Winter Songs Winter Writing

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Winter spring summer or fall is the name of a song, or is it line in a song? I've always wondered why the songwriter started with WINTER. Why not start with spring, when everything is born again? 

Anyway, try writing in winter. Spring is good for the mind and writing because I can see the wind in the trees. See? Probably not, because it doesn’t have form or colour like flowers. I think there is wind because the freshly minted green leaves move. Green is a big thing if you live in complete winter denudation, where branches are either brown or gray.

My writing is like that in winter, probably because of what is happening around it. It becomes defiant like trees shorn of leaves. It’s the season. A reminder that human beings are not in charge. We cannot place certain things under a microscope and look for what is not there, and never will be. Even rude artificial intelligence cannot change the big four: fall winter spring and summer.

The gentle spring wind is conducive to writing because it is not unilateral. It has capital letters, small letters, comas and full stops. I cannot write when there are gale force winds that put dust in eyes, blow up our skirts, pull down construction sites and blow some roof tiles away. The writing will not flow. It will be like the weather outside, singe, chop and axe.

Maybe I should stop dreaming during the day, but I do wish my writing could have a slight wind through the mind of some readers.

By: Nonqaba waka Msimang.

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