the workshop

Spent the weekend in Sedona. Inside. It was beautiful outside, but I was inside. Inside a theater/lecture hall of the Red Mountain High school for two full days taking a workshop with Natalie Goldberg.

I learned some important rules:
use a fast pen. continue no matter what. keep your hand moving. don't be tossed away. don't cross out. be specific. write from your whole body. figure out what your obsessions are. tell the truth. lose control. read it aloud. it is not a precious something... it is just writing!

Some words I heard:
I stopped sleeping on Sundays. symbolic pools of blood. Ramon brought me back to life. they were not killers. I was a hog man. six months away from a heart attack. it's coming and it's coming today. red grass. one, two, three. is is is unraveling. dumb and slow. fuck. all the different kinds of years. my heart is as full now as my desire was full then. he didn't know he was beautiful. unballing.

Some words I wrote:
I didn't have a camera or maybe the energy to pull one out. in the midst of this somberness were light and life. whatever it is, it is not the future. begin to think about the important parts, like shoes. now I'm thinking about it. flotilla of mushroom. polished skull. her neck in cinnamon warmth. light cast with a shade of cool. rough skinned and still cool after all these hours of resting next to my water bag. peel-pull, break off a segment. sits like plates, cockeyed and stacked in the sand. the woosh of snow as it leaves the shovel. soaked through, teeth chatter, can't even talk.

not much else to say right now, but I think you could start in any one of these places and there would be possibilities.