Big V Validation

Yesterday was an amazing, nurturing experience for me, from something I had expected would be both problematic and difficult. It also involved a group of artists who have, it must be said, reaffirmed my belief in a fair few things. There was other stuff too, but we’ll focus today on a single moment which, as I write this, is a significant moment of Big V Validation.

It transcends simply reaffirming that poetry is on the right path, it reinforces instead the belief that I am truly evolving in my very late 50’s. This alone is the surprise that continues to keep on giving: work can become an extension of your own personal growth. It has been a week full of compliments and simultaneous heartbreak, but the constant is the way that I write, and what it tells me.

In this case it focuses on a particular poem based on Virginia Woolf’s work.

I think we all know the feeling when we write something that’s above what normally passes for our best poetry, that one piece that seems to transcend what constitutes or passes as regular output. This piece came after reading around the mechanics of Woolf’s narrative style, and the emerging ability to write in what we now consider ‘a stream of consciousness’. Deep within me, something ignited.

I was staring at the burning of what I assume was methane, far off on the horizon at the Thames Estuary, driving home from work at some point in my twenties, literally more than half a lifetime before. The image was so clear and crisp, a moment that reminded me of a shot from Ridley Scott’s science fiction classic, 'Blade Runner', which I rewatched recently and found disappointing.

Times change, but that moment made a connection between past and present.

I’d been thinking about Woolf‘s ‘To The Lighthouse’, how the burning flames in the distance were always present on my trip home from work but never close enough to reach, how what we see and what is real are often vastly differing ideas, and a poem appeared on my page with basically no effort at all. It simply compelled itself into being, and I didn’t touch it afterwards.

It went with me yesterday, to be read with three other pieces which were far safer, more concrete, and absolutely more accessible to an average audience. I stood there and read four brand new pieces for the first time and was staggered at how well they were received, and that would have been enough on most days. A brief that had scared me because of its precision had become a step forward.

On any other day, that process would have become validation enough.

Yesterday however, I was gifted with more. A piece I’d helped one mentee with was read aloud and I was beyond proud of both them and that work. Another redefined our mentoring agreement and there was a sense of immense satisfaction at their ability to tailor that process to better align support to their ambitions. I am lucky to know some very intelligent, self-aware writers.

That still wasn’t the Big V Moment though, which was such a surprise that I accept that I’m still in shock. Someone who I have always admired but was considered as someone who was not a great fan of my work, because not everyone in your business will ever be, came over after my reading and raved about how one particular poem had resonated with them above the rest.

It was the piece inspired by ‘To the Lighthouse’.

There is so much else to write about in relation to the Exhibition, including the fact it was so good it seems a criminal waste that it is only on for two days. If you’re local to me and reading this, PLEASE make an effort to go and see it, and you will not have to pay a penny to do so. I’ll do a separate post on details, and my personal favourites, at some point next week.

I’m still thinking about the refinery on the Thames Estuary, and the revelations that have emerged from embracing my own relationship with the stream of consciousness that this work, and other pieces has unearthed. The Pamphlet Project I was working on is now done. That validated insight sits hidden within its pages, and will now be utilised as a stand-alone submission elsewhere.

Sometimes, you only need one unprompted moment to move a process forward.