Dear Living Dark reader,
Yesterday, a brief Note that I had posted here at Substack began insisting that it wanted to be a poem. This kind of thing—poetry, I mean—happens to me approximately once per lifetime, as if the wrong kind of muse had spoken to the wrong kind of writer. Apparently, this was the week for this particular incarnation. And who am I to argue with a muse?
The motivation to actually share such things is even rarer. It’s a reticence perhaps validated by the specimen at hand. I’ll leave that judgment to you.
THIS LANTERN
Maybe you’re like me:
I have never been much good at five-year plans.
Life knows what it wants from me.
The future never shows itself as future.
It can tell me what it is
when it arrives as present.
The best things in my life have come
from serendipity
while I was wholly given to
the path in front of me.
This lantern in my hand creates
those shadows up ahead.
(Note that, for a longer prose rendering of the same theme, you can see the introduction to Writing at the Wellspring.)
Warm regards,
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On the deeper sources of creativity:
“[An] intimate journey into the mystery of creativity and spirit.” — BookLife review (Publishers Weekly)
“A guide for writers who welcome the dark and hunger for meaning. — Joanna Penn, author of Writing the Shadow
“I can’t think of any [other books] that link the creative act so uniquely or persuasively with spirituality.” — Victoria Nelson, author of On Writer’s Block and The Secret Life of Puppets
READER REACTIONS:
“This isn’t a how-to book about writing. It’s a book about why writing matters, and what it’s actually touching when it’s real.”
“One of those magical texts that voices the Truth I secretly always knew.”
“It easily earns its place on my shelf of texts that have challenged and changed how I think about writing and the creative life.”
“If Colin Wilson and Krishnamurti and ST Joshi had written a tome on the essentials of creativity, it would be something like this.”
“There is potential here to change your life.”
"This lantern in my hand creates
those shadows up ahead." is a fabulous line that reflects what we've been discussing in creative work.