where I write

I write in the small soft space between bedcovers and eyelashes, in the place you settle into before you drift off. My favourite place to find words is in the sunshine on my duvet, but second place is between the raindrops on the window I see when my head’s down on the pillow.From my bed, I reach my dictionary and diaries off the shelf. I sit cross-legged with notes and rough drafts spread across the comforter. I sprawl on my stomach to tap on my laptop. I sit up against the headboard; the room becomes my head space; I slip into the dream story world. I glance up through the windowpanes when I need freedom from lower case thoughts, but then burrow back into tender down-filled definitions, before finally slipping book covers and laptops shut to go to sleep.

I write in between places, on the subway and sitting down on bridges. I grab words that whizz by like tube stops and slam them down onto the paper before they zoom away again. 

I write up down staircases. I sit on the side and squish against the wall so when ladies walk by with their dogs they become the next character in my stories about shoes.

I write in secret sunshine places, following the light from park benches onto balconies and the roofs of neighbours' houses.

I write in refracted rain, with the silhouettes of the light inside me reflecting on the windowpane and the shiny screen.

I write on cold park benches beside bamboo, where coloured pencils colour my words. All the adjectives a in pink, the nouns bright green. It takes me longer to get it all down, but colour coding helps me remember what I meant.