The doctor tells the family of the dying patient: there is nothing more to be done.
An ending tugs and tugs and tugs.
The beginning does not want the ending; the beginning, like so many young people, believes itself to be immortal, trusts the illusory material of existence, and trusts that the distant point in the future that is ever-so-distant will continue to remain ever-so-distant. The ending is composed of distance and illusion; that is why the beginning, having not gone through the middle, believes that it too will live forever.
But we know, despite the feelings a writer possesses upon writing a beginning, that endings happen, that beginnings do indeed come to an end. The book spine betrays; the word count is a demise; each page number a crossing out of calendar days.
An ending is when a leaving leaves.
A beginning is asking: more please.
A beginning, in asking for more please, steps into that nebulous, often forgetful, amnesiatic land of the middle.
The middle is the leaving.
The middle is ever-so-full of things that we did together as lovers that matter to no one else but one of us. For the middle is the story of love unrequited.
And so, an ending is when a leaving leaves.
When even the leaving has left you, there still exists ever-so-much white space, an emptiness that tugs you to read the ending once more, to read the beginning again.
An ending says, I might have loved you once, but things have changed between us; things are different now. An ending says, It’s not you, it’s me.
Someone has moved on.
Someone has lost his heartbeat.
When I began to write The Book of Beginnings and Endings, I felt that beginnings and endings were true; that is, the middle was nonsensical: the middle was all but a dream. A beginning stabbed like bright light, sharp stars. An ending lived inside me forever and forever; an ending was played out over and over again until it took on the shape of mourning, and then an ending was mourned until I felt that I could approach a beginning again.
The Book of Beginnings and Endings is just that: it is a book of solely beginnings and endings to hypothetical books. The beginnings end abruptly; the endings begin in the middle of things. It was my book about how love is always only a beginning and an ending.
The middles were only about the despair of the endings: the approaching ending and the ending of beginnings.
The importance of the beginning is to make possible the love affair; the importance of the ending is to make impossible the love affair.
The ending says, There is nothing else that I can do to keep you, and so—despite the heaviness and the utter heartbreak that you may feel—I leave you with such a small message, such a small sorrow, such a small sound. That is what an ending should do.
Acknowledgments
I am grateful to the editors of the following publications and anthologies, in which versions of these pieces first appeared:
“the future imagined, the past imagined” in MiPOesias
“Forecast Essay” in How2
“On Writing and Witchcraft” in LUMINA
“Inner Workings, in Meadows” in The Force of What’s Possible: Writers on Accessibility & the Avant-Garde
“Einstein on the Beach/Postmodernism/Electronic Beeps” in Essay Daily
“On the Voyager Golden Records” in Kenyon Review
“The Page as Artifact” in Poets on Teaching: A Sourcebook
“Between Cassiopeia and Perseus” in DIAGRAM
“Kafka’s Garden” in Unsaid
“Six Black-and-White Movies in Which I Do Not Find You” in Tarpaulin Sky
“Moveable Types” in Maisonneuve
“How to Write on Grand Themes” in MiPOesias
“The Art of Fiction” in ArielX
“Fragments” in Another Chicago Magazine and effing magazine
“22” in Coconut
“On the EEO Genre Sheet” in Bending Genre: Essays on Creative Nonfiction
“Writing Betwixt-and-Between” in Family Resemblance: An Anthology and Exploration of Eight Hybrid Literary Genres
“On Beginnings and Endings” in The Rose Metal Press Field Guide to Writing Flash Nonfiction
“The Poet’s Education” was a talk given for the Chicago Poetry Project’s “Poets Talking” lecture series.
Additionally, the following essays also appeared in the now out-of-print chapbook Moveable Types: “Forecast Essay,” “Kafka’s Garden,” “Moveable Types,” “Fragments,” and “22.” “22,” “Fragments,” and “Between Cassiopeia and Perseus” also appeared in of the mismatched teacups, of the singleserving spoon: a book of failures.
I also wish to express my extreme gratitude to Coffee House Press, especially to Chris Fischbach, who quickly believed in this book; to Caroline Casey, who knew there was something there; and, most importantly, to Carla Valadez, who, through her meticulous reading and devotion to meaning, made me believe in this book too.
Coffee House Press began as a small letterpress operation in 1972 and has grown into an internationally renowned nonprofit publisher of literary fiction, essay, poetry, and other work that doesn’t fit neatly into genre categories.
Coffee House is both a publisher and an arts organization. Through our Books in Action program and publications, we’ve become interdisciplinary collaborators and incubators for new work and audience experiences. Our vision for the future is one where a publisher is a catalyst and connector.
Funder Acknowledgments
Coffee House Press is an internationally renowned independent book publisher and arts nonprofit based in Minneapolis, MN; through its literary publications and Books in Action program, Coffee House acts as a catalyst and connector—between authors and readers, ideas and resources, creativity and community, inspiration and action.
Coffee House Press books are made possible through the generous support of grants and donations from corporations, state and federal grant programs, family foundations, and the many individuals who believe in the transformational power of literature. This activity is made possible by the voters of Minnesota through a Minnesota State Arts Board Operating Support grant, thanks to the legislative appropriation from the arts and cultural heritage fund. Coffee House also
