandy Wednesday: When One is Truly Ready

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Wed, 19 Sep 2012 20:37:00 +0000

Photo by Claire Burge

Want to make Wednesday simple and sweet? Blog WordCandy. Can't wait to see yours.

Grab the WordCandy Wednesday Button :)

WordCandy Wednesday

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Tue, 11 Sep 2012 18:49:00 +0000

Photo by L.L. Barkat

Want to make Wednesday simple and sweet? Blog WordCandy. Can't wait to see yours.

Grab the WordCandy Wednesday Button :)

On, In, and Around Mondays: Fictional Seeing

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Sat, 08 Sep 2012 15:04:00 +0000

"I do it on purpose, you know."

That's what I told my friend, when it was observed that I have a Georgia O'Keefe approach to photography.

After I said this, I went back over some of my photos to see if it was true. Do I really do it on purpose? Often, yes. And sometimes it is just that I go through a series of shots, after the fact, until I find the ones that do what I would have done on purpose, had I the mind to do it.

I am reminded, suddenly, of an idea I include in The Novelist, from Mario Vargas Llosa. He said this regarding the construction of fiction, but I think it might apply to all kinds of seeing and composing...

A successful fiction would always contain something inexplicable, something unbound...certain factors [are] crucial to a work—intuition, sensitivity, divination, or the elusive reality of chance. (p.106, The Novelist)

Now it is also true that whether or not I create in a purposeful way, somehow my true self seems to come through not only in the inexplicable and the divination but also in the elusive reality of chance.

Makes me wonder, then. Is Georgia, really, always on my mind?

_____

On, In and Around Mondays (which partly means you can post any day and still add a link) is an invitation to write from where you are. Tell us what is on, in, around (over, under, near, by...) you. Feel free to write any which way... compose a tight poem or just ramble for a few paragraphs. But we should feel a sense of place. Would you like to try? Write something 'in place' and add your link below.

If you could kindly link back here when you post, it will create a central meeting place. :)

This post is also shared with Laura Boggess, for...

WordCandy Wednesday

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Wed, 05 Sep 2012 12:00:00 +0000

Illustration by Gail Nadeau

Want to make Wednesday simple and sweet? Blog WordCandy. Can't wait to see yours.

Grab the WordCandy Wednesday Button :)

On, In, and Around Mondays: Touch Stuff, Get Happy

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Sat, 01 Sep 2012 19:33:00 +0000

Eggplant ends, and hot peppers. The skin of an onion. A few stray seeds.

This is the stuff of potential made-things. And I live with two girls who always seem to know the secret: We are made happier when our hands touch textures, when we fill our senses with sound and scent.

Kelly Sauer knows this. She started buying books and magazines again, because they fill her in a way that cyber-reading does not.

I still love my cyber-reads. I learn so much. I find people, and people find me. But there is something about a made-thing that is so important. And, yes, we are made happier when we engage with them. So I understand Kelly's books and magazines.

I was reminded of the power of made-things again this morning, reading about knitting groups, and how they can touch the world.

All of this spoke to the dynamic I've begun to cultivate on Sunday afternoons. Touch, experience, fill the senses. Cut the eggplant, or the onions. Water the garden. Read a book with real pages. Fill a bath and add rosemary oil. Just one day. But it makes my week.

Oh now, I can't wait for tomorrow...
_____

On, In and Around Mondays (which partly means you can post any day and still add a link) is an invitation to write from where you are. Tell us what is on, in, around (over, under, near, by...) you. Feel free to write any which way... compose a tight poem or just ramble for a few paragraphs. But we should feel a sense of place. Would you like to try? Write something 'in place' and add your link below.

If you could kindly link back here when you post, it will create a central meeting place. :)

This post is also shared with Laura Boggess, for...

WordCandy Wednesday

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Wed, 29 Aug 2012 12:00:00 +0000

Photo by Kelly Sauer

Want to make Wednesday simple and sweet? Blog WordCandy. Can't wait to see yours.

Grab the WordCandy Wednesday Button :)

The Secret to Writing Fiction

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Mon, 27 Aug 2012 20:06:00 +0000

lovely cover photo by Sarah Elwell

Warning to my regular readers: this one's not the usual fare. Seriously. If a little bareness and swearing make you blush, please pass it by.

But if you want a story-approach to learning how to write fiction, stick around for my novella, The Novelist.

A challenge, a tea empire, a woman lost and found in love. She travels through her past to try to bring a novel into the present, relying on the companionship of literary greats such as Mario Vargas Llosa, Mary Shelley, and Murasaki (the first known Japanese novelist, whose real name has been lost to history because she was a woman).

Can our protagonist meet the challenge to write a book in record time? She might not even make a cup of tea by midnight, so who's to say.

On Kindle
Print version

On, In, and Around Mondays: Listen to the Whisper

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Sat, 25 Aug 2012 17:25:00 +0000

She rounds the turn, cantering, and it is like watching her fly.

My girl asked for this. Two years ago, as we drove by the stables, she wanted to know what went on there.

"Horseback riding," I said.

"Can you call on Monday?" she said.

I did. Because, you know, this girl doesn't ask for much. So when she ventures a request, I know it means something. I don't even need to know what it means. I honor it.

Watching her take those turns, flying free on a powerful creature, I ask myself this...

Do you honor your own requests? And how do you know when you are making them?

It seems more complicated for me. I have to know how to listen to myself, and it may not come as clear as Can you call on Monday. Sometimes a request is nothing more than a complaint that keeps resurfacing. Sometimes it is a sadness. It can even be something that looks like rebellion.

I want to learn to listen harder. For whatever it is I hear. The whisper, the laugh, the slight shift of cloth. Yes, I might want to fly.

_____

On, In and Around Mondays (which partly means you can post any day and still add a link) is an invitation to write from where you are. Tell us what is on, in, around (over, under, near, by...) you. Feel free to write any which way... compose a tight poem or just ramble for a few paragraphs. But we should feel a sense of place. Would you like to try? Write something 'in place' and add your link below.

If you could kindly link back here when you post, it will create a central meeting place. :)

This post is also shared with Laura Boggess, for...

WordCandy Wednesday

noreply@blogger.com (L.L. Barkat) — Wed, 22 Aug 2012 19:23:00 +0000

photo by Claire Burge

Want to make Wednesday simple and sweet? Blog WordCandy. Can't wait to see yours.

Grab the WordCandy Wednesday Button :)