Maybe the hardest thing about moving overseas was being in a place where no one but your own family had any memory of you. It was like putting yourse… - Naomi Shihab Nye

Each thing gives us something else...The more any of us writes, the more our words will "come to us." If we trust in the words and their own mysterious relationships with one another, they will help us find things out.

(BM: So "the fuel that feeds you" is the power of words?) NSN: I think so. The power of words, and a faith in the power of words. That words can give you something back if you trust them, and if you know that you're not trying to proclaim things all the time, but you're trying to discover things. (2002)

We feel uplifted, exhilarated. Writing regularly can help us feel that way too. It slows and eases us, calms us down. Having a focal point is generative. Consider the spaciousness of the sky over the water, which we often forget about as we scurry through our days. I love what the poet Marvin Bell has suggested about writing-Read something, then write something. Read something else, then write something else. It's all connected, it's always been connected. Let one activity inform the other. Streams of language exchanging their powers.