Back in mid-October, I tuned in to Neil Gaiman’s lectures from Bard College. I tune in to everything I can by Gaiman, so nobody who knows me should be surprised at all. And Gaiman was talking about writing, being a writer during this series. One of the things he said was to look back at your old writings with compassion to the you that existed then. You have several past yous, and your failures in the past make the next you better.
After a little thought, I wanted to go back to 20s me. I wanted to recognize that the me from 18-30 was both extremely important and mostly forgotten to the me now, at late 53. The me at 18 (late 17, fall semester of my freshman year) started writing without knowing it was poetry or what to do with it. I wrote around a poem a month that year. That summer, I committed to writing poetry, and if I didn’t have a teacher (I didn’t), I’d learn it myself. Three poems a day, sometimes more, for the next 2-3 years. I found the stage (open mic readings) on my own by 21, and the poetry slam soon after. And the magic back then was something I could taste. I could read my work to tens of people, and I could listen to the other writers. I could see what they were doing, and I could try those things out. Everything was an experience, and everything was an experiment. When I wrote, it often felt like magic, like I tapped into something new. I could have an idea, grab my pen and paper, and disappear for half an hour into the words, surfacing with something that could startle me. I still remember writing “Mall Romance,” or more specifically having written it.
When I was in my teens, dad took me to a “Why Knock Rock” anti-rock-music seminar put on by some local church group. During that (ridiculous) talk, one thing I recall was the speaker talking about how the Eagles claimed they wrote “Hotel California” in just a “we don’t know where this came from” sort of feeling, and the speaker was certain it came from Satan. The thing is, that’s the same feeling I could have from writing at times. When the ideas flow, you just make a record of them.
So I’ve been digging into the old work, the 20s work. I quit writing 3 a day within a couple of years, and I worked on learning how to be a better writer. I found a book from Arco press called How to Write Poetry, and I did every exercise in it (mostly meter, rhyme, and form stuff). I got a list of challenges from Asheville emcee Allan Wolf and did a number of them. I ran other readings, so many readings, around town so I could keep surrounding myself with poets. I absorbed poetry however I could. The library poetry section was thoroughly explored. Mid 90’s, I took a class in “Modern American Poetry” from a professor who was in the anthology (Don Johnson; no, not THAT Don Johnson). And in 1997, I ran the biggest Southern Fried Regionals to date. Considering I started writing in 1988, my hosting still kind of amazes me, but I was traveling with other poets by 1993 to other nearby cities to read in their poetry shows; it was a rich and vibrant region, and I wanted to experience all of it.
And one of the ways I learned how to write was to stand on stage and read what I’d written to an audience. I learned a lot from reading on stage. My writing improved regularly through that process. My earliest pieces were meandering, unfocused attempts to understand what I was even thinking in those moments. There were good lines here and there, but they were “journeyman” practice. On stages, though, I learned a lot. On the right nights, with the right poems, I could connect with the audience, myself, and my ideas all at once. And looking back at them, there were a lot that were awful, but here’s that compassion thing that started all of this. I was learning; I was putting in the effort. And some of the pieces I was really proud of, they held up okay.
At one point, I had just read There Are No Children Here, and I wrote a poem called “Street Blood” for Craig Davis, a young Black man who was killed by the police in the book. I also wrote “Weeds in the Wilds,” another social problems piece inspired by the book. I still have a soft spot for those two, even though I’d not write them now (in part because it’s not up to me to write about the Black experience, but college-town Tennessee me didn’t have any exposure to that understanding yet). I was expanding my world outlook, and I wanted audiences to join me.
So I’m giving myself grace for the old writings. I’m looking back fondly, at least today, at the me of 1988-2000, the me who regularly fell into writing, who was inspired by everything in the world around him, who wanted to have a voice after a childhood of not being allowed to have an opinion. That guy was making up for lost time, and he was doing the work, long hair and all.
Bill Abbott, poet, web page 