Sunday 26 July 2009

With a little help from my friends...

Today has been a productive day.

With a little help from my regular Sunday night Rock Band crew, who have been waiting to read the novel I've been working on for-ever, I was placed in the situation where I had to provide them with some of it to read, by today, under pain of mockery or Chinese burns.

I am pleased to say that I handed over the prologue to Matt and Adam this evening with a list of music that kept me company whilst I wrote, or that fit with the tale...

Here's the list, expect the words next week...

The Last Man - Clint Mansell

Darkest Days - Stabbing Westward

Waiting For The Night - Depeche Mode

Crawling - Linkin Park

Disposable Teens - Marilyn Manson

Chinese Burn - Curve

Burn - Nine Inch Nails

Greedly Fly - Bush

The Noose - Perfect Circle

The Kill - 30 Seconds To Mars

Prayers For Rain - The Cure

Something I Can Never Have - Nine Inch Nails

A Beautiful Lie - 30 Seconds To Mars

I Put A Spell On You - Marilyn Manson

Ich Will - Rammstein

Get Your Gun - Marilyn Manson

Bodies - Drowning Pool

From Yesterday - 30 Seconds To Mars

Pet - Perfect Circle

Famous Last Words - My Chemical Romance

Broken Bones - Howling Bells

Blood - Editors

Low Happening - Howling Bells

Teardrop - Massive Attack

Haunted - Evanescence

Haunting Me - Stabbing Westward

Every Day Is Exactly The Same - Nine Inch Nails

The Trick Is To Keep Breathing - Garbage

Thursday 16 July 2009

Diving into unfamiliar waters...

Today's post is a poem.  This is rare for me, I don't generally write poetry, I find it incredibly hard when every word has so much weight and importance, when one wrong adjective can buckle the structure and bring all that emotion and thought crashing down.  (Although some writers I know say it should be the same case with prose, but if you're telling a story, shouldn't  the pace, flow and cadence come naturally?  You can over-think some times, I can certainly over-write and I kinda think life's too short...)

But I love the way poetry works, the way an entire piece can be a Polaroid of emotion, a parable, a metaphor and a riddle of meanings.  Poetry allows you to cloak your intent in deep, dark waters, so that on first reading it can seem like a summer's day but it has this edge, a promise of a storm, an unnoticed broken rung on a ladder, something big moving in the darkness of the lake...  Poetry is like stealth-prose, usually smaller, sleeker and full of surprises.  Good poetry anyway.

I don't often write poetry, but I find that sometimes its size and nature is ideal for emotional writing.  It can allow you to write about a subject without feeling the burn of the fire, without diving so deep that you suddenly find you can't breathe...

This is quite raw, I've not worked on it much, but the moment it captures feels true...

The Empty Chair

This chair;
worn and old but comfortable,
the wooden skin polished and varnish thin;
though I sit in it,
it waits for you.

Outside, the blue sky chases clouds,
bird's flight casts shadows.
The wind changes and I know
you're out chasing feathers in it;
following the seasons
from marsh to wood,
from sea to snow.
I can see your glasses pushed up,
high on your head, above binoculars,
Your hair ruffled like crows.
Your stillness and silence
making you part of the earth.
I can hear your key in the door,
The dog barking and your shout,
"Get out you stupid dog!"
The waxed jacket slides from your shoulders,
with a scent of trees, pepper and tobacco.
The chair creaks as you sit and reach for the paper.

Thursday 2 July 2009

We are the all singing, all dancing, crap of the world...

I'm sitting in the usual seat, the usual place and feeling very aware of the fact that I haven't written or blogged for a while.  Has the novelty worn off?  Am I in a creative wasteland?  Did someone steal my typing fingers while I was asleep?

I'm relieved to report that none of the above are appropriate, it's just been a couple of long weeks and there's a couple more ahead.

There are times when I want to write everything down, record these days in a way more reliable than memory.  Snag the moments in a butterfly net of words and keep them trapped forever, so that it's there to experience even after I'm gone.  No matter how good or bad I feel I write, there's probably no one else who will write exactly like me, who will live this exact life, who will see through these green-grey eyes...

Then there are days when I want to just get through to the end, ideally intact, with low body counts and no trips to the medical centre.

Writing is largely about communicating, about making a connection through shared experiences and emotions.  About letting even one other person know that you've felt the same, whether it be elation, delerium, ennui or boredom.  It's also about entertainment, watching created worlds spiral into Hell or greatness with an intimate audience, others who will grin and say, “Yeah, I was there when Highgrave burned...  That was a night to remember!”

But sometimes you don't want to remember, you don't want to share.  It's too tedious or painful for one person to endure, let alone to share it around.  Sometimes the cut goes too deep and those are the wounds that you keep to yourself, quietly picking at them in the darkness of 3am when you can't sleep.

There are times when it may seem that I'm not writing.  Sometimes it's because life has legitimately gotten in the way.  Sometimes it's because I'm being lazy – no surprise there, it's the whole reason I started this blog.

Sometimes it's not that I'm not writing, it's just that it's nothing I want to share.

By the way, for those who missed it, this blog entry was titled after Tyler Durden from Chuck Palahniuk's Fight Club.