Writing, literature, and a nodding acquaintance with the texts I love--

I got back on the writing-a-draft-a-day bandwagon yesterday; granted, pushing out two drafts in quick succession is not comfortable, and I know that one of the two is dreck, but writing them serves as a type of bookmark for me to come back to, the images and ideas are there for me to revisit and work with/through, if I choose. What's puzzling me is how I've turned to the computer instead of pencil and paper for creation. I used to draft by hand, only, and now I seem to be able to ramble on with ease on the computer. I'm curious when this shift happened, and how, if at all, it has changed or informed my work. I am paranoid that one day this computer will finally crap out, and I'll have lost it all. I should print everything, and probably will, but not this minute. Ink is expensive. Maybe I'll put it all on that fancy new external storage device of mine and print it elsewhere. 

I'm not going to be one of the minor poets in this country where anyone wants my "papers." I'm even pretty sure that my family is not going to want to find/wade through folders of unfinished work or drafts. When I go, so will all these words. That's fine. I won't know any different. 

That said, I'm glad to be writing, even if it's blurts of nondescript value. Every now and then an actual poem appears, and that's fun. 

Speaking of fun and poems, my Brit Lit kids did write new poems yesterday, after we wended our way through Wordsworth and my friend's poem involving daffodils. And they were pretty predictable, as a group--though two of them had some real promise. How cool is that? And my seniors in Am Lit are working their way through "Thirteen Ways of..." drafts, based on the Wallace Stevens poem. We'll see how those turn out on Friday. 

Today, though, will be fun: in Brit Lit, we are reading Coleridge, and then illustrating sections of "Rime of the Ancient Mariner." Visual analysis. It works every time. We'll be starting Their Eyes Were Watching God in Am Lit-- I love that novel, and I hope this small group of five girls will, as well. I guess I'm pretty lucky to be a writing and lit teacher, because it keeps things fresh for my own work. Sometimes, though, it's a little heartbreaking when I get blank stares back after reading a poem or passage that really sings for me, but I suppose that was me in math class, back when I was a high school kid. It's enough that they make the acquaintance of the work.

Have a good day--it's rainy again. "Water, water, everywhere" indeed.

C