We are in the midst of a home renovation. We’ve done a few over the years, so it’s not surprising when we walk in and the kitchen looks like this:
Do you love my new kitchen island?
Maybe because I’ve been writing and revising throughout the process (thank heaven for temporary housing), the renovation has caused me to draw the parallels between revision and home renovation: Starting with a good idea and a framework, we must decide what’s worth keeping, and what needs to be demolished and then built back up in a better way. The process is messy and time-consuming, yet it can also be rewarding as the new structure begins to take shape. We are propelled on by the promise of the something improved, something inhabitable, a result in which we can take pride.
Here is the start to a poem that was inspired by another house at another time that was giving us fits:
OUR HOUSE
In nineteen-hundred-twenty-two,
our house was tidy, fresh and new.
But decades passed and we admit
we have neglected things a bit.
Our door is cracked, the railing creaks,
the doorbell doesn’t ring, it squeaks.
Our toilets tinkle, faucets drip,
the stairways waggle, sway and dip…
© 2013 Tamera Will Wissinger
Don't you just love the possibilities that come with do-overs?
Enjoy Poetry Friday at Tabatha Yeatts: The Opposite of Indifference.
01/25/2013