Where I Write #29: Ten Werecantos
We think of our brains as a place. We surround thoughts with metaphors of environment.
...more
Posts Tagged: Where I Write
Weekend Rumpus Roundup
On this warm weekend we are favored with a cool breath of fresh air from the likes of Matthew Lippman, via Michael Klein’s review of Lippman’s poetry collection, American Chew. Poems like these are refreshing in their honesty and bewitching simplicity—Lippman’s, in particular, “start outside the body,” Klein writes, “but they almost always end up […]
...more
Where I Write #28: A Small Bench Between Two 25-Story Buildings
I was doing clerical work for a magazine publisher in a high-rise along the Wilshire corridor and each day I would take my one hour lunch on a small bench between two 25 story buildings. The proximity of all these tall structures created a vortex of wind that constantly combed through all these magnificent trees. One by one I had to know and then write about each individual Jacaranda, Magnolia and Floss Silk tree.
...more
Where I Write #27: Now In Silence, Mute
Now in silence, mute, a place still quiet/within reason, ear-protected, I hear/the flow and pump of blood.
...more
Where I Write #26: Where The Rocks Gather
I write from that burning body. Four years old or seven years old or ten years old. Crawling out from under a fire.
...more
WHERE I WRITE #25: The Wild Pendulum
Here I am, seven years later, a “full-time writer.” I spend about half my time locked up in my apartment in the West End of Providence, Rhode Island, hunched over my laptop.
...more
Where I Write #24: I Don’t Know Where I Write
There’s a window, but no tree. Just the next building, identical blinds. I’ve done a fair amount of writing here, I guess. Assembled at least one book. But again, I can’t picture it, can’t imagine being comfortable in this space. When I write at home, I know I don’t have long. Something will intrude or distract.
...more
Where I Write #23: The House My Mother Built
That’s what I want to do as I write: break through the varnish my mom helped me shellack over my truth, the stains we both used to deny our imperfections, hide our dark places.
...moreWhere I Write #22: A Room of One’s Own in the Middle of Everything
I’m writing on the bathroom floor, laptop on my knees. It’s tight in here; shower, toilet, and sink crammed together with just enough space left to stand, or in my case, sit
...moreWHERE I WRITE #21: On the Edge of Sky and Sea
In the dark streets of Lhasa two summers ago, I bought a bracelet stringed with smooth skulls and wear it now habitually.
...moreWHERE I WRITE #20: Towers Diner
Author and artist Cassie J. Sneider dishes about her favorite writing spot:
...moreWHERE I WRITE #19: With Love From My Desk From A Dumpster
I write at a desk two gay men helped me pull from a dumpster and load in my truck. The legs are bruised, and its paint’s coming off.
...moreWHERE I WRITE #18: Where I Draw
Artist Jason Novak puts his own spin on our “Where I Write” series. Enjoy:
...moreWHERE I WRITE #17: From a Place of “Yes”
(Well, at least for the next two weeks, anyway.)
...moreWHERE I WRITE #16: In Storms
With the exception of the four years I spent at a small college on the east coast, I’ve lived in Chicago all my life. Anyone who grew up in the Midwest, or spent any significant amount of time there in the oppressive heat of summer can tell you about at least one memorable storm.
...moreWHERE I WRITE #15: The Hospital Room
I’ve only rarely worried about death. The one time I actually was dying in a hospital for a while, I wasn’t worried about it.
...moreWHERE I WRITE #14: A Green Room in Gujarat
The wall in front of the desk is a greenish turquoise. The painters came and finished the whole flat in just a few hours, and you can see where the paint-soaked rag dripped a little.
...moreWhere I Write #13: To Walk Among Coyotes
I moved to Los Angeles a few weeks ago to house-sit for the summer. I drive a borrowed car and have a meager savings. The house is near the Hollywood sign, in the hills,
...moreWhere I Write #12: A Stable in the Floodplain
Across the Missouri River from North Omaha, just east of the intersection of Interstates 29 and 680, a few miles
...moreWhere I Write #11: A Table Meant For Dining
There is a corkboard here. On it, there is a paper doll of L., a friend from my grad school days. The doll features a pixie haircut, a polka-dot blouse, a pair of men’s pants.
...moreWhere I Write #10: Nowhere, Everywhere
Most often, I don’t. I watch basketball instead. I check my e-mail. I cook dinner and make love to my girlfriend and read magazine articles about the financial crisis. I move constantly, from Brooklyn, New York, to the Pacific coast of Mexico, to Portland, Oregon, to the rural South, to Portland again, and now to […]
...moreWhere I Write #9: A Cabin on the Lakefront
I stopped counting when I reached eighteen moves. That was a few moves ago. I am very good at packing my life into boxes.
...more
Where I Write #8: The Strange Nooks of Our Bodies
Behind me there’s a bed that hasn’t seen anyone but myself since I purchased it four months ago when I moved across the country, and I make it every morning.
...moreWHERE I WRITE #7: Between Clients
I write between clients. There’s a yellow wall behind me, and fuzzy leopard print pillows on the floor.
...more
WHERE I WRITE #6: Blood Red Desk
The top of the desk is blood. I mean red—dark red. But blood is my favorite color.
...more
Where I Write #5: Please Continue the Story
I am looking at the things on my Ikea desk surrounding my 2007 Dell Computer that I am typing on. What I see from left to right: Jan/Feb issue of Poets And Writer’s Magazine. The inspiration issue. Smith Corona electric typewriter. A mug with a green monster on it saying, “Gimme Coffee” holding a spoon […]
...moreWhere I Write #4: My Old Wooden Desk
I write at an old cherry wood desk. It’s heavy and difficult to move, scarred, the stain is flaking off, initials etched into the surface. The desk has seen better days but it’s still beautiful.
...moreWhere I Write #3: Wherever and Whenever I Can
At the moment, I’m writing in a cafeteria full of adult nerds who are parents of teenaged nerds, some of whom will likely be running the country twenty years from now.
...moreWHERE I WRITE #2: Situation/Coordinates, Venue, Witnesses
The list below is a register of the dates and locations of when and where the author wrote her memoir Revolution, published in this month.
...moreWHERE I WRITE #1: Hotels, Highways, Hotspots, Haiti
If I were independently wealthy, I would be less for it, because the chase for money to pay for food, shelter, babies, and now small children has taken me from sharing with two women an eighty square foot octagonal house originally built in the early twentieth century in rural Florida to house a wealthy child’s […]
...more