The creative life asks of me to try (essayer).
It is 6 a.m., and I have been trying to sleep since 4 a.m.
But that is not the kind of trying I am talking about.
I am talking about the kind of trying that might mean looking at things in a different light. Like the way I took these photos of a Japanese tea set at night.
I am also talking about the kind of trying that involves risk. The risk of being a beginner and putting something out there in any case, even if we feel vulnerable, or “not enough.”
Like this little poem* I wrote in French, for a prompt at a French site …
Dans la nuit
je rêve de thé noir,
doux et velouté
et plein de saveurs riches
comme ce soir.
It is trés (very) simple. Not what I might be capable of in English with the same amount of trying. Must everything we do be perfect? If so, we will not be free to try. To play (jouer). And our creative lives will suffer.
What could we otherwise create—what roses grant the world—if we let ourselves play (si nous nous laissons jouer)?
Yesterday, for the first time, I understood that Walt Whitman was playing in “Song of Myself.” Even being amusing! How unexpected from dear old Walt. Or is it that we ourselves forget to play as we read, as we receive? As if all poetry from the “greats” is (and was) serious business only.
In making my way in another language, I feel the risk of trying beyond myself. It is not easy. I often feel a sense of le dépaysement (being “out of my country” or outside my ease, off my familiar paths). It can feel like a leap into thin air.
What helps us navigate? What grants us freedom? To play, to be? Without fear? Or maybe just with courage, even if we are afraid? Bringing something along that grounds us can help. For me it’s tea.
There is also the comfort of memory, and of those who came before, lighting our way.
The lamp whose light played upon my Japanese tea set was my mother’s. It’s one of the many small things I brought into my home after she passed away in October, as a way to remember and honor the beautiful life she built in a humble place. Everything she did was beautiful, despite how little she had and the struggles (la luttes) she faced.
How better to honor her, really, than to try (essayer) to build the beautiful, despite mes propres luttes (my own struggles) and the vagaries of the larger world.
For you, maman, I play.
Photo by planetMitch aunger, Creative Commons, via Unsplash.
See all Words to Travel By posts…
Poem translation
In the night
I dream of black tea,
sweet and velvety
and full of rich flavors
like this eve.
Poetry Prompt
Write a poem that begins “in the night,” Or, go French and try “dans la nuit.” What might you find in the velvet dark?
- Poetry Prompt: Meet Your Muse Euterpe - April 6, 2026
- Learning by Poetry: Dans la Nuit - March 13, 2026
- Poetry Prompt: Meet Your Muse Terpsichore - March 9, 2026
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