Skip to primary content

Vow | Oct 25 2002

I have resolved to write garbage. This is the only way out. Every day until the end of the year I will write some likely piece of garbage, and I will not miss any days.

My friend Terry, who probably owes me a phone call (Terry, pick up the goddamn phone), once wrote a hundred poems in twenty-four hours. I read them all but remember only one:

Now everything I think is a poem

This isn’t why I’m going to write garbage. I’m going to write garbage so that I can get over my phobia of writing garbage.

Actually, there’s another, bigger reason I’m going to write garbage, but I can’t talk about that. Nor can I talk about why I can’t talk about it.

This is what I mean by garbage.

Except that this at least is mildly entertaining: a vow to write garbage. The garbage itself will be, I expect, another thing entirely.