I admire so many great American writers

Their volume!

Their tenacity!

Their creativity, bravery, and courage!

Word, thoughts, ideas, stories, relating the human experience.

Writers, writers, writers, giving me so much to read.

~

Stephen King- quintessential, Maineiac, prolific.

He writes everyday

And he gets down into it- fear, pain, hallucinations, phobias, sex, blood, gore, psychology.

Did I say fear?

He writes and he writes and he writes

He even wrote about writing. His children and his wife write.

Carrie, The Stand, ‘Salem’s Lot, Pet Cemetery,

The Dark Tower, Children of the Corn, Christine

Cujo, Firestarter, The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon.

Green mile, and more, more, more.

~

Ken Kessey- truly a master who somehow was not able to write and write and write.

One of the best novels I have ever read

Sometimes a Great Notion

Read the book, don’t watch the movie, unless your heart swells

for a young Paul Newman.

Characters come to life in an Oregon of brutal reality

Feuds, chainsaws, and death. You will cry. Cry, cry, cry.

Your heart will open wide.

~

Mary Karr, the great poet and autobiographer

Sharing her deepest secrets in Lit

The Lair’s Club

Cherry

How does she remember those specific conversations?

I remember so few from all of those years ago

And she captures pages, and pages

Chapter upon chapter

of precise conversations and dialogue-

Real stories, real people, a genius who found sobriety and God.

I love you Mary Karr (not in that way, silly).

~

James Frey

With the repeating catchlines

You may even believe he was a drug addict, an alcoholic, and a criminal

Despite the facts that proved otherwise

He still may have been a drug addict, and alcoholic, and a criminal.

How can you resist

James Frey

With the repeating catchlines, the repeating catchlines.

~

Three books in a series, all captivating and yet somehow all the same

Violence, greed fear, love, pain upon pain, war

Suzanne Collins- an empire known as the Hunger Games.

She did it- bestseller, sold the movie rights, admirers everywhere.

Katniss creator; a female heroine.

What about peace Suzanne?

~

Caroline Knapp, gone too soon

Such relate-able stories

Chronicling the challenges of growing up

And becoming a woman in recovery

Rowing saved her

How did she drink so much, and yet write so well?

~

Hilarious writers: Too funny to believe

David Sedaris, an NPR regular

His sister Amy Sedaris

Augusten Burroughs

And his family-

Not as funny, but still relatable

brother John Elder Robison

mother Margaret Robison

~

And then there are the great spiritual teachers and leaders

of personal transformation, so many books, so many methods.

Help us to be present, to know love, to let go of Ego and attachment:

Pema Chodron, Thich Nat Hahn, Louise Hays, Wayne Muller,

Joan Boryenseko, Wayne Dyer, Ken Wilber, Deepak Chopra, Andrew Weil,

Jon Kabat-Zin, Jack Kornfield and many many more

Fill my hunger for a better life

~

Ah God, please just shine yourself through me

Help me to write, write, write-

Funny things, factual articles, touching moments,

Help me find the time

Help me get the kids to bed on time when I really just want

to sit at the keyboard and write.

Grant me the grace, strength, patience, focus, love, and passion

To write

Help me write, God, shine down on me as you have upon them.

Write me God, write me.