WATERMARK

a poet’s notebook

Established 02004

February 26, 2004

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A large bird flies over the skylight. Friend Abigail sees a flash of light; I see the wings’ dark shadow.

On reading my Solstice Letter, Abigail observes that most people live their (busy) lives "horizontally", along the surface; but I live "vertically"; that I have the time and space this requires.

Time. Space. The gifts of illness.

Later, I find this at Vivid:

Lent

go out
into deep water

Noticed

Ancestral (Artificial )Intelligence

I do not use AI to write. For me, writing is how I think, and I prefer to do it myself. If/when I post anything here that I suspect or know to be AI generated, I will tell you.

I have changed this from Artificial to Ancestral, after Abi Awomosu @ Substack. This medium was made with human history, human thought. All of it, bright and dark. It is ancestral.

Poems

Please do not assume that I am the speaker/ subject of my poems.

In these times of creative nonfiction and fictionalized memoirs, I think of the poem itself as true fiction: it is most likely not factual, but it must be true.

It is likely to be — it is best if it is — a truth I did not know before I wrote, and may not understand even then.

A poem is my way of discovering (dis-covering) what I feel; sometimes, what I think — but it is not necessarily biographical.

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Lent

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