Crafting the Beautiful

This morning, my student showed me a fine pencil drawing of her friend. I was amazed.“How did she do that beautiful sketch?” I asked her. And since she is also an artist , she jokingly answered, “It's simple Miss! While she was working, she just erased the lines that didn’t make the drawing look beautiful.”

"What a beautiful work of hand. " I told her. Then I started to ponder on the things I do with mine.

Just like the the drawing, I think my writing also has its aesthetic qualities-- it becomes a beautiful piece when it is carefully crafted, especially when all the strewn words are wiped away.

But when do we really say that a piece of writing is good?

I think we can say that a piece is well-written when it has this particular rhythm which is pleasant to the eyes, tongue and ears. We can say that it is an elegant piece when it carefully sways in varied lengths with changing tempo, depending on the topic. We can say that it is a powerful work when it creates a melody that is so convincing, so divine, so enchanting.

I started writing when I was in first year high school. The first piece I wrote was a narrative poetry published in our school paper, The Excelsior entitled “Once a Writer, Always a Writer.” That poem skilled me with some of the things I know about writing now which my dad once shared:

"In writing, you are the seamstress and the words are your tools. And your goal is to make a beautiful piece by weaving words together carefully. That when you work with dedication and heart, you too can make a fine-looking piece."

Each time I write, I try to weave details in my mind and then I decide where to take my readers. If I wish to bring them to, let’s say Wonderland, I try to pick phrases which could produce harmony and excitement to their ears. When I want to scare them, I move violently to armor my lines with speed and strength which I believe to could possibly blow them away. And when I want to share a love story, I start to recall what makes me really stay in love.

But writing isn’t at all that easy. If I sounded earlier that it is plainly pleasure, wrong. Writing for me is sometimes bothersome.

In my years of writing, never did I say that “This is a perfect piece , it can’t be improved!” Often, I get perturbed when I see my stories published as I always say “it could have been written this way…”

I remember the feature story I wrote for Brew magazine in UP Baguio years ago. It was a story which really embarrassed me. I felt like I was pulling the wool over my readers’ eyes as I nonchalantly featured a place which I am not really familiar with And so I stuffed my lines with adjectives. And upon realizing how poor my writing was, how I wanted then to get all the distributed copies back.

Blankness in writing is unpardonable blunder. And the lesson I learned from that inexcusable poor feature article I wrote is that no great words can cover up of the lack of research and that no good voice can veil the necessary facts. I should know what I write so that I will be believed in.

And to discourse myself for that mistake, I must make sure that I know what I am writing about and that I must place my words properly so that so that they are agreeable to the eye and the ear. It’s a struggle but I should try to make it uncomplicated and sublime.

Writing is not easy but it is simple. It’s just a matter of choosing true, sweet and simple words. It’s just like drawing a beautiful piece with proper shading.

And drawing is just like writing: simply sketch (write) exactly what you want to see (say) then pick beautiful colors (words) to enhance your work.

With my hands, I try to weave beautiful words. How about you? What do you make with your hands?