Blogging Around #2--Noreen Andersen's "Metacognition: Inspiration, Then Perspiration" Repsonse

Nonie,

That was one very interesting and striking expression of your feelings about the process of your poem. There are certain elements of your post to which I can't totally relate, the cross-over to the music world or being motivated almost completely by the grade (although it is a motivator for sure), but I totally agree with the underlying message originally conveyed by your guitar teacher in seventh grade.

I think everyone in our class can relate to working hard at one thing or another. And while the "rolling around like a pig in mud" in the middle of the room while trying to write and painstakingly improve the darn thing is part of the process which I experienced as well, I wasn't as clever as you were in resetting mind and body to the mode of poetic thinking.

The Giving Tree is obviously a comfort of yours. As writers, and poets especially, we have an obligation to take risks, but just as important is our ability to build atop what we already know and something that we feel secure about, that thing being that very special book in your case. Knowing yourself as a worker and poet definitely helped you in this case because by resorting to an old but not forgotten comfort, you established an inspiration. And, although you may not have ridden that inspiration OT the end of your process, it ended up feeding your willingness to perspire throughout the actual writing of your poem--a willingness that I, and probably some of our classmates, undoubtedly could have used.

I will definitely keep in mind this simple, yet completely true message when I decide to embark on a difficult and oftentimes frustrating journey, especially in the context of my writing. Nice work!