Telling a story of illness, one pulls a thread through a narrow opening flanked on one side by shame and the other by trivia.

But still, the other voice, the intuitive, returns, like grass forcing its way through concrete.

Even in the grimmest of circumstances, a shift in perspective can create startling change.

Every time I deny myself I commit a kind of suicide.

I know I am made from this earth, as my mother's hands were made from this earth, as her dreams came from this earth and all that I know, I know in this earth, the body of the bird, this pen, this paper, these hands, this tongue speaking, all that I know speaks to me through this earth.

Each time I write, each time the authentic words break through, I am changed. The older order that I was collapses and dies. I lose control. I do not know exactly what words will appear on the page. I follow language. I follow the sound of the words, and I am surprised and transformed by what I record.

There is always a time to make right what is wrong.