I’ve been struggling with the idea of a manuscript – and specifically what it would be about. Even more difficult seems to be recognizing solutions when they appear.

For example, I had a dream last night about a stone staircase leading down from an esplanade to a beach. I think I’ve dreamed of this place before – I have vague memories of a buildings in the town. This time the entire action of the dream involved me feeling with my bare feet and hands the rather cool silky sands of the beach.

The question remains how does this suggest a solution to my problem of constructing this manuscript.

I had a bit of a flash about this today – in that the staircase may be a metaphor for the shape of the thing. The problem with bodies is that they don’t think with words but with movement patterns, actions, shapes, smells, etc. So how can a piece of writing, a series of poems to be exact, be understood as the shape of a staircase? And the sand? It is to feel like the sand did in the dream?

Going to bed to think about this some more.