I didn’t learn much about IT Systems in college, although that was my major. A minor in Business produced almost no real knowledge about running a business, and a second minor in English now seems almost as useless. In fact, almost everything I know about IT and business I learned after graduation, and almost everything I know about English I learned before kindergarten. But there’s a poem that I read in one of those long-ago classes that has stuck with me. Something about that poem struck a chord, and I’ve remembered it verbatim, even after all these years. It’s very short, but it’s not its brevity that makes it remarkable or memorable; it’s the terrible, unsettling image it plants in the reader’s brain – the kind of image you just can’t shake. Written by Margaret Atwood, it’s a powerful lesson in writing that is simply brilliant and brilliantly simple. (And you know how I feel about those qualities.) When my writing seems weak or uninspired, I sometimes find new inspiration by trying to emulate the simplicity I found in that poem. Maybe it will help you as well. Here’s the poem in its entirety:
YOU FIT INTO ME
You fit into me
like a hook into an eye
a fish hook
an open eye
