"But then you find the words that spark connection, or rather they find you, slipping effortlessly from your tongue like an oft-sung lullaby, and the patient hears them too and so it begins, a quiet duet performed with elegance and grace, and the irritation is gone, and you know you are where you are meant to be, and this is why you do what you do."
Beautiful! There's something so moving about the "you" not being in control but rather connected to the world or something other/bigger, so the words find you. The simile, "like an oft-sung lullaby" adds texture and emotion to the words. I'm collecting clues and the next one is "patient" and now I feel a setting appear. The lullaby becomes "quiet duet performed with elegance and grace." The patient and the protagonist are connected and from this so much happens. The irritation is gone and there is meaning in the world.
Thank you! All of this practice will flow into your writing, expanding it, giving you an overflowing menu so you can match language to the truth of the moment.
But then you open the refrigerator, or rather, a numb robotic zombie clone that looks precisely like you -- but isn´t -- opens the refrigerator, and a you/not you hand reaches for the banana cream pie with the eerie unerring manual dexterity of an obese ballet prima donna, and then the pie is on the counter and your fork plunges in and for a brief ecstatic minute your mind is calm and quiet.
So good! Humor comes in with the string of adjectives "numb robotic zombie" clone, which the "you" has become, taken over by the clone. Agency has vanished and the you is watching this hand reach for the pie.
But the cold push of harbour air finds my fingers, yet it is a small sacrifice, gladly offered, to be seated on this port-side ferry bench, waiting for the short evening film on this long clear winter night to roll on the big sky screen, and as the Collaroy glides past the shelter of shore, to begin its swaying across the harbour mouth, and I gaze out beyond the Heads to the dark Pacific where the full moon begins its slow ascent, and its light limns my harbour bearing this ferry on route to the Quay.
Beautiful! I am so well situated in this scene with so many sensory details. The cold harbour air; sitting on the ferry bench; winter night; the gliding past the shelter of shore, the swaying, on and on. I love the metaphor of the night sky (big sky screen--those three heavier stresses make me slow down and see it) as a short evening film. The long sentence, too, mimics this ride. So lovely! My only suggestion is to cut "as": "and as the Collaroy glides past the shelter of shore...."
Thank you for the feedback. I’ve always had a soft spot for the long flowing truthful ‘and’ , ever since I read Hemingway’s ‘The Sun Also Rises’, and the scene where Jake Barnes is sitting in a church, and tries to pray but finds himself unable to fully connect.
I’m planning to use my recent ferry ride for an essay I working on with a group of other writer / friends in based on the idea of Ordinary Marvels. In my case the marvel of the full moon. Cheers.
In that moment it clicks as if honeyed nectar is coating a tongue, previously dry and uncertain, and its lubrication encourages me to reach for Cicerian heights, and the words are now kissing and coupling, and the dissonance retreats and the address rises beyond the rafters and into the minds of men.
This is such a great extended metaphor, capturing the feeling of finding the exact right words; that flow, that sense of moving the truth into language. You give the sensation such sensuality with "honeyed nectar" coating a tongue, previously dry and uncertain. By using the conjunction "and" you simulate this flow. There's momentum and a rush to the end.
This one is so timely! I'd just written a sentence full of "ands" to capture an awkward moment of a first kiss (consensual). For fun, here's the original and the new version, thanks to this wonderful lesson:
ORIGINAL:
He leans down to press his lips to hers. Light, warm, soft, lingering.
And then it’s over and he backs up and trips on an exposed root and she reaches out to grab his forearm to stop his fall and stumbles forward into him and now his arms are tight around her and hers are around his waist and she presses her cheek into his chest and grips his jacket and they stand there laughing like teenagers.
NEW:
And then it’s over or, more accurately, she cuts it short, feeling trapped as a piece of trash under a rock and he stumbles backwards like a schoolboy caught stealing and she lurches into him and he embraces her and she grips him hard and they laugh gentle joy into the stream’s symphony.
There is a lot of energy in both examples. But the revision invites more imagery, and through the imagery, you create more associations. We have a sense of what’s going on in their internal worlds. So good!
Great post, Nina. I love "and". There is such music in it. I get carried away and have to pull back, but I allow it. And brings on the "thinking out loud" in the moment, the scene, the character.
Absolutely agree! It also helps me psychologically. Joy and sorrow and bewilderment and tranquility…So many emotions can exist at the same time. And there’s a really interesting propulsion to it once you get beyond three things. The list seems to imply it could go on forever so the connections go on forever.
That’s exactly it, you’re using the conjunction to get “to it,” to find what’s under that first feeling, thought, idea, reaction. When I “and” them, I get an amazing list and the one I’m after pops and I rearrange. Beautiful to behold. Freeing. Promising. If people only knew, I sometimes think, about this language of ours. It’s a miracle and a gift.
