Let There Not Be a Hair's Breadth

“Words are the closest any of us can come to making something from nothing at all.”
—Danielle Ackley-McPhail 

So what am I making, from the words that are the insubstantial stuff of my sandcastles, castles in the air?

At the moment, besides coming to the end of my mystery set on the St. Bernard Pass, I’m weaving a new tale that will include Queen Mab, the Christ in the Desert Monastery, symbolic logic, three pepper brioche, a maker of masks, a room painted Regatta Blue, the road in Santa Fe called Escondido (hidden); choral works and thievery and making chili pods into sauces (a holy ritual); people I like on first acquaintance, and mean to load with worthy causes, ideals, beyond their quirks and foibles and onyx chess sets.

These things are in me, of me, making me as surely as those in my story.

“When composing a verse let there not be a hair's breadth separating your mind from what you write; composition of a poem must be done in an instant, like a woodcutter felling a huge tree or a swordsman leaping at a dangerous enemy.”—Basho

image:  She Who Is