Spaces to Write – Monica Suswin

Saturday, 16 February 2013

A myriad of spaces is what immediately comes to mind, ranging from the space inside my head to the actual space of my surroundings.   All of importance to me in different ways for my writing.

TIME & SPACE
Time and not having enough of it, or any of it, is never an argument I find convincing.   It only takes me ten minutes to get some initial thoughts down onto paper.   Later on I might take another ten minutes to do a free-write, to string some words together, any words that want to flow from the end of my fingers.   I will then fit in any amount of ten minute slots to work on one piece; if I can I’ll double that into twenty minute slots.   Sometimes there is the luxury of three quarters of an hour.
I gather together a jigsaw of draft material when I work like this.   Of course there are days when I might bury myself in a timeless place for endless scribbling, redrafting or editing.   But I find these short spurts of time, given enough care and focus, will eventually give me a form to my writing which pleases me.
Any project can be broken down into constituent sections to be worked on piece by piece until the whole comes into shape.   This is a permission I give myself whatever other demands life makes on me, and there are always pressing demands.   Mine is a 24/7 attitude to writing.   With this approach to my time, I find the spaces I need to write.   To read the full article go to Spaces to Write  on the Poetry Space Competition blogspot where you will find a series of articles to inspire you and details on how to enter this year’s poetry competition.