The Wave in the Mind: Talks and Essays on the Writer, the Reader, and the Imagination (42 page)

are chirping on the roof.”

And like the sparrows

her thoughts go hopping

and flying and trying out words.

And like the light of morning

her thought impalpably touches

shape, and reveals it,

brings seeing from dimness,

being from inexhaustible chaos.

That is the good time.

That is the time when this she-plural writer

finds what is to be written.

In the first light,

seeing with the eyes

of the child waking,

lying between sleep and the day

in the body of dream,

in the body of flesh

that has been/is

a fetus, a baby, a child, a girl, a woman, a lover, a mother,

has contained other bodies,

incipient beings, minds unawakened, not to awaken,

has been sick, been damaged, been healed,

been old, is born and dying, will die,

in the mortal, inexhaustible

body

of her work:

That is the good time.

Spinning the fleece of the sun, that cloudy mass,

weaving a glance and a gesture,

shaping the clay of emotion:

housekeeping. Patterning.

Following patterns.

Lying there

in the dreamtime

following patterns.

So then you have to cut it out—

take a deep breath,

the first cut, the blank page!—

and sew it together (drudgery,

toil in the sacred sweatshop),

the garment, the soul-coat,

the thing made of words,

cloth of the sunfleece,

the new clothes of the Emperor.

(Yes, and some kid comes along

and yaps, “But he hasn’t any clothes on!”

Muzzle the brat

till it learns

that none of us has any clothes on,

that our souls are naked,

dressed in words only,

in charity only,

the gift of the others.

Any fool can see through it.

Only fools say so.)

Long ago when I was Ursula

writing, but not “the writer,”

and not very plural yet,

and worked with the owls not the sparrows,

being young, scribbling at midnight:

I came to a place

I couldn’t see well in the darkness,

where the road turned

and divided, it seemed like,

going different ways.

I was lost.

I didn’t know which way.

It looked like one roadsign said To Town

and the other didn’t say anything.

So I took the way that didn’t say.

I followed

myself.

“I don’t care,” I said,

terrified.

“I don’t care if nobody ever reads it!

I’m going
this
way.”

And I found myself

in the dark forest, in silence.

You maybe have to find yourself,

yourselves,

in the dark forest.

Anyhow, I did then. And still now,

always. At the bad time.

When you find the hidden catch

in the secret drawer

behind the false panel

inside the concealed compartment

in the desk in the attic

of the house in the dark forest,

and press the spring firmly,

a door flies open to reveal

a bundle of old letters,

and in one of them

is a map

of the forest

that you drew yourself

before you ever went there.

The Writer At Her Work:

I see her walking

on a path through a pathless forest,

or a maze, a labyrinth.

As she walks she spins,

and the fine thread falls behind her

following her way,

telling

where she is going,

where she has gone.

Telling the story.

The line, the thread of voice,

the sentences saying the way.

The Writer On Her Work:

I see her, too, I see her

lying on it.

Lying, in the morning early,

rather uncomfortable.

Trying to convince herself

that it’s a bed of roses,

a bed of laurels,

or an innerspring mattress,

or anyhow a futon.

But she keeps twitching.

There’s a
lump
, she says.

There’s something

like a
rock
—like a
lentil—

I can’t sleep.

There’s something

the size of a split pea

that I haven’t written.

That I haven’t written right.

I can’t sleep.

She gets up

and writes it.

Her work

is never done.

CREDITS

“Introducing Myself,” copyright © 1992 by Ursula K. Le Guin, first appeared in
Left Bank
.

“My Island,” copyright © 1996 by Ursula K. Le Guin, first appeared in
Islands: An International Magazine
.

“On the Frontier,” copyright © 2003 by Ursula K. Le Guin; an earlier version of this essay entitled “Which Side Am I On, Anyway?” appeared in
Frontiers
, 1996.

“All Happy Families,” copyright © 1997 by Ursula K. Le Guin, first appeared in
Michigan Quarterly Review
, Winter 1997.

“Things Not Actually Present: On
The Book of Fantasy
and J. L. Borges,” copyright © 1988 by Ursula K. Le Guin, first appeared as the introduction to the Viking edition of
The Book of Fantasy
.

“Reading Young, Reading Old: Mark Twain’s
Diaries of Adam and Eve
,” copyright © 1995 by Ursula K. Le Guin, first appeared as the introduction to
The Diaries of Adam and Eve
in The Oxford Mark Twain.

“Thinking about Cordwainer Smith,” copyright © 1994 by Ursula K. Le Guin, first appeared in the Readercon 6 program book.

“Rhythmic Pattern in
The Lord of the Rings
,” copyright © 2001 by Ursula K. Le Guin, first appeared in
Meditations on Middle Earth
.

“The Wilderness Within: The Sleeping Beauty and ‘The Poacher,’” copyright © 2002 by Ursula K. Le Guin, first appeared in
Mirror, Mirror on the Wall: Women Writers Explore their Favorite Fairy Tales
, 2d ed.

“Off the Page: Loud Cows: A Talk and a Poem about Reading Aloud,” copyright © 1992 by Ursula K. Le Guin, first read at the National Council for Research on Women Awards and appears as the frontispiece of
The Ethnography of Reading
, ed. Jonathan Boyarin, 1994.

“Dogs, Cats, and Dancers: Thoughts about Beauty,” copyright © 1992 by Ursula K. Le Guin, first appeared in
Allure
.

“The Writer on, and at, Her Work,” copyright © 1991 by Ursula K. Le Guin, first appeared in
The Writer on Her Work
, vol. 2.

All other essays are copyright © 2003 by Ursula K. Le Guin and appear for the first time in this volume.

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