The Stafford Challenge

I love to write, whether its's a blog post, a portrayal of one of my ancestors, or a poem. Doesn't matter what I'm writing as long as I write. Granted, I can discover many mistakes in my missives, whether grammatical or logical, but rarely spelling. I have help for that bit. Still, I continue to send these drafts out into the world...for what?

I joined the Stafford Challenge thia past week. Not because I have nothing else to do, but because writing a poem a day for 365 days intrigued me. I know I can do this, but the matter is how to do it and for what end. Before the challange I had heard of William Stafford, the poet, but I knew nothing of his son, Kim, or even of the process of how William wrote. I just enjoyed his poetry. Without being a spoiler, I remember reading William's poem about the pregnant deer decades ago, and that poem stayed with me as much as Robert Frost's poem, "Two roads diverged in the wood and I..." stays with us all.

Last night, as part of the Stafford Challenge, I "met" Kim Stafford through Zoom as he addressed the attendees from the challenge and offered his wisdom. It was then I learned about William Stafford's writing process as explained by his son, Kim. You can read about the process yourself online at Kim's website, "Writing as Ritual."

What got to me was that I was evolving into this practice without any assistance as I kept writing. Finding inspiration first, which seemed so difficult so many years ago and is second nature now, writing it down, making changes, and then making some more changes as I format. This method, to me, is far superior than just running off the top of my head and creating mistakes from haste (such as accidental metaphors, otherwise known to me as unnoticed words that often lead to wrong conclusions or an overbearing message).

How long does this method take? Depends upon how often you write. If you write every day, then you are a writer, and this method is one way to write better and faster. If you don't write every day, then this method might take a week just to pump out one poem or article until you make it yours.

I'm glad I joined the challenge. I plan to keep it light and easy by writing a daily shadorma, much like a daily meditation. A shadorma is a poetic form where a sextet makes a stanza, and syllable count makes the lines (3/5/3/3/7/5). The themes? Nature, pacifism, and other topics that focus on William Stafford's stance as a writer. I hope to have a book filled with shadorma poetry by this time next year.

As to why I write? To what end? Because I love to write.