When I was a kid, my dad kept a copy of the Birds of North America and a pair of binoculars near the patio door. He tried for so long to teach me how to see birds moving through the trees, but I didn’t have the patience or the interest then.
Like so many things, of course, I’ve come around a little. (I have yet to take up gardening!)
What I like about looking at birds is how still you have to be, how quiet. Also, if you have a tree outside your window, you can even do it from inside.
today’s exercise
Go look at a bird.
If you want more direction, find a quiet-ish place where you can stand or sit, and watch for a moment. You’re looking for movement. You can also listen. Jenny Odell has a great section in How to do Nothing about how bird-watching should really be called bird-listening.
If you want to write, you might consider the birds’ calls, or how they move. When we did this in my attention economy class last week, one student came back from break talking about the different flights of birds and the shapes they made as they flew. You could write about that, or you could sketch it.
If you want to learn more about birds, the Cornell Lab of Ornithology has an app called Merlin Bird ID. (What a joy to be talking about a bird app and not mean twitter!)
You might also just enjoy a still moment in your day. I really believe that quiet and space is a big part of what we need to let our writing grow.
other writing things I’ve loved recently
What If Writing a Poetry Journal Is Your Path to Self-Love?, an amazing list of prompts and reading suggestions from a bunch of great poets, at Oprah Daily
Poems That Will Inspire You to Keep Writing, from Catapult
The DIY Writing Residency, from Summer Brennan’s A Writer’s Notebook
a note of welcome + what we’re doing here
Welcome, new subscribers! Today’s exercise (look at a bird) might not feel like writing, so here’s a note of explanation: rather than the kind of frantic (though sometimes fun) poem-a-day I’ve done in this past, this year we’re doing a series of exercises and experiments. Many of them are more explicitly writing-related, but some, like today, are more focused on ways to carve out a bit of brain space and make room for poems to start. Every couple of days, the exercise contains suggestions for shaping your notes and fragments into a poem draft.
I’m hoping this way of approaching daily (or at least regular—it’s fine to miss days here and there!) writing will be encouraging and also a little more humane and more in keeping with the slower, more deliberate way I’m trying to work now. (If you’d like more prompts, we did a poem-a-day last year; you can find the first one here: poem #1: real things.)
And an invitation: if it helps you to share, you’re welcome to post a sentence below, or email me, or put your sentence on twitter or instagram. I’ve really loved the work folks have shared so far, and it means so much to me to see how these exercises are turning into poems.
What birds have you found? How is your writing going? I’d love to hear from you. You can always reply to this email, comment below, or find me on twitter (@nancy_reddy) and instagram (@nancy.o.reddy).