I’m obsessed with my bed. I love sleeping in it. I love lying around in. Waking up in it. Reading on it. Pulling my daily tarot cards while sitting on it. It’s a sacred space. It cradles my fragile little head for a third of my life as silly little dreams run through my mind. It’s somewhere I’ve laughed and I’ve cried. Shared it with others to cuddle and kiss.
I’ve actually been taking random photos of my bed some mornings when I wake up for months if not years. Capturing the specific way my sheets are tangled up after climbing out. Seeing the morning light as peeks through the blinds and dances across my duvet. No two mornings will be the same. It’s like looking into the sky, my bedding is all kinds of different fluffy cloud formations. My bed, all our beds, are a self-portrait. Keeping secrets about our dreams, but making it obvious how we slept the night before on a scale of restlessness to calm.
I told myself I was having a Tracy Emin moment and I decided to just run with it. I listened to her interviews on podcasts like Desert Island Discs, Great Women Artists (by
) and Woman’s Hour. I read about her life, her works, her influences. Retracing the steps to see how we got here. Here being: me inspired by Tracey Emin, on the basis of the things that inspired Tracey Emin.
It was on the Great Women Artist podcast that she spoke about the motif of the bed being a stage and constant symbol in her work. She goes on to draw similarities between beds and tombs, talking about the burials of people together. Immediately I thought of An Arundel Tomb, the final poem in the Whitsun Weddings anthology by Philip Larkin. And so, the layers of inspiration begin to overlap. The poem is about the tomb of the same name of the 13th Earl of Arundel and his wife Eleanor. The pair are holding hands, destined to be a symbol of eternal love.
Philip Larkin is one of my favourite poets. Whenever I studied something at school I either truly loved or despised it. I tend to resist being told what to do. Or what to read. But there are times I’m eternally grateful for being introduced to something I may not have found otherwise. The Whitsun Weddings anthology was the latter.
When my sixth-form teacher told me Philip Larkin was a cynic I scoffed. He was a fake (cynic)! I knew this because I was one too. If the world scares you and its harsh realities make you feel vulnerable, you regain a sense of control by being ambivalent. Especially towards love and relationships. To be cynical makes you feel powerful in the face of what you can’t control.
He wrote of tenderness, beauty and mundanity with such sentimentality. The last line of An Arundel Tomb you have probably already heard, even if you’re not familiar with the poem. “What will survive of us is love”. Some say this is a cynical statement. The fact nothing you do in your life really matters or will be remembered in the end. But Larkin has even said himself he was moved by the Arundel tomb and the simple idea of love giving meaning to our lives. As I write this my Co-Star app (the astrology girlies will get it) has popped up with ‘your day at a glance’ and it says love is a conspiracy. Sigh.
When attempting to capture creativity, I think most people can relate to feeling stuck and unsure where to go next from time to time. Lost at sea. Retrospectively realising you were armed with a harpoon and in desperate attempts to find a new idea you ended up killing inspiration dead in its tracks. Or maybe you managed to grab hold of something, but it escaped from your fingers like slippery little fish. It’s so easy to feel deflated when creativity isn’t constantly thrashing about all around in mighty waves. But it will never be dried up completely.
You just have to retrace your steps. When did inspiration last strike? Who was it that last intrigued you? What was it that last made you feel curious and want to learn more? That’s where you’ll be able to fan the flames and be reunited with inspiration.
A little note to say that I’ve had quite a few new subscribers recently so a big welcome and hello to you. I’m glad you’re here and I appreciate you supporting my work by reading this Substack! In a month’s time, I’ll have been writing on Substack for six months wow doesn’t time fly when you’re having fun? It would be incredible to see how many total subscribers I’m able to hit between now and then. If you enjoy Drafting, I will be forever grateful for your shares, mentions and recommendations. THANK YOU.