Why I Write

I sit here in the near dark, and wonder: why is it I pound away at the keyboard, creating scenes about people who never existed but in my imagination and my heart? What compels me to pour word after word on a blank computer page, even as my father's labored breathing fills the room, seems to tremble around me in time with my own pulse? I look up only when his noises stop, my body clutching at the sudden silence -- is this it? And after his breaths resume, it seems to me so pointless to write, there are so many reasons not to, especially now, when every second should be savored, remembered, never forgotten.

I write for many reasons: for joy of the word, the love of my imagination, to share stories, to make truths, to discover myself, to make meaning of an incoherent world, but now, late this night, I write madly because the sheer motion of putting down the words is the only act within my control.







Peace, Linda