On the street, a dark blue shape-shifting wall, and in front of the public library a mass of blue algae and we waited, they waited, until the march stepped off and now, we were the mass and started the chant, and as one voice sang out, “Hey-hey, ho-ho, Donald Trump has got to go.”
I love how the blue keeps shifting: "a dark blue shape-shifting wall," and then "a mass of blue algae," and then the two come together , "we were the mass." The "they" and the "we" have united and become a "we."
I recently opened up an old story I was working on and it opens with a Nordic tale so I thought I play around with that: But when Odin ambled beneath the ancient tree, the ravens, or the very essence of thought and memory alighted upon his broad shoulders, whispering secrets of the world like the rustling leaves of a forgotten dream; and Munin, the color of dense fog, mirrored the shifting clouds in his gaze; and Hugin, bright and clear-eyed; and he named them, and he sent them out to watch and listen."
I am immersed in this other way of being in the world with ravens, "or the very essence of thought and memory" alighting on shoulders and whispering secrets. You have found a grammar of animism.
I know some love the flat, unpunctuated prose line, but give me some commas and italics so that I can hear myself saying the words on first reading, particularly when they "run on." Once again, thank you.
The day dragged by for Faith or, more precisely, she felt it pull her unwillingly onwards as if she didn’t want it to end, and it hauled her along, filling her with dread when she knew she couldn’t avoid going home and seeing what awaited her and knowing the house was a mess and that everything was wrong.
I love the image of the day dragging Faith along. It hauls her forward and fills her with dread. I picture her digging in her heels but day has her by the neck. She doesn't want to go home because it's a mess and "everything was wrong." This last bit is vague and creates the reader question: what has gone wrong?
I was rewriting part of a paragraph in a short story, which I'm trying to finish and this helped a lot. In context, "everything was wrong" because Faith is in the process of telling the truth of her life, which is pretty awful...
"But then you find the words that spark connection, or rather they find you, slipping effortlessly from your tongue like an oft-sung lullaby, and the patient hears them too and so it begins, a quiet duet performed with elegance and grace, and the irritation is gone, and you know you are where you are meant to be, and this is why you do what you do."
Beautiful! There's something so moving about the "you" not being in control but rather connected to the world or something other/bigger, so the words find you. The simile, "like an oft-sung lullaby" adds texture and emotion to the words. I'm collecting clues and the next one is "patient" and now I feel a setting appear. The lullaby becomes "quiet duet performed with elegance and grace." The patient and the protagonist are connected and from this so much happens. The irritation is gone and there is meaning in the world.
Thank you Nina. I love the sentences you choose. Appreciate the encouraging feedback. It took me a while to write that!
Thank you! All of this practice will flow into your writing, expanding it, giving you an overflowing menu so you can match language to the truth of the moment.
Love this. Of course I can´t know for sure, but it has the ring of nonfiction -- which makes it all the more moving.
Thanks! I'm always in that grey zone in between, but this is from experience.
But then you open the refrigerator, or rather, a numb robotic zombie clone that looks precisely like you -- but isn´t -- opens the refrigerator, and a you/not you hand reaches for the banana cream pie with the eerie unerring manual dexterity of an obese ballet prima donna, and then the pie is on the counter and your fork plunges in and for a brief ecstatic minute your mind is calm and quiet.
I love this; what a great way to express the dissonance and internal conflict that many people experience.
Intriguing!
So good! Humor comes in with the string of adjectives "numb robotic zombie" clone, which the "you" has become, taken over by the clone. Agency has vanished and the you is watching this hand reach for the pie.
But the cold push of harbour air finds my fingers, yet it is a small sacrifice, gladly offered, to be seated on this port-side ferry bench, waiting for the short evening film on this long clear winter night to roll on the big sky screen, and as the Collaroy glides past the shelter of shore, to begin its swaying across the harbour mouth, and I gaze out beyond the Heads to the dark Pacific where the full moon begins its slow ascent, and its light limns my harbour bearing this ferry on route to the Quay.
Beautiful! I am so well situated in this scene with so many sensory details. The cold harbour air; sitting on the ferry bench; winter night; the gliding past the shelter of shore, the swaying, on and on. I love the metaphor of the night sky (big sky screen--those three heavier stresses make me slow down and see it) as a short evening film. The long sentence, too, mimics this ride. So lovely! My only suggestion is to cut "as": "and as the Collaroy glides past the shelter of shore...."
