Begin Again
The question was inevitable. I knew it was coming. And still four days after publication, I found myself completely wiped out by, “So, when does your next book come out?”
I tried to tell myself this was the highest form of a compliment. For there to be any excitement to pick up a copy of my new novel, My Brother’s Mark, let alone for someone to be anticipating the next book, is a big deal. It is nothing short of amazing, and I am so grateful for, the incredible reception this book has already received.
A piece of me shrank back from this question, however. Intense thoughts of: Would anyone know that I hadn’t been writing the entire week of book launch? What if I didn’t get another book done in a “timely” manner? Or even complete another book?
What if? What if? What if?
The sun was bright and cheerful in eastern Iowa this week. I spent a full afternoon prepping my yard for Spring. The soil was still cool just below the surface. And the bugs crawled slowly up and out of their holes. When I reached down to lift a pile of leaves that had clustered in my flower bed, I found the most adorable sedum sprouts.
Fresh, succulent greens pushed up through the dirt. The clusters were delicate and numerous as if a group of them had collaborated together to announce this was the day spring would emerge. The surprising sprouts gave me a jolt, and I started brushing away mulch and fanatically wiping away dried, brown vegetation. Every bud and whorl I discovered beneath the old leaves brought a smile to my face.
The garden was full of new beginnings!
Here is Margaret Atwood’s take (from The Door):
SOR JUANA WORKS IN THE GARDEN
Time for gardening again; for poetry; for arms
up to the elbows in leftover
deluge, hands in the dirt, groping around
among the rootlets, bulbs, lost marbles, blind
snouts of worms, cat droppings, your own future
bones, whatever’s down there
supercharged, a dim glint in the darkness.
When you stand on bare earth in your bare feet
and the lightning whips through you, two ways
at once, they say you are grounded,
and that’s what poetry is: a hot wire.
You might as well stick a fork
in a wall socket. So don’t think it’s just about flowers.
Though it is, in a way.
You spent this morning among the bloodsucking
perennials, the billowing peonies,
the lilies building to outburst,
the leaves of the foxgloves gleaming like hammered
copper, the static crackling among the spiny columbines.
Scissors, portentous trowel, the wheelbarrow
yellow and inert, the grassblades
whispering like ions. You think it wasn’t all working
up to something?
I’m not sure what you need to hear today, but I am going to see the symbolism in what is happening in the garden. New projects, first words on pages, and initial hellos can be our sedum sprouts. The work we have completed, or are about to, leaves behind fertile ground for new growth to come up right after. Those sprouts of new ideas might even be there already. Who is to say, unless we are willing to begin again?
Three books I love about new beginnings:
