The Luxury of Excerpts

In the interests

of good writing

books imbue profundity

and poetic meaning

into the actions, words & lives

of their characters.

**

Even memoirs achieve

this tidiness –

this well-structured

architectural masterpiece,

this neat polygon life,

this feeling of control.

**

But I tell myself

don’t be intimidated

because in writing things down

we find ourselves

compelled to make sense of them.

This is the luxury of excerpts.

Like statistics you pick the ones that suit you

arrange them like puzzle pieces

and glue them or screw them

or hammer them

(or moosh them uncomfortably)

into place.

**

I guess writing is like house-keeping –

freeing your brain

of the cloying accumulation

of cobwebs,

rearranging the ornaments

and at least pulling up

the bedspread

to make your head

a more ordered

space to live.

**

But sometimes

we can only be bothered

when we know

guests are coming.