Clean slates
Starting from scratch
There is something refreshing
in taking back control
Returning gold
to straw
And realising that straw was all it was anyway
just straw
But, straw is at least fodder
And fodder is always a useful thing.
*I did something I had been meaning to do for awhile on the week-end. I unpublished and deleted all my books on Amazon and Draft to Digital.
It felt good. Clean. A little extreme. Which is why I hadn’t done it. In case it was a passing thing, (I once blew up an Instagram account years ago with hundreds of organic followers and a great concept that I enjoyed when I had a case of the blues).
After that, I learnt a lesson: think long and hard before blowing up things you’ve put effort into.
So I did, and I’m happy with the decision.
I am no longer a published poet (other than on this blog) and to be honest, I never felt like one anyway, I just made my books as a creative act and enjoyed the process.
It’s not that I don’t like my poetry, I love many of the poems contained in those books and they remind me of certain times in my life when I wrote them.
However, I always regretted that when I decided to create books, I took a great deal of material from here on my blog. And because Amazon trawls the internet for double-ups before it will allow you to publish, I had to delete the poems, hundreds of them, from this blog.
Luckily by the third book I was wise enough to send them to the drafts folder instead, so they could be published back in the blog timeline where they belonged if I wanted to do so later.
I was never entirely happy with the layout of any of the books. But I used to be such a spontaneous, impatient person , that when the urge to create something came across me, I would just forge ahead regardless.
I don’t do that anymore. I now know how to edit correctly. This is because I have had the fiction manuscript, which I wrote, professionally edited quite a few times. I would still be having it edited, except the last editor told me, “This is great; it’s ready to go, do something already”, and I respect him immensely, so I will. Do something. I’ll test the wind and ask God what he reckons, and when the time is right, I’ll take that list of publishers another author has given me and begin sending out my manuscript. However, the three edits by three different editors were not wasted because I looked at the corrections every time that draft came back and learned something. I learned how to be a better writer.
Mostly I’ve learned how to be patient. Allow space for God. Timing. A change in the wind. Intuition. None of these things have the opportunity to assist when I go off creating at a 100mile an hour.
My mother would be proud.
My blog writing has also evolved, it was started in 2016 after all, but looking back at old examples of my writing here on the blog doesn’t annoy me because a blog is clearly a work in progress with your best work permanently at the present moment.
Books don’t have that ability. They are time capsules, their contents, the writers skills, trapped in time, forever.
Yikes.
So I unpublished them all and I’m so relieved.
A bonus is now that I have deleted the books, I can rework old poems into my current way of writing and editing rather than leaving them stranded and embarrassed on a stagnant page forever.
Mornings are always a chance to begin again, and this one feels lighter having made that decision and moved on.
Header photo: AI art generated to accompany one of the poems that I included in my third poetry book.
Cheryl Strayed once said (in Dear Sugar) that nothing is ever wasted.
I agree whole heartedly.
Nothing is ever wasted, not that magazine that you poured yourself into, nor the books that you loved creating, not the time spent picking grapes and blueberries for an article that never paid you a cent (neither the picking or the article ha!) and certainly not all the adventures and travelling and talking to people and learning so much about writing, photography, art, philosophy, healing, essential oils the list is endless as I am one curious cat.
I have had so many wonderful things I have taken up, and I loved every moment of learning, playing, and creating. Nothing is wasted. It all amounts to something because, in the end, WE amount to something. Not despite, but because of the risk, the adventure, the learning, the growth, the failure, the money, the sadness, the happiness, the injuries, the loss.
The embarrassments keep us humble. The falls make us compassionate. The knowledge makes us wiser. The people who laugh at us – oh, they are the best – because they make us brave, resilient and determined. These experiences form part of the structure of who we are becoming.
We are always becoming. This day is part of our becoming. There is never a day when we are not becoming unless we are dead. So we’re just not quite there yet. Excellent. Many opportunities still ahead. The very best part, though, is that one day, we look at ourselves, we look within deeply and realise that actually, we are in love with our becoming.
So isn’t that at least, worth something? It is to me. Everything. It’s all there is. So, if there is something that you want to have a go at learning, doing or creating, but you are afraid it will be wasted, think again. Not in terms of money but in terms of the enjoyment, knowledge, and strength you will gain. By simply doing it because you want to. Have a great Sunday X
It seems extreme that you’ve “unpublished and deleted all [your] books on Amazon and Draft to Digital.” But you know what’s best for the person that you’re becoming <3
It does feel extreme Rosaliene, but not really when I consider as an indie author I can rearrange the books entirely, put new covers on them and do a re-edit on them before releasing them again. For now I’m happy not to have anything published other than the blog.
Indeed, that’s one of the advantages of being an indie author.
I understand your decision to unpublish your books. As writers we grow and evolve and words that once felt so write can feel completely different. I’m glad you’re happy with your decision, I think that means you made the right one.
Thanks Pooja, I feel a lot better about it. It’s like calling parts of myself home and feeling my whole because of it. Poetry is a very personal thing, at least mine is.
That’s really great. I understand, poetry is often from our heart and sometimes we don’t want that out there.
Bold, but please confer with me and the rest of your followers here if you wake up one day and decide to delete this blog. We’d miss it terribly.
