On Beginnings, in Madness, Rack, and Honey: Collected Lectures, by Mary Ruefle
...the poem ends on the page, but it begins off the page, it begins in the mind. The mind acts, the mind wills a poem, often against our own will; somehow this happens, somehow a poem gets written in the middle of a chaotic holiday party that has just run out of ice, and it's your house.
On Beginnings, in Madness, Rack, and Honey: Collected Lectures, by Mary Ruefle The bearer of the secret may be unburdened, but the hearer is now burdened. This is the heartbeat of all exchange. It goes by many names, and one that is not perhaps chiefest among them, but is nonetheless important to us, is reading.
On Secrets, in Madness, Rack, and Honey: Collected Lectures, by Mary Ruefle The loss of a secret makes one angry – if one's intent is to remain isolate. The loss of a secret makes one joyous, if one's intent is toward fellowship. Openmouthed, closemouthed. All secrets have an inside and an outside, they must, because they are concealed or hidden – that is their nature –
On Secrets, in Madness, Rack, and Honey: Collected Lectures, Mary Ruefle It takes great courage to speak in fragments.
It takes great courage to speak in whole sentences. On Secrets, in Madness, Rack, and Honey: Collected Lectures, Mary Ruefle. Photo taken at lavender farm, Oregon But there is another side to "the secrets we choose to betray lose power over us" and that is that, in relinquishing a secret, we may lose a very important power indeed, one that nourishes, protects, and defines us. We may lose our life. We may lose what little or great personal power we possess, lose our sense of self, lose the energy that drives our soul.
On Secrets, in Madness, Rack, and Honey: Collected Lectures, Mary Ruefle |
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