Let's Talk Writing: Issue 14

Let's Talk Writing is my news article featuring five different writers that I've discovered here on deviantArt. It will be published every Friday. If you have any suggestions, please feel free to note me. I will take them into consideration. Now, Let's Talk Writing!

Sorry this issue is a day late, but I was having major internet problems. They're fixed now, obviously XD

Writer #1: winterkate

shhhwe are lurking too close to jesus,
on the empty edge of a lightless stage,
curved nails digging into the skin of our pale palms.
he asks as an afterthought
do you believe in something holy? and i think yes,
i think this is what i believe in. Vishnui. (matsya - fish)
in the beginning, there was silver;
mercury inscribing cuneiform
beneath the bloodwork of your skewed scales,
scrawling preserver
throughout salt-drenched lungs.
and you laced clear planets into your slipstream,
wrapped solar systems in translucence.
ignoring all the shattered galaxies. ignoring
how easily their frail orbits
broke.
ii. (kurma - turtle)
your ribcage screamed a shattered warcry
of not-quite-god and less-than-human;
a shark's-tooth carapace crushed in.  
forgotten names clawed out your sternum.
your spine fused into your biting back.
iii. (varaha - boar)
razor-wireless shrieked of true tales
thieved by midnight's neon-tripped true bones.
gunshot eyelids half-horizon,
you rose, arpeggio
of stop.
iv. (narasimha – half-man, half-lion)
he walked like christian gods on holy
breaking waves of children's bowed backs.
a crooked tooth inside you turned,
crucified his smug steel-gray blue.
v. (vamana - dwarf)
eras of electrons scratched
themselves into your heels THAT POEM (Writer's Block)I sat down at my computer last Thursday night
with the full intention of writing THAT POEM. Oh, don't
play dumb. You know what THAT POEM is. We all know
what THAT POEM is. You with the cigarette train-tracks
charting your eternal drift to nowhere
on the insides of your arms, you
with the sludge of alcohol dripping thick & brown through
veins swollen & slow & pussy as zombies, you
with the eight children whose faces you can't remember
& the husband in the Hamptons whose name you sometimes forget
& the lover who never seems to come around as much as you pay him to – you
all know what THAT POEM
is. It's the rhythm beating a dull staccato in your skull
when you've taken something to take the edge off, the weary shadows sinking senseless
into the black-slung cradles hiding underneath your
bloodshot eyes. It's the weight of the gun & the way its metal feels
when you push it against the squelching skin of your skull – not to kill yourself, just to feel it,
to know you could. This wa Astronauti.238,900 miles away
the Earth gleams in the darkness.
A cat's eye, opalescent blue
flecked with terra verdant,
fifty-two cream colors
of cloud.
Under a heavy lid of night,
it glares. Angry.
Baleful.
As if to say to the Sun:
I was dreaming
of all the fish
in my seas.
As if to ask why
it had to be woken.
ii.
Thoughts are protozoan here;
with glass-thin skin
transparent as the first lie
he ever told as a child.
No,
I didn't steal that candy bar.
He can see the mechanics,
the workings,
the insides.
They divide like dreams,
impossibly smoothly,
Whole and unbroken
as they tear apart. If
he could stretch far enough,
he could pop his home planet
like soap bubble.
Even now,
he's too small
to make much
of a difference.
iii.
238,900 miles away,
there is a small click.
A tiny latch
catching
as his 14-year-old daughter
slides her seatbelt
into place.
She's learning how to drive,
and how to feel a new kind of terror.
Haunting thought
of collision. Of bone
or brick breaking,
of sound
a

What inspired you to start writing?

I was actually a teen angst poet. I wrote about the tiny little horrid things that happened to me when I was fourteen and just kept going from there.

How much do you feel you've improved in the last few years?

Past few years…well, I am sixteen to the thirteen or fourteen I was when I started. But I think that in the past few years I’ve improved exponentially. Exponentially. And I really do credit that to all the people who helped me here.

Why do you post your writing to deviantArt?

Because there’s such a wonderful community here that helps and encourages me whenever I write. They push me to try new things, and they’re really a litmus test for whether or not something works. Ampersands? Not that well received. Slam? Some of my most popular work. Charting responses helps me figure out what works with the audience nowadays and what doesn’t. And that’s hugely important, because I want to do this for a living one day, which means that I’m not just writing for me. I’m writing for other people too.

Do you write with pen and paper or do you type on a word processor?

