A Writer's Notebook, Day One-Hundred-And-Seventy

I drafted my query for the next agent, though I did not send it out today.  I still need to check the specific criteria, and I want to make a final pass on the letter to check it over again tomorrow, but I plan to send it out.  Then I can get into some more of the research.  I am quite nervous about this process, but I feel positive that it will work out in the end.  It may take a bit of time, and I may not get exactly the results I hope for or expect, but I don't doubt that, in the end, I can get there.

In terms of poetry, I did write another piece today.  It is another longer narrative poem, with a sort of strange, somewhat surreal element to it.  Unlike the past couple of days, it felt like genuine work from the start, and I feel really glad that I am still writing in that way.  I do have that fear of losing a bit of my mojo again, and I am also afraid that fear will actually cause me to do so.  I mean that, I will become blocked due to a fear of being unable to keep at the work like I am.  Even discussing the idea is conflicting: will it ward against or jinx me instead?

The only thing to do, really, is to keep at the work and trust that it will be there.  So far, that is working out for me, and I am hopeful for that to be true.  I don't think that I will lose this, if I keep myself in the right space for it.  I do think I need to reach out to others and build more of a community for myself. 

Honestly, I'm not sure why, but I am not reaching out to some people that I want to make contact with.  I am not making that gesture myself, and I don't really know why that is.  I have email addresses and I know what I want to say in many cases, but I am feeling a block on taking that action.  I expect it is an extension of some fear I have about getting my work out there.

I feel that I am moving forwards now, and I wonder what it is that is keeping me from feeling more confident in making certain gestures.  In part, I have felt rejection and abandonment in the past, so I suppose that is a hesitancy that I feel right now, but I need to get past that and recognize that the actions of individuals from my past should not dictate what I allow in the future.  I mean, if I presume that others will act the same way, I am limiting what they can do, and I will not create the possibility of other outcomes.  Anyhow, I feel good about the work I am doing, and I know it is building.  In the end, I expect to have a really good book of poetry in the near future, and am already planning on places to submit some of my current work.  Obviously, I still have much to do in terms of revising and editing, but I feel very good about the output.  One thing at a time...

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