Touchstones

August 1, 2009

A touchstone author is one who doesn’t merely speak to me, but resonates and in turn inspires sympathetic vibrations that span differences in time and place. His or her work is alive with an inexplicable power, no matter the flaws and shortcomings as evident to me as anyone else.

A touchstone author is one I understand in soul, impulse and project despite the impossibility of such understanding and my own limitations. I can’t know this author but I do.

A touchstone work isn’t dulled by repetition, but polished each time like a lucky stone turned between my fingers, warmed to my particular heat.

When I read from my personal pantheon (and the works really are both personal and godlike) I am simultaneously inspired and depressed. These poems and stories say things I want to say—and things I wasn’t sure could be said at all– in a way I never could have said them.

These works most precious to me aren’t timeless; they exist in their own time. They don’t transcend time; they make time.

If a touchstone work is lost to me it’s because I’ve lost or given up something of myself. It is I, diminished.

Tags: reading, touchstones