Don’t push. Never force. Doesn’t come to you? Let it be. Allow time to pass. But, not too much time. You have a job to do.

This art is scary. Each word is a step on a tight rope. The writer never knows when they’re going to fall. And, eventually, they will.

Nothing is there. No words nor images. Sitting alone at a desk or on a couch. Forgetting how to write. How to apply words to paper.

Early in morning hours or late night rendezvous, the writer stretches notes like Coltrane or Coleman, experimenting with short bops and bahs followed by long blown measured music, precise, yet improvised, always sounding like the first time ever played.

Like so many, the beats understood this. Kerouac, Ginsberg, Snyder, Burroughs, writing like mad men, but taking time to observe, patience for the page, never moving forward till they had stepped backward two or three times. 

Don’t believe me? Pray to Gil Scott- Heron and ask him. Tough times produce great art. Look at those times. Wait during those times. Write during those times.

For it is our salvation.