Microsoft Word, eleven-point single-space Times New Roman.

What was the first piece you ever wrote?

In second grade, an acrostic poem for Mother’s Day. There was a terrible little picture of my mother and a goldfish randomly sketched in the corner. I wrote it in rainbow ink. It wasn’t very good.

What room is your favorite to write in?

My bedroom. I can’t write anywhere else, really. I don’t let my family see my writing, for the most part, so my bedroom is the most ‘safe’.

What is your favorite place for thinking?

Definitely the shower. I swear sometimes they lace the water with liquid inspiration.

How do you beat out your writers block?

Listen to a lot of Andrea Gibson, steal song titles from the Top 50 and write based on that, look through the visual art on dA, lots of things. Promise myself a cookie if I get a poem down. This is why I’m portly.

Do you listen to music when you write?

Yes. It helps me maintain a rhythm in the writing itself. But very rarely does that music have words – those distract.

Writer #2: LiliWrites

:thumb298406408: :thumb199593104: :thumb199839448: :thumb303002718:

What inspired you to start writing?

I started writing when I was about six years old. I don't recall the exact moment I decided to write a story (it may well have been a school assignment) but I remember the feeling of accomplishment that came with writing "the end". It felt like I had done something no 6-year-old in history had ever done before, and I loved that feeling.

Then I grew up a bit and realized that every 6-year-old in history had likely done something similar, so the task became learning all the ways it had been done before so I could do it differently.

...I'm still working on that.

How much do you feel you've improved in the last few years?

I feel like I've gone from planning the space mission to training for it. I'm in the plane headed upwards and in just a few moments, it is going to go for a tumble that will simulate zero gravity and I'll understand that gutless (literally, feels like your guts are gone according to Mary Roach's book on the subject) feeling when there are no restraints, when you could go in any direction if you can just twist your body against the proper opposing force.

Then, of course, you remember you're actually still within the atmosphere and that plane has to come out of the dip at some point and when it does you're going to crash back to the bench you're floating above, so you'd better get your ass in the proper position before your ribs take the pounding instead.

Why do you post your writing to deviantArt?

Mostly because it is beneficial to my growth process to get feedback - negative and positive. The work I intend to publish rarely sees dA, and most of my stuff has the anti-search applied so that if I change my mind I'm more than likely protected from goggle scouts in the publishing world.

But it is really nice to feel the warm and fuzzies when someone really connects with something that came out of my head.

Do you write with pen and paper or do you type on a word processor?

I only write letters by hand anymore. And even that is a lesson in patience. I think much faster than I write, and sometimes even type (and I type very fast) so I almost always use MS Word to write. When I edit, I tend to print out a double-spaced copy of my work and mark it up with a red pen, then retype the whole thing in a new document. This results in several drafts in my binders that have handwriting all over them. One day if I get famous and someone stumbles on these drafts they may wonder what such cryptic notations as "WTFWYT?" and "HITI? mean. (For the record: What the f*ck were you thinking? and How is this important? are my two main gripes to myself.)

What was the first piece you ever wrote?

It was that story from when I was 6. Dad still has it in a frame above his computer desk. It is titled "Cally Goes to the Moon" and predictably, it is about a girl and her family who move to the moon. Complete with illustrations!

What room is your favorite to write in?

I actually prefer writing outside when it isn't cold and raining. Now that I have a new laptop, I'll more than likely be found at Kneeland Park on sunny afternoons this summer typing away.

What is your favorite place for thinking?

I don't think I have a favorite place for thinking, as it happens constantly. Even when I wish it didn't. I am a terrible insomniac. I'll stare into the darkness for hours counting to myself to try to drown out the insatiable curiousity inside my skull.

How do you beat out your writers block?

I write all the really terrible stuff that's been building up while I write the only kind-of terrible stuff. Once that is out of my system, I generally do okay.

Also, alcohol.

Do you listen to music when you write?

Almost always. I have 426 albums from 52 genres in my iTunes right now, and someone got me $100 iTunes gift card for Christmas, so that's going to be improved quite soon.

