It’s a garret, I tell people—really just
an upstairs studio in a former auto
body shop-turned-arts-center where
people come to write with me, a space
I thankfully inherited, sweetly outfitted
with bookshelves, long tables and
red chairs, even the paisley tablecloth
on the snack table. Move-in ready,
as they say. And oh, the writers who
have sat in the red chairs and written
their art out, me offering poems
and prompts, the shelves littered with
inspiration—cubes with words for
rolling, old keys for holding, a panel of
century-old mother-of-pearl buttons
sewn on velvet for touching, for dreaming.
But this is, more than less, a dusty attic,
So, before summer heats it up too
unbearably, I hustle the Shop-Vac up
the dozen stairs and set to sucking up
the schmutz, taking up broom and mop,
rags to wipe down horizontal surfaces,
whisking tablecloth and curtains into
bundles bound for the washer at home—
along with the fleece blankets we sit on
or wrap around our laps during the cold
months. I finger through dozens of
nametags standing upright in the red box
bearing the handwriting of so many
who’ve come to write with me, some who
will never again lift a pen or poise fingers
over a keyboard. I set their nametags
on the highest shelf, along with memories
of the one whose 1899 dictionary lives on
the revolving stand by the window, as well
as the one who created the process we use
to reflect on what we like, what stays with us,
what is strong about brand new writing that’s
flowed from them around the tables.
Thanks, Heide and Carolyn, I say. Thank you,
Sherri and Dolores. And Pat, our belle
of Amherst, who pops into every session
from her spot in the firmament, I see you
in a corner crouched over your yellow legal
pad, your pen vigorously writing, me wishing
to hear you read one more brilliant time.
•••
With thanks to Katie McCleary for finding the loft where she founded 916 Ink young writers and later passing on the space on to me. Much gratitude to Pat Schneider, who created the Amherst Writers & Artists method and founded the nonprofit organization that serves writers around the world. And to our other writers no longer on the planet, may you all be gathered around a table somewhere in the mystery, writing with others. We have not forgotten you.