The Flow Zone,
On the glowing rectangle of my screen:
A diagonal arrow, straight
(sometimes with stylized curves)
Starting at zero in the left bottom corner,
Pointing upwards to the top right corner,
An endless vector between
The axes of Competence and Difficulty.
Locate yourself on the graph.
Leave a fingerprint on the screen.
Later, disgusted, wipe it off.
Along with all the other greasy marks.
How many left per hour?
The evening class.
Wearing my slightly itchy knitted sweater.
Real wool.
I am one point in a semi-circle of desks,
Facing the Creative Writing professor.
She is laying down the ground rules for giving feedback on writing.
Whatever you say, don’t say It flows.
Everybody says that.
But what does it even mean?
I guess she was right.
I still can’t tell you
What flow means,
Except with that old dodge:
I know it when I see it.
What about defining what flow is not?
Start with the opposite.
Go against the flow.
Go into the woods, find a wandering stream
Step in, force shins and ankles against the current, feel the undertow
The ache of the cold.
No, this is not the opposite of flow.
To push against a current is to have direction.
To go upstream is to seek a source.
To seek a source is to believe a source exists.
Besides,
How could standing in a woodland stream ever feel wrong?
But if there is truth in water,
Follow it.
How about sailing a boat, on a day of little wind?
I can hear my father’s voice,
Watch the ripples on the water, follow the shadows
They will tell you where the wind is coming from next,
Push out the boom, loosen the sheet, be ready.
But the wind is
A breath, then an angry gust
First from here, then from there,
The weather vane spins.
The sail, set ever so carefully,
Backs and snaps
Set it again.
Dead waves slap and rock the hull
Knock the bow sideways.
A storm waits somewhere, they mutter.
But you have no wind
Either to turn and face it,
Or to flee.
No, that is not a comfortable feeling.
Like the itchy knit sweater, on a cold autumn night.
Why did I even wear it?
Perhaps as defiance
Against the approaching winter.
The wind cut through it, quickening my breath,
Pushing my feet faster, over the concrete path as I walked
To class.
The heated room with yellow cinder-block walls
Felt almost welcoming in contrast.
The sweater was my mother’s.
There are photos of her wearing it,
Smiling into the camera, on top of a ski hill.
Even when I was a child,
This was a long time ago.
A time I knew only from story:
My mom and dad as newlyweds.
An apartment fire.
Everything lost.
What did they hang onto in every re-telling?
The single black and white photo of her favourite cat from childhood,
standing on his hind legs.
His first slide rule, a parting gift from a grandfather I never met
When he left Greece for Canada.
After the fire they went back once.
My mom refusing to take photos. I don’t want to remember, she said.
They saw their brand-new sauce pans on the stove, filled with ashes.
It was Christmas Eve.
The sweater.
She picked it up,
After people in the city
Filled a gymnasium with donations.
At some point, moving above the axis of time,
It was my turn to remember.
The song of the stream
The swish and slap of the lake on the hull of a boat
Too many notes to put into music,
But whether by lake or by brook, I take out my phone,
And record it.
It is memory.
My daughter goes to sailing school.
On land she wears black and her hair falls like a curtain
Over a stage where the play is yet to begin
But on water she is fierce.
She watches the wind, she leads the fleet.
Even now, walking a concrete path, she turns to me smiling.
This would be a great day for sailing.
Yes, it is, and I smile back.
Your grandpa would have said the same thing.
And look at those clouds, is there a squall coming?
(c) October 2025 Síochána Arandomhan
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