your voice is a tree

or, seeing the writer's voice

Pine Tree Tops

in the blue night

frost haze, the sky glows

with the moon

pine tree tops

bend snow-blue, fade

into sky, frost, starlight.

the creak of boots.

rabbit tracks, deer tracks,

what do we know.

— Gary Snyder

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What is voice in writing?

Picture a tree.

Whatever rose and converged in you to conjure that specific tree is the same stuff that makes up your writer’s voice. Your experiences, your conception of the world, how your mind goes from one place to another, the threads of your body connecting it to past iterations of the self, what you feel in your body at this moment. What hurts and delights you and all that you find wonderful and everything you wonder about the world. There is no generic “tree” growing just the same in each of our minds.

You might picture the oak out back of your childhood home, the one you fell off of when you were ten. Or the willow standing behind you on your wedding day. The one you planted in remembrance of someone. The giant you saw pulled up by its roots after that storm. Or the one in whose buried roots float the bones of your old dog. It could be a dream tree, not out of any memory. You might have no idea where it comes from. It could be the tree of an alien planet. It’ll be something I could never imagine.

If you wonder what your voice is, struggle to understand how it might be worth it to add another voice, another story, to all that’s been said, how to define the voice, and hear it, start back with your tree. And if you haven’t been writing for a while, and you’re reading this waiting to be inspired to pick it back up, or for the first time, this is your sign. Start here.

Picture a tree.

Now write all about it. What does it look like, what are its colors and textures? Does it have any scars, does it bear any fruit? How old does the tree look, do you know its Latin name? Are there animals living in it, can you see them? Is your tree one of one or one among? Are there people underneath the tree, what are they doing? Is there weather? What season is it? What part of the world, or in what dream?

What perspective do you have on the tree? Are you inside its branches, being held in the palm of the branch of the tree? Is the tree on its side, bedding in the earth? What color is the earth? What is the quality of the light? Have you climbed to the very top of the tree, what can you see in the distance? Are you underneath the tree, looking up, or are you far away, the tree barely visible? Are you retreating or trudging your closer path?

Write it all out and then look back.

What have you learned about your voice?

The more you write, the more your voice will reveal itself to you. Voice happens when you’re busy thinking of something more important, like how to describe the sound of an acorn falling. Walk out the back door and visit your tree. Sit quietly and let the wind blow through its branches. Listen.

And when you struggle to remember your voice, and why it matters, remember your tree. Only you could have conjured that tree. Sit beneath it and look out at the world and begin.