“As #writers [we] will be misunderstood. We’ll be criticized by strangers. Sometimes even by people we love. Writing is an act of exposure, and writing about something this personal, this political, and this dangerous feels like standing in a blizzard naked.” Rebecca Makkai is No Longer on This Platform

“I make rope out of words and lift myself up from the depth of darkness.” ~ #GoliTaraghi #writingcommunity

winter dusk a path that stops at nothing ~ Matt Morden // #Photography by Patrick Zephyr #haiku #vssnature

“There are no rules for a first draft. That’s the key to going the distance (and letting the #creativity in)… When you’re #writing that first draft, you’re writing for yourself. Later, you’ll edit for your reader. That’s when “the rules” are important.” buff.ly/PAT94mX

“Beneath your world of skies and faces and buildings exists a rawer and older world, a place where surface planes disintegrate and sounds ribbon in shoals through the air.” ~ Anthony Doerr, All the Light We Cannot See

light leaking from clouds pooled rain on the river-road a silver ribbon ~ Catherine Baker // #Photography by Alex Ugalnikov #haiku #micropoetry

“#Writers are masters of self-doubt… We revise endlessly, pick apart every sentence…a deeply ingrained work ethic makes it hard to slow down and trust the process… If you forget to play—be still—you’re cutting off the very thing that fuels great writing.”

“And then we continued blissfully into this small but perfect piece of our forever.” ~ Stephenie Meyer, Breaking Dawn #Valentines

evening chill the heat of your hand in mine ~ Petro C.K., @petro_ck // #Photography: Edouard Boubat, Paris 1964 #SaintValentin #ValentinesDay #DíaValentin #haiku

“Writing is a collaborative #art form between writer and reader. The #writing itself is just words on pages. It’s not a finished experience. The reader uses their own imagination to complete this process. The #story almost literally comes alive within their mind.”

Winter solitude— In a world of one color The sound of wind. ~ Bashō // #Minimalist #Photography by Patrick Ems / visual-decadence.com #haiku #vssnature

“Freeing yourself was one thing, claiming ownership of that freed self was another.” ~ #ToniMorrison, Beloved

“Your opening sentence should be the hardest working sentence in your novel… I would argue that an author cannot write a truly effective and all-encompassing opening that hooks the reader until the majority of the book has already been written.” buff.ly/7nivaY5

at the top of the mountain a bird shows me how to translate my poems into the language of clouds ~ Barry Goodman, @BarryGoodman // #Photography by Marek Piwnicki #tanka #短歌 #micropoetry

“Never are voices so beautiful as on a winter's evening, when dusk almost hides the body, and they seem to issue from nothingness with a note of intimacy seldom heard by day.” ~ Virginia Woolf

“I think about that famous quote from John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars: Pain demands to be felt… Hope has to be chosen. Our #writing likely won’t heal the world, but if it makes someone else feel less alone in it, then maybe it’s done its part.” buff.ly/r0oc2iD

ballroom moon-- the clouds glide across the sky ~ 𝙻𝚊𝚏𝚌𝚊𝚍𝚒𝚘, 𝙻𝚊𝚏𝚌𝚊𝚍𝚒𝚘 💙 // #Photography by Martin Rügner / ruegner-photography.de IG: @martinruegner_photography #haiku #vss365 #micropoetry

“I was still water, held by my surroundings. I am now a river, carving my own path.” ~ Scott Stabile

“We often think of readers being transformed by stories but don’t often acknowledge how profoundly #writers are changed through the process of #writing them… To reckon fully with a character is to brush up against your own choices and contradictions and desires.”

at the top of the mountain a bird shows me how to translate my poems into the language of clouds ~ Barry Goodmann, Barry Goodmann // #Photography by Marek Piwnicki #tanka #短歌 #micropoetry