This is why I write

Photo courtesy of J Phillipson

What is it that I see when I close my mind to this world and open it to that other one? That place beyond the glass from which ideas fly--to be let into my room at my whim and leisure.
When we close our eyes to bright sunlight, the shapes of things are still visible against our closed lids. Violet and orange, the colors of flame--they wait, licking at my fancy, static and patient--for me to let them in. And so I pick up my pen and open my soul's eyes, and I give those fiery forms their true design.
A tree outside the window, its leaves a blur of green, becomes THAT tree, the only tree, the first tree. Its bark is gnarled with wise age, its limbs are fingers that point to things beyond my ken, and its leaves--the leaves have renounced blurriness. They are unique, each quivering with particular life, each its own shade of life-green, verde vitae, and each limned in gold, fire-veined. This tree speaks to me as its whorls and knots spin and shift to become a face that is distinctly itself. I am the Source, it says. And I don't need to question what the source is. There is no quest for more, just complaisance as I wait for knowing to roll its golden path through me.
I stand beneath the branches and stretch out my arms to either side, and I marvel at the play of green and gold on my skin. And I wait there.
This is what writing is to me, this deliberate step into a new world, my own world, a place I create as I move through it. There is no sense of desperate urgency here--only contentment.
I know that if I stand here long enough, poised for any eventuality, it will come. And I will record it: I, Life-giver, will record it in my book.