Creative Writing - Short Stories, Parables and Poetry

The further from my Mormon experience I travel the more I feel inclined to write things of a creative as opposed to an analytical nature. While I don't consider myself an artist, I aspire toward being able to create things that will produce the "aesthetic arrest" of which James Joyce wrote in his semi-autobiographical "The Portait of the Artist as a Young Man" (See "Does Religious Belief Affect Creativity? [hyperlink this])

I am also reminded in this regard of something I recently read in a book by the literary critic Harold Bloom ("How to Read and Why") His comments are as relevant as writing and other arts as they are to reading. Here are a few quotes that helped me to understand my recent burgeoning interest in the creative aspects of life:

"... ideology, particularly in its shallower versions, is peculiarly destructive of the capacity to apprehend and appreciate irony ... the loss of irony is the death of ... what had been civilized in our natures." (p. 25)

[The appreciation of] "... irony demands ... the ability to sustain antithetical ideas, even when they collide with one another. Strip irony away from reading, and it loses at once all discipline and all surprise. Find now what comes near to you, that can be used for weighing and considering, and it very likely will be irony, even if many of your teachers will not know what it is, or where it is to be fond. Irony will clear your mind of the cant of the ideologues, and help you to blaze forth ..." (p. 27)

"We read Shakespeare, Dante, Chaucer, Cervantes, Dickens, Proust, and all their peers because they more than enlarge life. ... I urge you to find what truly comes near to you, that can be used for weighing and considering. Read deeply, not to believe, not to accept, not to contradict, but to learn to share in that one nature that writes and reads." (p. 28)

I find that the effort required to frame my experience in a way that recognizes life's inherent uncertainty and paradox helps me not to take myself, or those around me, as seriously as I have in the past and to both see and appreciate much more than I previously could. This is healthy in a variety of ways, and makes for a much more intersting trip through life. So, having set the bar high enough that I am unlikely to get over it, here are some attempts. I note that those written earliest tend most toward resolving instead of exploring conflict.

Short Stories

Revelation (5 pages – no abstract) – This storyu was spinning through my head when I woke up on March 19, 2005. It is loosely modeled on several intense days I experienced in July, 2002 as my Mormon belief crumbled. My experience contained each of the elements of the story above, but I did not try to accurately describe what happened to me. I do not think I am capable of that. My initial inclination was that this was the beginning of a larger story I needed to articulate in the course of my ongoing recovery – writing about these things has become a kind of therapy for me. But the well dried up where the story stops. After a few tries to “finish” it, I decided that it is complete as it is. The reader should be left hanging without the conflict this piece creates being resolved. Let each reader write her own conclusion. That process could be used as a mirror into the soul of those who makes the attempt. Some have questioned my use of profanity in this and other things I have written. I don't use profanity much in my speech. However, I was a very profane teenager and so my vocabulary in that regard well developed. Until recently, the “rebellious” teenage period of my life represented chaos to me at a fundamental level. That is how I was trained by well-meaning parents and religious leaders to interpret it. And that is why it was so terrifying to feel my unformed self literally flood in and take over as soon as the restraining force of religious belief was removed. It was as if a dam had burst. People who do not have my history would probably not experience what I did in this regard. Other things that represent chaos to them, however, may make themselves felt in ways that I might have trouble understanding. This is a version of the “thing most feared” that Orwell described in “1984” as being the psychological tool used by Big Brother to mentally break dissidents. We each have our “thing most feared”, and it will often be a product of the social conditioning we have undergone.

The Blessing Chair (5 pages; no abstract) - This is a piece of creative writing that explores the emotional dynamics of individuation within a Mormon family setting.

The Missionary (8 pages; no abstract) - This is a piece of creative writing that explores the forces that cause Mormons and others to come to "know" things of a spiritual nature.

Dialogue with a Prophet (11 pages; no abstract) – This short piece works through my imaginary encounter with one of the larger than life authority figures that dominate the Mormon psyche. It responds to several things that members of the current slate of LDS prophets have either written to me, or said to others respecting my current circumstances.

Bridges (2 pages) – This short piece draws an analogy between a bridge near our home to some of the things I have experienced in my recent spiritual development.

Vision (2 pages) – This short piece records some insights I gleaned recently from a friend's encounter with laser eye surgery

Poetry

Heaven in my Hand (4 pages; no abstract) - The following came to me while waiting in the hospital with our son Dallin as he fought a serious infection. Since it came in rhythming verse, to music, I have recorded it that way as well as in what for me is more conventional form.

Borrowed Light (1 page) - A poem for my kids about our intergeneration love affair with basketball.

Evening (1 page) - I wrote this for my wife after we had been married for 15 years. That was about eight years ago. It still rings true to me.

Harmony (3 pages) - I wrote this for my son while he was serving as a Mormon missionary in the Ukraine. It chronicles and synthesizes two experiences we enjoyed together when he was a small boy - visits to the beach and the prairie.

The Weaver (2 pages) - I wrote this for my father. It explores our sometimes difficult relationship, and thanks him as best I can for all he has done for me.

Wings (1 page) - I wrote this for a loved one during a time of great stress. It explores our relationship to life's difficulties.

Parable

The Parable of The Boy, The Dog, and The Bear (1 page; no abstract) - This parable explores the relationship between fear, courage and reality. Good parables have no particular meaning, and while this one may not be good (my wife and teenage daughter assured me that it is not), it likewise is not intended to mean anything.. But, it was inspired by certain experiences members of my family and I had while working our way out of Mormonism. I invite you to hold this little mirror up to your eyes and see what it reveals.