Writing for me is lovemaking. This is not a metaphor. Nor was it for Shakespeare in Sonnet 74. In his orderly and fervent lines, he was launching himself into a loved one’s heart, past the bounds of death, envisioning a Resurrection sweeter than Jesus’. For he returns to us – to me – no faceless angel, interchangeable, but palpable, unduplicable, individual, while joyously disencumbered of “the dregs of life.” I know Shakespeare better than any friend, so well we converse. He makes me laugh, cry, feel my time more vividly. Such intensified perception is the gift of love. What dearer bounty than joy?

Friends ask why I write. I ask myself. It is for this, to implant myself in another, as beloved makers have implanted themselves in me, where they germinate, grow, enlarge after a conjugation more precious than concupiscence. But you are not Shakespeare, my friends smile. True that. Neither am I Bach, Handel, Caravaggio, Montaigne, Michelangelo, nor any who’ve rung my bells while wringing my heart. What they did could only have been done by them, for they were conduits of their moment. As am I – and you – and any who strive to express themselves. Our glory is the attempt, not our result, which is beyond our means. One can rejoice in tennis without being Jimmy Connors (I date myself). In trying to sing memorably I am Shakespeare’s equal. “For us,” wrote T.S. Eliot, “there is only the trying. The rest is not our business.”

If you are reading this, you know what I’m talking about. If you’ve never felt this, it’s impossible to explain. Materialism sees artworks as things, products of worth and use – and so they are. A painting enhances its wall; a poem may provide calm surer than any chemicals. There’s a market for such wares, even, for a fortunate few, a living to be made from them. Compared to many occupations, making art is clean, innocent, interesting. I would never discourage a would-be maker from trying, however modest their gift. The attempt itself is salubrious.

I did not have the guts to make poetry my profession. My pride could not have withstood the frustrations and rebuffs; I hadn’t the hardihood for penury. But though I shied from the career, I never denied myself its consolations. Only making was I making something of myself: that was my conviction. I wrote – always – often in secret – as if my life depended on it. Because it did.

Setting down such explanations sounds suspiciously like a boast. Shakespeare runs that risk too. His intended first hearer may have smiled at his vaunt, that his poem was a gift beyond price. The joke was on any detractor. His mysterious dedicatee is now a literary celebrity, gratis the poet’s attentions.

But that is a materialist conclusion. Writing one’s best feels good, as does prayer. Experience may dispirit, but art gladdens us to be. How I love to love!