What You Find in the Trunk

**Please note: I will be posting on Tuesdays now due to a new work schedule. Thanks for understanding in advance!**


Place: My garage, more specifically, inside my Honda CRV which is parked in the garage.
Time: Early. After I've eaten some granola but before a shower. Probably 8:00 am on Labor Day morning.
Climate: 52 degrees, raining, with an icy wind gusting through the open door.


I decided to spend my extra day off cleaning out my car, which hasn't been cleaned in a little over a year due to college demands. Within the first few minutes of tossing receipts and deflated straw wrappers out the door, I discover a pair of blue gloves in the passenger side door. They are knit and have silver patches over the thumb and index finger to keep warm while texting. I unball them and slip them on. I don't remember ever owning a pair of gloves like this. In fact, I'm pretty sure they aren't mine at all. It's cold enough this holiday to wear the gloves while I work. I clean the front seats, the back seats, and then open the hatch. The rain spatters onto it so I try to move quickly. I'm emptying it out so I can vacuum away the little leaves and bug carcasses when I find a pair of black socks. Like the gloves, they are neatly balled. After removing my ice scraper, I find another pair of identical socks, also balled. I know these socks are mine and I suspect they got loose in the move. I stuff the socks into the pockets of my sweatshirt and keep cleaning.

End Scene.

***

Much like my car-cleaning experience, I recently rediscovered a poem I wrote almost two years ago. Like the gloves, I found little gems I didn't remember writing, but that I found to be pretty good lines or ideas. I kept them.

But I also found lines or ideas that were out of place - like the socks. I found myself asking, why is this line here? Can I cut it? What does this scene do to my narrative? Can I cut it?

The socks didn't belong in my trunk. They went rogue in a move and I forgot about them. The lines of poetry had the same syndrome. During my first draft (and second draft) I either didn't see them as problems, or had read the poem so many times, I didn't see them at all. They popped out of my mind like my socks popped out of their suitcase. And just like my car cleaning, they needed to be cleansed from my poem.

This is the beauty of letting a piece sit for awhile before you go back and revise/reedit it. The time apart can force you to look at it in a new light, just like a reader who finds it in a magazine or online. Gone is the sense of creation and instead you can focus on what the piece needs to be truly brilliant. Does this mean you may miss a submission deadline for a contest or literary magazine? Yes. But don't you want to submit your best work? If you don't give the piece some space and some time apart, you will never be able to see it anew. You could be missing the black socks against the black upholstery of the trunk. In most cases, you will be rejected because the editors can definitely see the socks. If you are accepted, though, and you reread the poem a few years after publication. I'm sure you'll see the socks too. It will drive you crazy.

So, make sure you take your time. Don't rush into submission or queries. Do what is best for you, your writing, and your career and take a step back. Let the piece breathe. Revisit in a month or a year and do your cleaning.