Now Playing: “Shadow Stabbing” by CAKE

 

I know one of the things poetry is trying to teach me about all of my writing:
Condense your language. Trust the reader. Calm down.

She’s been whispering it not in a judgmental way, just gently prodding me to take a little more air out of my prose. Reminding me that not every thought needs its own explanatory footnote. Some sentences, she says, should just walk away cool without looking back.

And sure—some sections of my novel already know this. The prose hums quietly. It gets in, gets out. It leaves room for the reader to lean in.

But then Word Raccoon shows up.

You know her. She does not whisper.

She clatters into a chapter like she owns the place, dragging a suitcase full of enjambment and metaphors wrapped in glittery duct tape. She doesn’t ask if I want her help. She starts yanking out adverbs like weeds and throwing poetic curveballs into my clean, orderly paragraphs. She cannot resist a good line-break moment, even if we are, technically, still writing in prose.

And sometimes, frustratingly, she’s right.

Because every so often, I find that I’ve overexplained again. Or that I’ve polished the language until it’s so smooth the reader slides right off. That’s when the poem-voice, the one that knows how to cut, starts quietly shaking her head.

Sometimes my novel needs a poem to walk through it like an editor who doesn’t care about plot or logic, only rhythm and resonance. Someone who asks: “Yes, but does it sing?”

And when she does that, I have to admit:
The novel is better for it.
The prose gets less polite and more alive.
The story stops performing and starts pulsing.

So now I toggle between the cool-eyed narrator and the feral poetry engine. Between structure and spark. Between letting it all make sense and letting it matter more than it makes sense. (Terrifying but hey, that’s poetry and sometimes, the best prose.)

Some days, I get the balance right. Other days, I have to go back and sweep up glitter.

But either way, I’m learning.

And I’ve stopped trying to keep Word Raccoon out entirely.
She’s earned a key. She just isn’t allowed to redecorate anything without permission.

(Not yet anyway.)

Emotional DoorDash

If your muse only shows up

when you are in pain,
that’s not a muse.
That’s a parasite.

Take your sorrows to the

loading and

unloading zone
Only.

But also:

Food delivered in a steaming bag,
Soggy fries half gone
Still feeds.

Poems are hard because
I’m used to
Overexplaining.

The anxious woman’s
Curse.

Let’s Pause Here for a Meta Moment

Yes, I’m aware that the poem about overexplaining overexplains.
Lines like:

Poems are hard because I’m used to overexplaining

are basically the poetic equivalent of someone labeling their suitcase “this is a suitcase.”
But that’s the point. That’s the spiral. That’s the anxious woman’s curse performing itself while trying to confess it.

And let’s be honest, I still feel regularly that I’ve somehow forgotten how to write. That every page of the novel is me trying to hot-glue together a sentence and hope no one notices the fumes. The below exemplifies it perfectly, dear Wordies of Mine!

---

Conjugation Chart: “You Suck”
An irregular verb, deeply felt (Not actually irregular. Just emotionally so.)

Pronoun	Conjugation
I	I suck (on the regular)
You	You suck (lie)
He/She	He sucks (he doesn’t)
We	We suck (sometimes, but mostly because I’m there)
Y’all	Y’all suck (only at objectionable rallies)
They	They suck (confirm who “they” is once and for all and I’ll circle back)
My novel	My novel sucks (only every other day)
My poem	My poem might suck but it has metaphors, okay?

Important Softener (Because I’m Not a Monster)
Listen, I don’t actually think you suck. Or that anyone else does, really. This chart is just what happens when I’m spiraling and need to temporarily redirect the self-hatred floodlights toward some imagined audience of Also-Sucky Writers. It’s not about you. It’s about my inner saboteur needing someone else to dunk on before I crawl back to compassion.

Let’s be real:
This chart is more about the way shame echoes than it is about reality.
Most writers don’t suck.
They’re just writing through the same storm.

Square One:
Me in pajamas, rereading a sentence I once loved, thinking, “Oh god, is this even English?”

Spoiler: it is.
Spoiler two: the work still matters.
To whom, I’m not sure.

P.S. Friends, I broke down and ordered Crush, and I am so excited for it to get here that I have actually looked at the tracking info for it multiple times a day. I never do that!

The package also contains a new dress, but I don’t care so much about that. I am thirsty for some poetry. I know there’s a great line hiding in that, like I’m Crushing, but I just want the book to get here!