Why Another 12 Months of Poetry and Flash Fiction

I can see you asking the question, even as I prepare this year’s collections for release, and it’s a good question. It’s a question I often asked myself. I can’t really explain why I want to inflict my very short stories and poems on the world, except that I love writing them. I love knowing I need to write at least one of each every day. I create the excuses to write them every day.

These short pieces have provided me with an age of pleasure and, over the last 24 months became something I could not imagine discarding from my day. And I’m not alone. There are plenty of other writers love their work and make a living from it. I think, way back in July, Dean Wesley Smith summed up the why of writing very well—that when you sit down to write “you are there to play, to have fun, to do what you want without caring”—and Kristine Kathryn Rusch said something that struck a chord with me, also—keep doing what you love and that she finds it essential to write.

These writers write because they love to write, and so do I. It’s why, even though I was raised to be pragmatic, to believe that writing wasn’t a ‘sure’ enough career to follow, that I never stopped writing, and why, now I’ve been given the chance to, I’m writing full time. It’s why I write so many different things and why I don’t want to stop playing with any one of them. I love writing.

And this love is why there’ll be many other collections of flash fiction or poetry in the future.

Because it’s fun. Because I can. Because I must.

Writer just gots ta write.