Writing in the Shadows of a Pandemic

Shadows of the Pines was written during the COVID-19 pandemic, a time when my real and imagined worlds crashed into each other.

I had no office to visit, little paying work, and no bar where my wife and I could let off steam. Our favorite barmaid had already packed up and moved to Cape Cod. And there were no gatherings of my poet friends at the Pines of Rome to discuss the state of the franchise. (The Pines had moved to a more upscale location and would never be the same bargain kitchen—that ordinary, humble place for pensioners, poets, and the workmen and workwomen of every profession.)

For companionship, I turned to my neighbors—Madame S., with whom I walked every day with our sibling dogs, the Contessa and Armel, and the Danes next door. I can never, for example, offer adequate thanks to Johanna B., who would routinely send her daughters over at 10 a.m. or 10 p.m. with plates of cake and cookies they left at my door.

Most importantly, I developed new COVID companions—the characters with whom I found myself in hours of daily dialogue. One of the most motivating aspects of writing fiction is that the characters often share your interests. For example, Harold Rava’s taste in literature not surprisingly matched my own. And I was also grateful to take the time to hear Harold’s dreams and grievances and explore his feelings about being a husband, parent, teacher, author, and borrower of other people’s material. 

I spent hours mimicking the style of other writers Harold introduced me to and finally brought them into our dialogue to revive interest in their work and have them participate in mine.

I wrote at a breakneck pace. What I loved was the fact that I was writing a book in the old-fashioned way, as if serializing a novel in a newspaper, completing what seemed like a new chapter every week. I had not had such freedom since I was paid in my mid-20s to roam the stacks at the Library of Congress and write whatever I wanted.

I would be remiss if I did not thank my friend, Madame S. for being a patient listener. Most specifically, she allowed me occasional moments of self-satisfaction on our walks. There were times, I am slightly embarrassed to say, when I was so admiring of my work that I would double over in laugher about a scene I was working through. Inevitably, the pages I found most amusing wandering around the alleys in our neighborhood seemed less interesting when viewed directly on the page. For I knew I had broken a key rule: Writing is something to be done in secret. It is a frail thing, like the egg beneath the bird that can be broken or betrayed by human contact. But I needed that contact.

At the end, I had a desire to experiment with language and write the kind of subversive poetry that Harold Rava calls for. I came up with dozens of highly visual poems about a wordkeeper and the words he keeps. It was a chance to interrogate the basic unit of writing and the rules of grammar and understand my writing from the words’ perspective. How did it feel to have Harold (me) strike, cajole, revise, interrupt, move, tease, and bully them, and search for them when they were lost or missing? The answer, I knew, would be harsh, and spurred me on, because I believe that good writing is largely a matter of good manners. I wanted to make up for their mistreatment and win back their lack of faith in the writer who must not diminish them. And then I added many of these poems to Shadows of the Pines as a change of pace, and to further decorate Harold’s inner world.

The pandemic is long over. I am still working at home, though some of my major clients have returned. I take away some lessons from the pandemic that I can share that are as true for me as anything I know, though I would have laughed at these truths if someone else offered them.

First, there is nothing better than bringing joy to others’ lives. Go out in your pajamas and bring something special to your neighbors’ door.

Second, the early rituals of COvID—from ordering groceries online and washing everything with antiseptic towelettes to driving to a housekeeper’s apartment to pay her for not coming—were important. These activities brought me into the culture of fear and awe of the disease –and gave me a sense that my wife and I were doing our part to protect ourselves and keep the illness from spiraling. further, the rituals of deep cleansing and maintenance are a kind of Zen meditation and also bring structure, just as tercets (or any regular stanza form) can make cut hay into a tidy rick.

I could move in any direction, riff on any theme, and keep the reader engaged with offbeat rhymes, sprung rhythm, routines, scene setting and the momentum of simple narrative. There is nothing wrong with formal routines. Doing your chores and dressing up for the wife can help her fall in love with you again.

Finally, there is nothing else like using a convalescence or time of holing up in place to rekindle one’s love of reading. I renewed my appreciation for writers and thinkers who taught me to portray a whole, distinct world and discover the patterns of our world that is not pattern, but vibrant and alive, dancing five ways.