Lovedrunk with that New-New

When it first came to me, from out of a scurrying mess of thoughts, I saw it as small and clear and simple. An image from another time: on a rural stretch of farmland, a son and father lug a handmade, heirloom table up a rise to throw it on a bonfire of everything they’ve ever owned. Just this flicker and nothing else. And that’s the narcotic, isn’t it: that new-new, a bit of imagining that feels fresh and...

The Novel Is Dead, Long Live the Novel…

I’ve been doing an autopsy on a stillborn novel, rubbing warmth back into it. A smart person would probably let it go, but it kills me that it sits undone. I’ve been rereading the manuscript I wrote, to the exclusion of almost everything except earning a paycheck, from, say 1988 to about 1995. I carried that sucker around the way I carry my smartphone and journal now; parts of it were written in dyke bars, while...