Once I pressed onwards in darkness without even myself for company and I wrote to drive pitons into a sheer cliff. I tried to thread myself through them because I was afraid to fall. I wrote to crack a whip over myself because I didn’t know why I was climbing. I wrote myself a yarn that I stretched like Theseus as I struggled through an inner labyrinth. I wrote whenever I could see. I wrote to erode the Sisyphean pit. Now I write to rappel into the depths because that is where I found myself waiting. I write to shed light on my subterranean discoveries. Then I write to dispel the vertiginous ascent as I carry them upwards. I write to press onwards ─ to create myself. I write to press inwards and center myself. I write to spin my impressions on the wheel, to feel them running through my fingers as my hand guides them with a will of its own. I write to steal from nature, like Prometheus, and give fire to my creations. I write to set my words in a kiln and see if the