Writer #3: toxic-nebulae

Sonnet XVIVYou are celestial. I tell you this,
not with the romantic veneration
of a Renaissance stargazer, whose bliss
depends on perfection. The cessation
of his quixotic notions, his fervent
belief in the Harmony of the Spheres,
would end altogether his pure content
with the firmament he's worshipped for years.
No—my ardour is more true, if somewhat
less zealous. My telescope has sought out
your craters, your flirtations with moons—but
I love you dearly still. Even without
his blithe ignorance, I see your beauty.
I love and I know you better than he. suckleyou pry me open
like a blood orange:
a scrape of sugar on my tongue,
a taste like sunrise.
you take in
the salt and slick and
split
of my thighs,
the pulped tomato
of my heart,
the fabric and
steel bones
of an artificial ribcage
as you unknot
them all.
I draw my first
deep breath
and it smells of citrus
and coitus and
you stellar nurseryat 1 A.M.
     I am
an impossible being,
a creature made of photons and
sinusoidal waves,
a spark of cosmic radiation.
I want to intrench my fingers
in the netting between stars
and pull hard,
shifting the feverish glow of galaxies
a bright toxic blue,
enveloping entropy in my mouth
like an old lover.
at this hour, planetary rotation
and axial tilt
transform me into a magician;
I wield
in my outstretched palm
buzzing electrons,
hydrogen fusion,
a fiery conglomeration
of matter. Eurydiceyou keep secrets like souvenirs.
your heart is a postage stamp,
your lungs, a pair of dusty
snow globes; I trace
a model Eiffel Tower
in the lines of your neck, an Arc
de Triomphe in the arch
of your back, a collection of
portraits
to rival the Louvre
assembled behind your eyes.
I gather each glimpse,
each fragment, every hint
of the things you've tried to hide
and hoard them
in the galleries of my mind,
curating my love for you
like a dense, Orphic art.

What inspired you to start writing?

Reading. Ever since I taught myself to read when I was four, I wanted to do what the authors of my favourite books did. I still have some of the poetry I wrote when I was five.

How much do you feel you've improved in the last few years?

I think I've improved significantly over the past couple of years, as you can probably see from some of the earlier poems I posted here.

Why do you post your writing to deviantArt?

I love the feedback and the community, plus the opportunity to read others' work and advise them.

Do you write with pen and paper or do you type on a word processor?

It depends. Often I'm inspired by something I see or hear online, so I use a word processor, but other times I'm just reading, or out, and in those cases I write on paper or make notes on my iPod.

What was the first piece you ever wrote?

This is the earliest one I still have:

Cold winter night
Stars shining bright
And casting off
Heavenly light
Snow falling soft
Ground gleaming white
Stars are shining
With all of their might.

So...yeah, I've improved since then.

What room is your favorite to write in?

My room. Something about being around so many books...

What is your favorite place for thinking?

Again, my room, or perhaps on the bus listening to music.

How do you beat out your writers block?

I read or listen to music. I generally just write when the impetus strikes me, so I'm not generally concerned with writers' block.

Do you listen to music when you write?

No. Before I write, maybe, but during I need everything to be still and quiet so I can think.

Writer #4: AimeeRaindrop

:thumb347637575: :thumb295688148: :thumb302283797: :thumb295865038:

What inspired you to start writing?

I actually hate this question because writing is something I've been doing since I can remember. To be honest it's just natural for me. If I'm not writing I'm reading. I love the written word. And although there are many things that inspire my writing, inspire my writing not inspired me to start writing, there was no light-bulb moment, no definitive one thing that made me start writing. I just did. It just happened. Like breathing; it's natural to me!

How much do you feel you've improved in the last few years?

Heaps! When I first started writing, not counting the years I was writing about my pet fish and my mummy as a little girl, seriously at around 14/15 I was so immature in my writing. So naïve. My grammar was poor, my language basic. I didn't really care how it looked or read or sounded; I just wanted to get my words out on the paper. And I did. But I grew up, I matured. And now a lot more thought goes into what I write. My personal diary is for just spewing words onto paper. The short stories, the novels, I produce now are thought out, planned, revised. They are as perfect as I can get them for the most part. I've come a long way. A long, long way.

Why do you post your writing to deviantArt?

I had a bit of a crisis of faith, I suppose, about whether or not to post my writing to deviantArt at first. Like all of us I was concerned about art theft and that putting my work on the web would make it harder to get published and on and on. But I love being able to share my words with other people and I love knowing that someone, somewhere, loved something I wrote. And maybe that it touched them, spoke to them, in some way. And deviantArt is the perfect platform to do that, because I don't yet have an agent or a book deal!

Do you write with pen and paper or do you type on a word processor?

I would love to write with pen and paper but my wrists couldn't take it! I have terrible arthritis in both wrists and after a page or so of writing they are crippled and painful. Although typing can have the same effect if I'm doing it for a long period of time, like I did with NaNoWrimo (my god, my wrists suffered that month!), it's easier on the wrists so I do all my writing on the word processor!

