Reading is the Gift, the Spark
I think that you should read Post Colonial Love Poem by Natalie Diaz. I’m probably requiring it for my creative writing students next semester. Which isn’t to say you have to do what I say but maybe I can tap into that uncomfortable power dynamic of teaching for a moment to guilt you into it? Maybe? Eh?
Not quite the best sales pitch, but this book has stayed present in my mind since I read it a couple months ago. Mainly, I’m thinking about how it helped spark the flames of writing in me more than any other book I’ve read recently.
I think that part of it was the constant mention of green in the book. Or, the ways in which Diaz weaves the act of loving in with aspects of a world that is violent towards that loving. There are connections in this book that make so much sense when I read them, I wondered how I didn’t know them already. It’s like those obvious things your therapist says that you should have known all along. Or, it’s the poem, “exhibits from The American Water Museum.” Damn did I like that poem. Reread it so many times and I continue to find so much I love.
Honestly, I’m not sure what, exactly, it was in the book that caused the continuous sparking. But it did. And I went back to writing with renewed strength to revise and write poems that I’ve been wanting to write. For this I want to give a large thank you to Diaz. This was one of the best gifts reading can give me and I’m grateful beyond words.
The gift here, to be clear, is a book that offers so much to its readers that it made me want to be a better writer, thinker, human. It made me want to practice and play with language in new ways so that I could get better at connecting with others, whether I’m the one listening or being listened to. It pushed me to create. To make. It made it feel like creating was important again.
It’s like that sometimes, isn’t it? The way that the reading can just make you want to create. To be a part of the great conversation of written words.
I’ll admit that I’m often brought back to the page through frustration. A kind of “I can do that better” challenge or a response to something I didn’t love. That’s a different kind of gift I think; to encounter a voice that you want to dialogue with. Or yell at. Or tell off.
The kind of gift I felt in Post Colonial Love Poem is a little rarer. It’s related to the gift I feel when I read a nonfiction book and get an idea for a story or poem I think would resonate. The kind of gift where you read about someone writing about their couch or their father or a hyper specific aspect of political justice and you think, “I can do that? Oh I’m going to do that.” Those are first cousins to this gift. I honor them deeply; the way reading inspires ideas and motivates me to write.
But the gift of desire towards creating itself? The desire to also make something new because you’ve been changed by this thing, this connection another has brought into the world? This is the dream I have for every book I pick up. These are the nutrients I crave.
Post Colonial Love Poem inspired me in the way that if I were asked to review the book I’d have to sigh and say, “All of it is good. Like the whole book. It’s just goodness.” It’s one of those books were I’m happier with the effect it has had on me rather than the ways it works. I’m not sure I want to know more than it has become part of the puzzle of me and if I read poems from it again, those poems click into place, bring light to my soul. It makes me feel more human and I’m happy with the mystery of how words can do that, for now.
It reminds me of when I first read Parable of the Sower by Octavia Butler. Or when I read How to Write an Autobiographical Novel by Alexander Chee, Palestine by Joe Sacco, my first poem by Li-Young Lee. They’ve all latched onto my being and stretched the ways that I can exist in this world, the ways that I can experience deeper. They’ve all changed me in some way. I can think back to how many different books made parts of me kinder, more critical, more understanding, or less ignorant of my own participation in the pain of others. It seems to me this is what books are often meant to be.
I’m not sure yet how Post Colonial Love Poem has latched onto me. That will come with time. For now, I know that if I crack it open and read something, I feel like writing poetry. That’s a wonderful feeling. It makes me believe that working on a poem can do something more than change a few keystrokes or pen marks on something no one may ever see. It makes me feel like the act of creation is worthy of my time. That creating can give me energy, give me light, give me something I don’t get anywhere else.
I don’t know if this book will do the same for you. I hope it does. But I do know there’s books out there that would. That would weave their ways into your soul. That would make you more complete. More human. More you.
I feel grateful to have found a book that does that for me. I can’t wait to find another that does.
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