Writing from the gaps: When your words are gone

[Feature photo: Moyan Brenn]

You’ve run out of inspiration. You’ve run out of anywhere to run. It seems impossible. You set out days, weeks, months ago on a journey that was intended to bring you into new country, into new stories. At first, the miles and the words raced through you.

Now, as you wake to a dawn you have never before seen or smelled or heard, you realize you might as well be safe at home. You sit at the window of the tiny room or at the edge of your campsite and you remember something about gaps; something about the places where not just the familiar or the amazing, but everything is missing.

“Every shaman, every conjure man who buries the world-wonder root, every artist, scientist or schoolteacher that goes to the edge of the usual and acceptable world and risks looking over, risks the sight of real principles, sees right into the gaps.” ~ Alfredo Vea, La Maravilla

You are looking into the gap. Sit tight. Sit til it speaks to you. Later, perhaps an hour, perhaps a day, perhaps a week, write a conversation with the emptiness.

Most of my deepest fear emerged as I sat on the edge of the usual and acceptable world. Most of my strongest writing came to me from the gaps. This message to you is not so much from me, as from the gaps.