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Thoughts On Writing In the 21st Century
6 years ago
My musings
"Words have no power to impress the mind without the exquisite horror of their reality."
-Edgar Allan Poe
Before I was 13, words were of no more importance to me than was the desire to be responsible and to find a way to be anything other than what I was at that very moment. I was as ignorant to the power of words as mere children are to the ideas of adulthood, such as sex and the value of a dollar or even basic responsibility and consequence.
This being said, I could have easily chosen a different path in my life. I could have chosen to not write and instead do something completely different all-together. My name, Devon, when translated into Old English means "Poet". My mother told me I was named this because she felt it sounded like the name of a writer. Perhaps she was thinking of the name "Steven King". Who can say?
She, after telling me the meaning of my naming, told me to go and write, perhaps to see what came of it. It was a decision that would change my life significantly but only once I reached adulthood and began to grow however-much more stable and responsible. Initially, I was terrible at it. I could read like few others, sprinting through books like they were nothing and memorizing the images in my head as if I'd seen a film on television or in the theater. But writing was a different story all-together.
It was something that I found to be excessively difficult. I, for starters, did not know what to write. Words escaped me. What I found out as an adult was that with certain moods and emotions, and when I was assisted by music, I found myself able to write words that flowed and touched you like a lover would touch your face on a cool Spring day. They would leave you in silence and wonder. They would speak to you with gentleness rivaling that of a mute dove sitting on your door. Words could also express other emotions: Anger, Violence, Hate, and Fear. They could be used to stir people into action and enable us to commit the most horrible attrocities imaginable including Murder, Rape and War.
The simple fact is that the ability to speak is a gift. A gift from God, if you believe in Him, or perhaps just a mere gift. Many take it for granted, as if it were something that "comes with the territory". Our senses, all five of them, are gifts. Taste, Touch, Sight, Hearing and Smell. But I believe Speech is also a sense. We can communicate with others. We can tell them we love them. Words between two lovers on a dark night somewhere intimate and quiet broken by a small laugh only a rabbit's hiccup above a whisper.
Words are also used for evil. Words like "I hate you" and "worthless" and "scum" and "kill yourself". Words used by countless bullies and evil people in countless venues across countless eons. Victims who endure them are countless as all the stars in the sky and all the grains of sand on every world in every system in the universe. We grow stronger or we break. For those who grow strong, strength comes in the form of kindness with a fire-spine! We treat others as we wished to be treated and thus break the cycle of hate and violence.
Now, I write seldom though I wish this were not so. Through life's experiences, I have dried up like a lake bed under curse from God; My inspiration a reminiscence, something I lost and wonder if it returns. Inspiration now comes in small breezes instead of wind storms from music or emotion.
Words are something that I do not believe will ever stop being used for violence. It is the way of humanity to twist and warp what is good so that it is put to use for what is evil. We are capable of such goodness and yet we are also capable of great wrong. When will we decide enough is enough? When good men rule and bad men who crave power and control are prevented from having it; When the good men and women of the world are wise enough to tell the difference in advance. On that day, we will have peace; And not before.
-Edgar Allan Poe
Before I was 13, words were of no more importance to me than was the desire to be responsible and to find a way to be anything other than what I was at that very moment. I was as ignorant to the power of words as mere children are to the ideas of adulthood, such as sex and the value of a dollar or even basic responsibility and consequence.
This being said, I could have easily chosen a different path in my life. I could have chosen to not write and instead do something completely different all-together. My name, Devon, when translated into Old English means "Poet". My mother told me I was named this because she felt it sounded like the name of a writer. Perhaps she was thinking of the name "Steven King". Who can say?
She, after telling me the meaning of my naming, told me to go and write, perhaps to see what came of it. It was a decision that would change my life significantly but only once I reached adulthood and began to grow however-much more stable and responsible. Initially, I was terrible at it. I could read like few others, sprinting through books like they were nothing and memorizing the images in my head as if I'd seen a film on television or in the theater. But writing was a different story all-together.
It was something that I found to be excessively difficult. I, for starters, did not know what to write. Words escaped me. What I found out as an adult was that with certain moods and emotions, and when I was assisted by music, I found myself able to write words that flowed and touched you like a lover would touch your face on a cool Spring day. They would leave you in silence and wonder. They would speak to you with gentleness rivaling that of a mute dove sitting on your door. Words could also express other emotions: Anger, Violence, Hate, and Fear. They could be used to stir people into action and enable us to commit the most horrible attrocities imaginable including Murder, Rape and War.
The simple fact is that the ability to speak is a gift. A gift from God, if you believe in Him, or perhaps just a mere gift. Many take it for granted, as if it were something that "comes with the territory". Our senses, all five of them, are gifts. Taste, Touch, Sight, Hearing and Smell. But I believe Speech is also a sense. We can communicate with others. We can tell them we love them. Words between two lovers on a dark night somewhere intimate and quiet broken by a small laugh only a rabbit's hiccup above a whisper.
Words are also used for evil. Words like "I hate you" and "worthless" and "scum" and "kill yourself". Words used by countless bullies and evil people in countless venues across countless eons. Victims who endure them are countless as all the stars in the sky and all the grains of sand on every world in every system in the universe. We grow stronger or we break. For those who grow strong, strength comes in the form of kindness with a fire-spine! We treat others as we wished to be treated and thus break the cycle of hate and violence.
Now, I write seldom though I wish this were not so. Through life's experiences, I have dried up like a lake bed under curse from God; My inspiration a reminiscence, something I lost and wonder if it returns. Inspiration now comes in small breezes instead of wind storms from music or emotion.
Words are something that I do not believe will ever stop being used for violence. It is the way of humanity to twist and warp what is good so that it is put to use for what is evil. We are capable of such goodness and yet we are also capable of great wrong. When will we decide enough is enough? When good men rule and bad men who crave power and control are prevented from having it; When the good men and women of the world are wise enough to tell the difference in advance. On that day, we will have peace; And not before.
