That’s something we know. And yet when we create we do our best to try for something new anyway, against the damned odds.<\/p>\n
I’m always slightly amused\/horrified when I belch up something (that’s always how it feels when I write, really: Like a force of nature, something to be gotten out of me and once it’s out, I feel better and lighter) and then later find something in this world that already existed for some time, something shiny and succinct in its own right that I might as well have pointed to as an obvious influence. An homage, on good days. There are things around me that I absorb and internalize to a degree that I don’t realize. When I unwittingly retrace my steps and stumble upon those things every now and again, I get quite a start. I feel confident that this isn’t just my problem; everyone who tries to make things has to run into this fact occasionally, right?<\/p>\n
I’m rambling. It’s 4 a.m., so that’s expected. The point is this: <\/p>\n
I wrote a poem-ish thing. The Great and Secret Thing was kind enough to publish it<\/a>. I wrote it months and months ago. September. Maybe October. I sat on it for a while, as I sometimes do with intensely personal things. Had to psych myself up to put it out there in the ether a few weeks ago.<\/p>\n And then it just happened that this past Thursday night, as I was combing through my bookshelves in hunt of a (bacon-themed!) book for Agitatrix<\/a>, I happened upon a Sharon Olds collection I hadn’t picked up in a couple of years. I plucked it out and set it aside. And then, after I had found the bacon book and stuck it in my bag to take to work the following day, I leafed through Blood, Tin, Straw<\/i><\/a>. And I lost words as I read “The Factors.” <\/p>\n Sharon Olds planted a seed in me the first time I read that poem years ago, and I didn’t realize it until just now. “Humbling” isn’t even an adequate word.<\/p>\n On The Clock<\/b> That last half of August those stifling August days The Factors<\/b> Sometimes we seem almost to be working, That’s something we know. And yet when we create we do our best to try for something new anyway, against the damned odds. I’m always slightly amused\/horrified when I belch up something (that’s always how it feels when I write, really: Like a force of nature, something to be gotten out of me and once it’s out, I feel better and lighter) and then later find something in this world that already existed for some… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[234,585],"tags":[693,2211,1053,1155,2259],"class_list":["post-4788","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-poetry","category-writing","tag-poem","tag-poetry","tag-sharon-olds","tag-the-great-and-secret-thing","tag-writing"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1jWWl-1fe","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theogeo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4788","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theogeo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theogeo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theogeo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theogeo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4788"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/theogeo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4788\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4791,"href":"https:\/\/theogeo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4788\/revisions\/4791"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theogeo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4788"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theogeo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4788"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theogeo.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4788"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n(Mine)<\/p>\n
\nthe part of me I don\u2019t admit to
\nthe tyrant I didn\u2019t even know was in there
\nset up shop
\n(I worked on commission)
\nand I think it\u2019s fair to call it a shop
\nof sweat
\nand tears
\nand blood
\neventually
\nafter I had put my handprints in the dust
\neverywhere
\nand spent you
\nagain and again
\nat ridiculous hours
\nferocious
\nwithout shame
\nthe clang of metal echoing
\nmy brain sure of bad ideas
\nmy body ready for science experiments<\/p>\n
\nwe just shut out the sun
\nand worked in the dark<\/p>\n
\n(Sharon Olds)<\/p>\n
\nas if making something, wrapped tight
\naround my body from either side as it is
\npouring off our gleaming pieces of work, which could be
\nnearly seen, for a moment, in the air, and we can
\nhear them, the clear note of their molecular
\nstructure stuck\u2014
\nsometimes you and I are like a factory
\nminting invisible artifacts,
\nhot shuddering that floats in air,
\nmore of it is continuously needed,
\nand more, and more, sometimes we wring
\nthe whole factory like a shimmering rag,
\nharder each time, the cloth-cries go higher and
\nhigher, from within comes pulsing a lambent
\nwobbling vessel, off the wheel it
\nwhirls, indented with the muscles’ bright thumbs,
\ntransparent with kiln-fire; another is needed,
\nand another, we don’t know who orders it, we are
\nworkers in a doting frenzy of making.
\nAnd where is love? This is its room,
\nwhere this is done; it is the bed,
\nthe air; and the glowing not-things
\nwrenched from the body, rushing from it
\nas though they are being born, those
\nare acts of love. One could not call it
\npatience, the hour you kneel, turn,
\nrise, drawing the, pressing the, made
\nlove out; inside each one
\na half-god, calling to the other
\nhalf-one, in the other one,
\ncome, come, yes, my darling, my
\nsweetheart, come. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"