George Orwell

'The English language becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts.' If such bad habits could be overcome then we 'can think more clearly, and to think clearly is a necessary first step towards political regeneration.'
George Orwell, Essays
2000 edition, Penguin 

Work, work, work

'The painter Edgar Degas, though best known for his beautiful Impressionist paintings of dancers, toyed briefly with poetry. As a brilliant and creative mind, the potential for great poems was all there - he could see beauty, he could find inspiration. Yet there are no great Degas poems. There is one famous conversation that might explain why. One day, Degas complained to his friend, the poet Stéphane Mallarmé, about his trouble writing. "I can't manage to say what I want, and yet I'm full of ideas." Mallarmé's response cuts to the bone. "It's not with ideas, my dear Degas, that one makes verse. It's with words."
     Or rather, with work. 
     The distinction between a professional and a dilettante occurs right there - when you accept that having an idea is not enough; that you must work until you are able to recreate your experience effectively in words on the page. As the philosopher and writer Paul Valéry explained in 1938, "A poet's function ... is not to experience the poetic state: that is a private affair. His function is to create it in others." That is, his job is to produce work.'
Ryan Holiday, 2016, Ego is the enemy, Profile Books, London.

 

mother's day

 
Three generations of children removed from their mothers. Removal from country, the mother.
Ali Cobby Eckermann finds her country again without knowing she needed it, as if something invisible has drawn her toward it. In her early thirties she also finds her birth mother. She says of that first meeting at Canberra airport with its floral carpet, that as she walked toward her mother who was standing there waiting holding a bunch of flowers, she felt like she was walking knee deep through flowers.
This collection of poetry by Ali Cobby Eckermann, published by Giramondo, is titled Inside my Mother. It is the result of grieving for her mother.
Through the sadness there is the drip, drip, the sounds of country. 
Finding the words to weave the story into poetry, what was lost is reclaimed, dignity is restored and meaning takes root, flowers. 
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/earshot/inside-my-mother-ali-cobby-eckermann/7319198