Leaving It All on the Page

          When I write, I see, not through my eyes, but through my mind. People and places dance across the white lined paper or the glowing computer screen taunting me, eluding me, challenging me to fit the pieces together, to create a story worth telling. More often than not, my drool hits the page before my pen makes a mark, so the process moves slowly. When I get going, I write in spurts, a sentence or two at a time followed by long pauses, endless pen clicking, and the jittering of my shoe on the hardwood. Every time I cease my fingers, moments flash before my eyes: sunrises cutting shadows out of the darkness, muddy boots dripping onto just-cleaned linoleum, blood adorning a white jersey. I attempt to interpret these images, to describe them on the page. The translation proves difficult because I constantly second guess myself, repeating a line until the meaning slips away, disappears, forgotten and unusable. A long exhale, a blink, or any break in my trance reveals my utter frustration, my struggle to hold onto the images, the ideas and the words. Writing often becomes a battle or even a prison cell. 

         However, when I write, I also feel. I replace the ink in my pen with my own blood; the faster my pen glides or my fingers scurry, the harder my heart beats in my chest. Every period shoots a tingle down the back of my neck. Every comma results in a pause, a breath. My writing excites me like new love. I linger on every word, every phrase, investing my passion into each line and I often find myself thinking about a paper for days after I hand it in. When I write, I leave my imagination, my emotions, and sometimes my drool on the page.
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