Thanks Tracy, that’s a lovely thing to hear and although I go missing sometimes I always return plus it is part of me now, and personal, it would be like deleting half of my memories. I don’t think I could do that. Ever. ✌🏻💞😊
I’ve been through some of these changes, Kate; fortunately the books I had published all came out before I began blogging; and the ones I’ve had published since — all chapbooks — did not bother if the poems appeared on my blog or not —
It’s an odd sort of thing being human and driven to be creative John. I try to listen to the inner conviction that tells me which direction.
yes, we are driven, Kate: I get restless if I haven’t got a post to put up after a few days; keep this under your hat, but sometimes I sneak a poem from the archives. give it a fresh coat of paint, and post it 🙂 anything but blankness —
I love that you do that John. Since I deleted all my books I am reading through old poems and thinking of how I would change them. I feel like suddenly I have a storehouse full of ideas that are my own, but now I can put them back where they belong on the blog but will probably do so a little differently, because I’m different now. Plus blogging is addictive because of that connection with other creatives – so I totally get it, anything but blank indeed – because otherwise it is a day gone past without a thread between hearts meeting and saying “hello”.
yes, we are driven; blogging is addictive, mixing with other creatives; yes, give your poem a fresh coat of paint — and the old poem becomes a new poem, one you can be proud of —
I love your poem and your philosophy. I’m also very intrigued by your act of deleting your books on Amazon, because I’ve been endlessly wondering whether to put my books up there. Thing is, as you said, they were all written many years ago and they need reworking. But I don’t have the energy now to do that – farming takes up all my time and thought.
I believe (in my life anyway) we regret what we do in haste. Particularly with art which as I say, have a much longer life span than we do. I always loved my poems but I wasn’t happy with the layout of the books – then, I guess I was happy enough – now? No definitely not. And the fact I took so many poems from the blog truly bothers me because I felt if they belonged anywhere they belonged here – as part of the evolution of the blog, which reflects my own life and moments along the way as well.
It’s a personal decision. I recently read Rick Rubin’s book The Creative Act and it has had a big impact on the way I think about writing, but also life – perhaps read that and mull on it some more.
Life is longer than we think it is, we have time, time to make art we are proud of, and it is far too short to make art we are not proud of. If something must live on after us, let it be our best work at the very least.
Hope that helps. Good luck with the farming – it is all consuming, but even better luck with the writing – because creating gives us the energy to do all the thousand things that drain it. 💕✨
Thank you for that thought-provoking advice! And I will try and get hold of The Creative Act as well.
For me I really like having my “time-capsules” from earlier in my writing on my bookshelf. They certainly represent a bold soul willing to put myself out there imperfectly (and impatiently). But it’s equally, if not more, bold to start afresh. Good for you to do what you needed to do for yourself.
I still have my printed copies of my books and will always keep those Monty. I just wanted a fresh start and when I begin pitching my fiction novel I don’t want any other type of work sitting on Amazon or in Draft to Digital that I’m not 💯 in love with.
Makes sense. I’ve wrestled with the idea to start publishing under my given name as a fresh start if I want to publish traditionally…it’s just hard walk away from Monty…haha.
I relate to a lot of this. My published books don’t represent my current writing skills or even my personality. I’ve toyed with the idea to unpublish them, but at the same time, people still read and enjoy them. They are definitely a a snapshot of a time in my life, but I guess all artwork is. I will also say that my entire 2nd book was published with 100% of the content still up on my blog. I never heard that Amazon banned that. I guess they never checked because other than some additional editing, they are a word for word match, right down to the story titles.
Wow! I can’t believe they didn’t ping you with the previously published thing. Maybe poetry is different. Amazon instantly hit me with the word thing every time, and so did Draft to Digital when I used them.
It’s not just the fact that I wasn’t entirely happy with the layout of my books it’s also I think a turning away from the mainstream and returning to a simpler way of being and writing. I have absolutely no wish to
Market or promote my books and never did. I just want to write and communicate with an authentic audience that shows up to read and
I can interact with and enjoy reading their words too. This is just my feeling though Jeff, you do you and it’s wonderful if your books are being enjoyed by others. I think everyone is a little jaded by now with Amazon and other models but if it works – no need to break it in order to fix it. It just doesn’t work for the current version of me is all.
Good for you Katie! I’m right along with you – I ‘unpublished’ 3 poetry books. Amazon is a monopoly and runs a tyrannical business model that is detrimental to organic small businesses and the free market in general. They just hide their manipulations a bit, but many a waking up to their coercive and discriminatory practices. I made the books into my own pdf ebook versions and share them with any one interested but I’ll never use Amazon again and since they are basically IT for self publishing at any sort of “affordable” pricing, I had resigned to making my own versions for now and looking in my local area for affordable hard copy options. Once I let myself forget about the published author carrot on a stick model that is in the mainstream I was actually able to write more content with more authentic content, which I actually feel connected to while creating. Before I would constantly be thinking of the audience or who would read it and how – I had totally lost the fun in my own experiences, trading it out for worrying about criticisms, judgements and potential likes or dislikes. Not saying you’ve been through the same scenario, but just hope to lend a supportive hand out to you to let you know you’re not alone in this very difficult situation. Doing what feels aligned to your inner compass, your own North Star is what is important these days! <3
Hey thanks for this thoughtful and honest response. So much resonated with me here. I’m glad you’re finding your writing fulfilling again, it’s everything to me. It energised and fills my cup to be creating exactly what I want and keeping it right where I want it, which is on the blog. We each find our own ways, it’s being authentic and as you say following your own North the Star that is important 💕✨
Thanks for sharing this idea Anita