Voice

There, in the vacuum of the said,
The pause, the breath that comes
Beyond the waves just fled,
That space, the hollow of the voice
Is shaped that the soul
May shred or smooth
itself
Lose the track or follow close
Along the wind-walled shore.

---

So...I've been thinking about a novel that is slowly disintegrating under that ceaseless, wearing, constant thought and I have come to fixate upon voice, which would give me a path through or a shape to the various grains of plot and theme and setting. Who is speaking?

In tandem with this bit of confusion, Carrie, one of the leaders of our local library writer's group, announced that she'd be holding a workshop on blogging. This seemed the perfect oblique way to find the voice that my novel is lacking. After all, my favorite bloggers have a terrific sense of voice. Typically, those voices are quite unlike what I would describe as my own half-lecturing tone. Blech. I mean, who goes in for voluntary lectures?

Carrie's work has a distinct voice and she encourages participation in a community of writers. This exchange helps, I think, strengthen the writing toward something that takes place in this exchange of idea and image. Other voices help you define your own. Maybe?

My own voice has become thin through repeating things until the ideas become worn away rather than refined. There are no walls from which to hear strange echoes.
Chatter becomes noise, eventually.

Therefore, I'm going to try and take this blog in a new direction: more flash fiction/prompt writing, less drifty blah blah blah (see above). We'll see if that helps.

---

Once upon a time, it rained. Rain fell on grass, on wide concrete roads, thin concrete paths, and short oaks; rain fell on dogs curled up beside warm bricks, on roofs, on narrow gutters that made streams beside the eaves at the edges of those roofs. Rainwater and thin rivulets from the yards pooled beside the rounded curbs until brown puddles lay on the edges of the streets.

Stories fell with the water and bubbled up in great domes floating across these rain puddles, an entire story in each great breath beneath the rainbow-thin water. They drifted across the stillness, across the reflections of sky and house, stark as photos on the ground.

As they pop, the rainbow remnant of the water that fell through frost and electricity and torrent, that flowed past leaves and grass and brick, stains my skin. Narratives evaporate. A quick chill of drops thump against my skin. More rain falls. The street lamp catches some and they roll around, hanging suspended from the insect-eyed glass, and fall into the calmness of the puddle, creating a lake of the curve of the street and the curb's cliff.

Damp, warm concrete presses its cuneiform into my stomach and arms. Someone launches a craft on the waves, a green and flat boat that carries me from the edge into the middle of the road, where the summer heat inhales all the stories back into itself. Even me, gone into the haze.