Thank you for the feedback. I’ve always had a soft spot for the long flowing truthful ‘and’ , ever since I read Hemingway’s ‘The Sun Also Rises’, and the scene where Jake Barnes is sitting in a church, and tries to pray but finds himself unable to fully connect.
I’m planning to use my recent ferry ride for an essay I working on with a group of other writer / friends in based on the idea of Ordinary Marvels. In my case the marvel of the full moon. Cheers.
In that moment it clicks as if honeyed nectar is coating a tongue, previously dry and uncertain, and its lubrication encourages me to reach for Cicerian heights, and the words are now kissing and coupling, and the dissonance retreats and the address rises beyond the rafters and into the minds of men.
This is such a great extended metaphor, capturing the feeling of finding the exact right words; that flow, that sense of moving the truth into language. You give the sensation such sensuality with "honeyed nectar" coating a tongue, previously dry and uncertain. By using the conjunction "and" you simulate this flow. There's momentum and a rush to the end.
This one is so timely! I'd just written a sentence full of "ands" to capture an awkward moment of a first kiss (consensual). For fun, here's the original and the new version, thanks to this wonderful lesson:
ORIGINAL:
He leans down to press his lips to hers. Light, warm, soft, lingering.
And then it’s over and he backs up and trips on an exposed root and she reaches out to grab his forearm to stop his fall and stumbles forward into him and now his arms are tight around her and hers are around his waist and she presses her cheek into his chest and grips his jacket and they stand there laughing like teenagers.
NEW:
And then it’s over or, more accurately, she cuts it short, feeling trapped as a piece of trash under a rock and he stumbles backwards like a schoolboy caught stealing and she lurches into him and he embraces her and she grips him hard and they laugh gentle joy into the stream’s symphony.
There is a lot of energy in both examples. But the revision invites more imagery, and through the imagery, you create more associations. We have a sense of what’s going on in their internal worlds. So good!
Yes, the imagery is a nice way to evoke emotion without relying solely on physicality. Thanks!
Great post, Nina. I love "and". There is such music in it. I get carried away and have to pull back, but I allow it. And brings on the "thinking out loud" in the moment, the scene, the character.
Absolutely agree! It also helps me psychologically. Joy and sorrow and bewilderment and tranquility…So many emotions can exist at the same time. And there’s a really interesting propulsion to it once you get beyond three things. The list seems to imply it could go on forever so the connections go on forever.
That’s exactly it, you’re using the conjunction to get “to it,” to find what’s under that first feeling, thought, idea, reaction. When I “and” them, I get an amazing list and the one I’m after pops and I rearrange. Beautiful to behold. Freeing. Promising. If people only knew, I sometimes think, about this language of ours. It’s a miracle and a gift.
On the street, a dark blue shape-shifting wall, and in front of the public library a mass of blue algae and we waited, they waited, until the march stepped off and now, we were the mass and started the chant, and as one voice sang out, “Hey-hey, ho-ho, Donald Trump has got to go.”
I love how the blue keeps shifting: "a dark blue shape-shifting wall," and then "a mass of blue algae," and then the two come together , "we were the mass." The "they" and the "we" have united and become a "we."
I recently opened up an old story I was working on and it opens with a Nordic tale so I thought I play around with that: But when Odin ambled beneath the ancient tree, the ravens, or the very essence of thought and memory alighted upon his broad shoulders, whispering secrets of the world like the rustling leaves of a forgotten dream; and Munin, the color of dense fog, mirrored the shifting clouds in his gaze; and Hugin, bright and clear-eyed; and he named them, and he sent them out to watch and listen."
I am immersed in this other way of being in the world with ravens, "or the very essence of thought and memory" alighting on shoulders and whispering secrets. You have found a grammar of animism.
Substack really has the best writing content out there
I know some love the flat, unpunctuated prose line, but give me some commas and italics so that I can hear myself saying the words on first reading, particularly when they "run on." Once again, thank you.
Congratulations to son!!
Thank you! Big step into adulthood!
The day dragged by for Faith or, more precisely, she felt it pull her unwillingly onwards as if she didn’t want it to end, and it hauled her along, filling her with dread when she knew she couldn’t avoid going home and seeing what awaited her and knowing the house was a mess and that everything was wrong.
I love the image of the day dragging Faith along. It hauls her forward and fills her with dread. I picture her digging in her heels but day has her by the neck. She doesn't want to go home because it's a mess and "everything was wrong." This last bit is vague and creates the reader question: what has gone wrong?
Thank you for your comment, Nina!
I was rewriting part of a paragraph in a short story, which I'm trying to finish and this helped a lot. In context, "everything was wrong" because Faith is in the process of telling the truth of her life, which is pretty awful...
I love this, Rosalind!
Thank you Yasmin!