Free Fall Focus

So, fuck this ineffective shit.

It's fall. Autumn. Whatever. The mornings are cool. The air is crispy. Halloween is coming. Dia de los Muertos is coming. Thanksgiving is coming. Screw Christmas, for now. This is my most favoritest time to fully engage my creativity. To read and write. To think. To reflect. To plan. I don't usually read poetry (maybe my next new hobby), but I'll make an exception for this season (see below).

First, I realized I cannot continue to divide my attention between books. I'm going back to the first book I started two months ago and finishing it. Today. Barring any sudden and sweeping inspiration, I'll focus on that. I don't like to feel divided. It makes me feel unproductive, and even though I'm undoubtedly moving forward intellectually and emotionally, when my focus is lost, it's more of a struggle.

Second, if I can't continue my revision, and by the painful, slow pace I'm keeping, it's becoming more and more apparent that I can't, I'll do what I did in the past: move on, at least for a time. Pick up where I left off in the next story. It also must come out, in time. And as long as I'm working, I feel at peace.

Another thing about fall, it's fruitcake season. I'm most certainly feeling fruitcakeish, especially today. Stripes, polka-dots, plaid, argyle. The sky's the limit. My scientific mind uses this phenomena as evidence that I'm in the right state of mind to create. My philosophical mind wonders WTF does this have to do with anything, but recognizes with this a priori, my consciousness has come full circle.

I'll hibernate in the safety and security of my home, drinking coffee long into the afternoon, cuddling with my dog, and allowing myself to become distracted by SNL, Fairy Tail, and The Somnambulist. This is how I work best. Why fuck with the process?

Apologies. Today's blog only makes sense to me. Apparently, I needed to talk to myself.

Don't knock on my door, people. I'm not home.

Jess

"October"
Robert Frost (from A Boy’s Will, 1915)

O hushed October morning mild,
Thy leaves have ripened to the fall;
Tomorrow’s wind, if it be wild,
Should waste them all.
The crows above the forest call;
Tomorrow they may form and go.
O hushed October morning mild,
Begin the hours of this day slow.
Make the day seem to us less brief.
Hearts not averse to being beguiled,
Beguile us in the way you know.
Release one leaf at break of day;
At noon release another leaf;
One from our trees, one far away.
Retard the sun with gentle mist;
Enchant the land with amethyst.
Slow, slow!
For the grapes’ sake, if they were all,
Whose leaves already are burnt with frost,
Whose clustered fruit must else be lost—
For the grapes’ sake along the wall.


"My November Guest"
Robert Frost (from A Boy’s Will, 1915)

My sorrow, when she’s here with me,
Thinks these dark days of autumn rain
Are beautiful as days can be;
She loves the bare, the withered tree;
She walks the sodden pasture lane.

Her pleasure will not let me stay.
She talks and I am fain to list:
She’s glad the birds are gone away,
She’s glad her simple worsted gray
Is silver now with clinging mist.

The desolate, deserted trees,
The faded earth, the heavy sky,
The beauties she so truly sees,
She thinks I have no eye for these,
And vexes me for reason why.

Not yesterday I learned to know
The love of bare November days
Before the coming of the snow,
But it were vain to tell her so,
And they are better for her praise.

Links:

http://poetry.about.com/od/ourpoemcollections/a/autumnpoems.htm