I think many of us that enjoy writing have tried journaling at some point. I have gone to bookstores and bought very fancy journals. I have had a black and white composition book and written along with my students. Calendars have ended working oftentimes as a timeline journal of events. I love the following poem by William Stafford. As he opens his journal up to us-it's a metaphoric journal:its contents are objects, jokes, images, and things that make him unique. Put together they say quite a bit about who he is as a person. When I read this poem I want to create that metaphoric journal myself. What would be in yours?What's In My Journal
Odd things, like a button drawer, Mean
things, fishhooks, barbs in you hand.
But marbles too. A genius for being agreeable.
Junkyard crucifixes, voluptuous
discards. Space for knickknacks and for
Alaska. Evidence to hang me, or to beautify.
Clues that lead nowhere, that never connected
anyway. Deliberate obfuscation, the kind
that takes genius. Chasms in character.
Loud omissions. Mornings that yawn above
a new grave. Pages you know exist
but you can't find them. Someone's terribly
inevitable life story, maybe mine.
-William Stafford