The Primordial Urge and the Singular Reader

we write because we must; we are blessed by those who carry our stories forward

“Primordial Urge,” Beth Kephart, Monotype

There is an urge, and you can’t quell it. You try (I do). It will be too hard. No one will care. There is more important work to do.

(Save the world.)

(Call a friend.)

(Shake the wildflower seeds toward the soil.)

But the story rises up, a sentence—

She lies in her bed, in her room, listening to the glug in the gutter.*

a next sentence—

The calico across the narrow of the street, new to its own mew.*

until of an unstoppable sudden it is all running out in front of you. Your story must become your story, this story that would be nothing without you.

I am here, you say to your story. I will not abandon you.

Now, the book in hand, you choose again. (I choose.) Not to yardstick yourself against rival measures. Not to force yourself upon a stage. Not to hope for that which is not yours to gain. Your irrefutable need has become a story. Your characters have become known to you; they keep you company. Your family is more whole for the editors who have stepped in, those goddess believers in you. And when a friend writes with news of this story you have made, when she has brought your characters into her realm, you name the act of being read as the miracle it is: a gift of time another yields in a world that yet wants saving.

* from Tomorrow Will Bring Sunday’s News: A Philadelphia Story (Tursulowe Press, April 1, 2025)