in this world of striving for who-knows-what that is known as writing long, i’m reminded of the importance of one. one word, one sentence, one paragraph. one at a time. slowly, an emotional line is drawn and it pulls the reader through.
thanks to Alison Pick for reminding me. she read a piece a couple of weeks ago that pulled me through my life into her imagination. here it is:
The train of memory sleeps on its tracks. At night, in the station, the shadows gather around it, reaching out to touch its cool black sides. The train stretches back, far out of eyesight. Where it comes from is anyone’s guess.
At dawn the ghosts retreat, take their place as shadows in the corners of the lofty-domed station. The train sighs on its tracks, a traveller hoisting very heavy bags. We roll over in our beds; we cough, stretch a little; the train of memory starts to move forward. Slowly at first, but gathering speed. The landscape drifts by like the last wisps of a dream. In the early morning hours the train begins to move into the opposite of memory. Into a future time when someone will look back at us now, wondering what our days were like and why we did the things we did. Or why we did not act, as the case might equally be.
Someone will be unable to make our lives make sense.
The train has no answers, only forward momentum. We open our eyes; it is moving very quickly now. Moving always ahead. It never arrives.
p. 311 from FAR TO GO
you’re welcome.