the white page

I want to write. But I am currently bereft of inspiration. Sometimes the writing pours from me like a river in full flow, the words tumbling over themselves as they seek their place on the page. Everywhere I look, I see or hear or taste something I want to write about.

There are ebbs and flows, obviously. Just to mix my river and sea metaphors up a bit. 

And perhaps it is no coincidence that there is a full moon tonight. If ever I was to be affected by ebb and flow, I am sure it is now.

That might be an excuse.

Are there any new ideas? Or are we just rehashing what has already gone before?

In Medieval times, creating anything new was blasphemous. Only God could create, they thought. So the art lay in the adaptation of what had gone before. Retelling stories with a different slant. The medieval French writers used the word antancion. You can probably guess that it had something to do with their intention. So what became important was their angle, the way they told a story that had already been told, be it biblical or from the Greek canon of Homer's Odyssey and the Iliad, and from the writings of Aristotle, Euripides, Aristophanes and Euclid.

The author's perception of what the subject matter requires dictates the way he or she crafts its description. And therein lies the treasure. Hopefully.

So. There is nothing new under the sun. The frisson that I experience as I look up at the full moon or the feeling of golden specialness when the sun slips down over the horizon, caressing bricks and chimneys and individual leaves. There are many who have appreciated these things before me and expressed the revelation and sense of wonder they engender in much more erudite terms.

Writing. It's the outer expression of inner knowing, wanting to know, exploring and feeling.

And I am happy to be part of it and to strive for my voice and my wonderings to be heard.