What was the first piece you ever wrote?

Errrrrr....*long pause*...I believe it was a story about my summer holiday in Greece when I was 5 or 6 years old. That's the first story I can remember. It was very childish, but hey; I was a child, so it's okay! Reading it back, as I have done a few times, it's quite amusing.

What room is your favorite to write in?

At the moment I write in my bedroom because I live with my partners in-laws and it's awkward for me to write anywhere else. But the room I'd really like to write in? The kitchen. Who doesn't want to write in the kitchen? You've got the refrigerator right there for snacks, and the kettle for tea/coffee, depending on your preference!

What is your favorite place for thinking?

The bus. I kid you not, I do a lot of thinking on my bus journey in and out of work, in and out of town, in and out of visiting family. I stick my headphones in, gaze out the window in, what I hope is, a dark and brooding manner and think. And I come up with a lot of ideas on the bus. It's just remembering those ideas that is the problem because, funny thing, buses aren't easy to write on!

How do you beat out your writers block?

Oh writer's block. I had writer's block for a whole year. A whole year. Can you believe? It was absolute torture. I wanted to write; I ached to write. But whenever I put fingers to keyboard drivel poured out. Nothing made sense; it all sounded fake. So you know what I did? I didn't push it. I didn't force myself like some people say. I just shrugged and said "okay, I won't write for a while." Oh sure, it just about killed me inside. But eventually I wrote something; and I wrote something good. I guess letting the writing come back naturally in its own time was the right thing to do.

Do you listen to music when you write?

I either listen to music or I watch television. Television is a bit of a devil; sometimes what I'm watching inspires me and helps me write, other times it distracts me and stops me writing. But music can be the same; if an emotional song comes on I can be distracted from the task in hand. I definitely prefer to have something on in the background when I write though. I can't stand the sound of silence.

Writer #5: crossing-ariel

What inspired you to start writing?

By the time I got to sixth grade I was just beginning to realize that maybe I suffered from the same depression that so affected my mother, and I felt very lonely and outcast. With the encouragement of my English teacher, who tried her best to instill her class with a love of Frost, I began writing reams of poetry. Other kids wrote it as an assignment, but I took it up with a vengeance.

How much do you feel you've improved in the last few years?

I would say that I've written good pieces over the years, but most of them I'm not very interested in now. I would like to think (hope) I'm at a different point now. I would definitely say I've become more deliberate about my writing in the last few years, and I think I've improved from the focus.

Why do you post your writing to deviantArt?

The same reason I imagine many people do: I want to share my work and see if others enjoy it, if it means something to them, touches them. I've made some really good friends here and so now it's about being a part of the dA community. I read, I write, I post, I interact.

Do you write with pen and paper or do you type on a word processor?

I pretty much use whatever is at hand depending on how quickly something comes. Sometimes I'll purposely use a typewriter, or I'll sit at my writing desk (an antique desk I found on craigslist that's one of my most cherished possessions.)

What was the first piece you ever wrote?

The first “real” poem I wrote was about snow and where it comes from (an assignment I imagine we were given to show our devotion to the poem “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,” which our teacher made us commit to memory and recite every morning).

What room is your favorite to write in?

My home office, which I painstakingly painted beige with eggshell trim and decorated to my heart's content. It's the only room in my house which reflects my personality and style. One entire wall is taken up by books and I love that.

What is your favorite place for thinking?

My mind is my greatest escape as well as my worst enemy. I over-think things a lot, but I also love to daydream. I don't have a particular place for doing it, though obviously it's a lot easier when I'm at home and feeling relaxed. My home office is probably where I think about the bulk of things which need to be gone over with some degree of importance.

How do you beat out your writers block?

This is always a really hard one to answer. I used to think there WAS some answer to it, or some right answer. I think reading a lot can help, but I've come to realize that sometimes my mind is just trying to take some time off to recharge its battery. We can't all be full of material all of the time. Sometimes I'll have a frighteningly long period of silence before a really productive bout of creativity. Writing goofy haiku back and forth with friends is also helpful.

Do you listen to music when you write?

I find music to be distracting for the most part. I always listen so hard to the lyrics (can't help it). These days I put on some spa music. Yep, that's right...whales and rain and soft, tinkling pianos. It helps me block out any unwelcome distractions, but isn't distracting in itself.