In my dayplanner/journal, I had written a future message. On the morning of November 3, I find the message in the form of a list: one poem, one short story, one essay. I remember the list was an admonition to read every day: one poem, one short story, one essay.
I must not have felt capable at the time of idea/inception, so I wrote it for a future date. But once it was written down, it became part of what I needed to do on November 3.
My first thought was to choose one of the many literature anthologies stacked in my closet. If I chose one, I would find all three genres. But how long will the short story be? How long the essay? I put aside the anthology and instead visited my "Best of" bookshelf and found the means to fulfill this mysteriously written goal.
The first book I pulled was Rachel Carson's Silent Spring. Each chapter could be considered an essay. But I reached for something older. My copy of The Whitman Reader, a collection of Walt Whitman's writings. The book looks like it was retrieved from slow burning coals, tossed by an impatient reader deciding to flunk out of English rather than read Whitman. It was full of essays, both long and short, and poetry both long and short. I resolved from here on after, that when I acquire a book, any book that isn't a library loan, I will write in the beginning pages where I found, bought, or received from whom--that book.
It will take away the mystery of book acquisition memory. The Whitman Reader has a history and it has been lost by failing to write its provenance.
After the first short essay, it became clear that this was a different language, lost from 21st century everyday use. I will need a dictionary to comprehend the rich 19th century language expressing deep thoughts of an American thinker. I will need historical context to understand the subjects of his poetry.
The poem I chose, of Whitman's is titled "On the Beach at Night." May I indulge in just one, elevated language, beautiful line?
Up through the darkness,
While ravening clouds, the burial clouds, in black masses
spreading,
Lower sullen and fast athwart and down the sky,
Amid a transparent clear belt of ether yet left in the east,
Ascends large and calm the lord-star Jupiter,
And nigh at hand, only a very little above,
Swim the delicate sisters the Pleides.
We are losing the power of our brains to memes; we must parse and ponder the construction of words in great prose and poetry, like we would in an algebraic equation.
Now for choosing a short story. My mind went to the anthologies again, but I didn't have the mind to read a creepy Shirley Jackson, or a Katharine Mansfield minefield or a Flannery O'Conner ironic tease. I opted for The Frog and Toad Treasury, and was delighted by the end of the first story when Frog had tricked Toad into the month of May.
November 3, by 8:00 a.m. the written goal one has been achieved, one poem, one short story, one essay.
It was a joyful beginning to the day. Equal to the literature was the accomplishment of a goal.
Ahhh, but I am burdened further to the challenge. Is reading enough? Why not write one poem, one short story, one essay a day?
PS: I checked out from the library: The Complete Works of CS Lewis. It will supply daily essays for months.
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