My creativity resides in my hips and when I begin feeling stuck I know it is time (past time) to turn on some fun music and move to the rhythms. I am a writer and poet and I believe that movement is the most important part to keeping the words and creativity flowing.
When I think about my writing I think about the wonderful books I have read and the first and most significant is Natalie Goldberg and her book, Writing Down the Bones. I remember taking her book with me on a four hour drive and devouring every word. Lucky for me my partner back then liked to do most of the driving.
I still have that little book and I still often carry it with me for inspiration. She talks about sitting in cafes in Taos New Mexico and teaching others to write even before she was an author herself. She would go to craft fairs and sell prose for a dollar. I thought, wow, what moxie. Â I could not imagine writing for other people. Well I could but only in my dreams.
About the same time that I read her book I read another fabulous author by the name of Gabrielle Roth. Her book, Maps to Ecstasy: Teachings of an Urban Shaman, stirred something in me that bubbled up and could not be contained. Dance. Movement.
Writing, dance, movement, writing, this marinated in my soul for years until I had the courage to act on it and began writing seriously the beginning of 2012.
I use dance and movement to connect to my muse, to my higher self, whatever you want to call it. Music and movement help me to open up and allow the words to flow.
Now I did mot start out writing poetry. Yes I wrote a few poems in high school and as a young adult but I did not take it seriously let alone have the confidence to continue with it. It was not until I saw a picture writing prompt on Shah Wharton’s, Words in Sync, that poetry began to stir within me once again. Stir, it began to boil. It took hold of me and did not let go.
I had forgotten for a time what poetry means to me; now that I remember I live and breathe it. I turn tragedy into words on the page. I take the bleeding gaping holes and mend them with my words.
Morgan Dragonwillow is co-host of @StoryDam and creatrix of OctPoWriMo (a poetry month in October) Morgan Dragonwillow is intimate with shadow and dances into the heart of it. She believes that diving in to what most people try to avoid makes great fertilizer for creativity whether it is writing, painting, or using other mediums for art. She currently lives in Marietta, Georgia with her partner, their Pekinese and their fluffy, long haired tabby. You will often find her online #wordmongering with her #StoryDam team and writing community.
Morgan's new book, Dancing within Shadow - A Poetic Journey, is available on Amazon as a free dowload today and tomorrow (June 19-20, 2013). Get your copy today!
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