It'll Sound Like This

Photo by The Cleveland Museum of Art on Unsplash

Hello from the deep end of summer, camerados-

Anyone getting writing in? Feeling it?

If not, it could be that it’s simply hard to write with your whole body. It shouldn’t be, but, unfortunately, we’re not trained in it.

The work I do with writers is an un-learning of the white, male, cerebral, western, canon-dominated way of writing training, which is to tell writers to sit down and write words. (If you’re white and male this is not your fault: this is an established way of training that happened way before your time).

Writers are artists. Have you noticed that there is often a line drawn between artists and writers? As though we are in a different class? I never hear writers call themselves artists unless they work in other artists disciplines. But that’s silly. You are an artist if you are a writer. By not naming that, claiming it, you’re losing out on so much. Community, for one. Coolness factor, for another. You’re limiting yourself in a big way because you’re not seeing all that is available to you.

When writers don’t see themselves as artists, they don’t see all the possibilities they have for collaboration, they don’t see all the tools at their disposal, and they limit their creative range.

Our training style often feels so un-artistic. We often resemble accountants with our sharpened pencils, Post-Its, legal pads, and computers. Our spreadsheets and thick glasses.

We meet in conference rooms and sit around tables. We mark up computer paper with red pens.

What we should be doing is meeting in ballet studios, barefoot, and challenging one another to explore our work with other mediums to see what we can draw out when we’re stuck and uninspired. We should be asking one another to act out scenes. Undergrad writers should be required to taking acting classes and learn how to sketch. How much more would you understand about your character if you could express their inner life in charcoal?

When I talk to the writers I work with, I often find out that they do have other artistic outlets: painting, sculpting, dancing. And yet they still don’t call themselves artists. What’s up with that? Is it because it’s not their primary focus? They don’t have n MFA in it? They aren’t being paid for it?

Exploration

What are all the creative things you do? Do you call yourself an artist or a writer? Why? If you don’t call yourself an artist why not? What’s keeping your from that? What would change for you if you did? Is there shame involved? Imposter syndrome?

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This summer I’ve got Jack White’s G.O.D. And The Broken Ribs on replay. It gives the Zen Master no end of delight how much I love Jack White. I’m not a rock-and-roll girl, but there are certain folks who I am ride-or-die for, and Jack White is one of them.

I heard the first strains of his guitar on our local amazing radio station, The Current (which you can get streamed on its app - highly recommend) and perked up in the car. I know Jack when I hear Jack.

The first line was like being covered in honey. If I had a pen I would have underlined it in the air and wrote ZING!!!!

Welcome to the Garden of Eden

Then Jack goes on to say how they’ve got some time to do the things they’ve got to do

and it’ll sound like this…

And “this” is him being a fuckin’ rocker man and rocking our socks off, leaving us to imagine all the things this one boy and one girl are doing in the Garden of Eden.

Here’s the song. Get ready!

It’ll Sound Like This

This song got me thinking about working more somatically on the page, what it would be like to try to do what Jack does: wonder about something and explore it as he does through music.

Could we wonder about something, explore it somatically - dance it out, create a gesture, do breath work, engage in some kind of tactile work (weaving, woodworking, etc.) that helps us metabolize this understanding and get it in our bones, and THEN move to the page so that the work is richer?

Gotta find a way to eat the fruit from the tree of fate
I bet it tastes like this

…cue crazy guitar riff to let you know how that apple tastes (if anyone finds this variety let me know)

Exercise 1

• How does the the fruit from the tree of fate taste? Use your body to explore this. Dance, shake, do yoga, hum, sing, swim, play an instrument, try anything tactile that will help you understand. You could also involve your taste senses. Go into the garden. Go to a farmer’s market. Then, write it out. STAY OUT OF YOUR HEAD AND IN YOUR BODY.

Exercise 2

• Go through the lyrics below and take out anything you’d like to work with in a similar way. Again, stay out of your head and in your body.

G.O.D. And The Broken Ribs

Welcome to the Garden of Eden
There’s nobody here but me and you
So, what we gonna be eatin’?
Microphone check, one, two, one, two
Looks like we got a little pace to do the
Things we need to do now, and it’ll sound like this

Welcome to the end of the world, yeah
Nobody left but one boy and one girl and one other
But you know we can’t live like a sister and a brother
They’re gonna make you a mother now

The first of the rivers is called River Rouge
And the third of the rivers is called the Strait
And I gotta get up, gotta get out
Gotta find a way to eat the fruit from the tree of fate
I bet it tastes like this

And do we exist?
And do we even know all the little things like
Where we came from or where we’re gonna go?
And I for one, am one who doesn’t know, but
So what? What’s up?
Join the club now if you can
Johnny begot Sam, Polly begot Pam
Tell me now, do we got fam?
One by one, everyone moving on with the plan

Watch me walk, then I stroll
And it’s your telephone talk
Then you scroll and it’s
A watch me rock, then I roll, baby
And it’s, let me out, let me out, let me shout, woo!
Right from my soul with salt and coal, ah
Now listen to me roll with it

Ring that bell then ring your neck
Write yourself a damn novel and then write yourself a check
Send yourself to hell in a hand basket, now, what the heck?
I’m a penny dreadful and a frozen Charlotte and
I need some more sense

Yeah
Well, it’s the beginning of the world now
And there’s nobody left
But one boy and one girl now
Let’s start again
Let’s do it again now
Let’s start again, yeah
Let’s do it all over again

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One of the reasons I think I love Jack White so much is that his music brings me fully into my body. It’s a visceral and instant reaction upon hearing his music and voice. I am not in my head at all.

I think this is one of the gifts of summer, too. It brings us into our body. The heat demands it. As writers, we can often feel frustrated about that. We want to be in our heads, working on our projects. Instead of pushing away what our bodies are asking us, see how you might listen instead to what your body and creativity are asking of you right now. The heat, the humidity, the lethargy…let’s just radically accept it.

How might your creativity and body collaborate in this season?

What needs to be metabolized? If you have some unprocessed writing grief or just stuff from this year holding you back, see how you can work that out through your body with intentionality. Swim it out, walk it out, shake it out. Lay in the sun and let it gently bake away.

Let the humidity take you to liminal daydreaming places where new ideas and strange bits of dialogue live.

Allow yourself to rest up for the more focused time of autumn and winter so you have some reserves in store.

Remember that reading is also writing - ideas and research and following your whimsey is where inspiration exists. Truly. Read that weird book. Go down that rabbit hole. Whimseymax to your heart’s content.

What does being a good steward to your creativity sound like?

It sounds like this…[fill in the blank].

Yours in doing right by the miracle,

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P.S.

Let’s dream and scheme and see how to bring your body into your practice.

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Great preparation for the autumn and something nice to do over the summer to support your writing practice.

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