Writing About Being Unable to Write: An Essay in Two Parts - By H.M. Sebbie Leaño

Written By: H.M. Sebbie Leaño

Category: Creative Nonfiction

Competition: Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026

In a thought-provoking submission to the Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026, H.M. Sebbie Leaño shares "Writing About Being Unable to Write: An Essay in Two Parts." This creative nonfiction piece delves into the struggles of writer's block and the intricate dance of creativity and self-expression. Leaño's work is a profound exploration of the internal battles faced by writers, reflecting on the challenges of articulating thoughts and emotions amidst the blank page's daunting silence.

About the Work

Leaño's essay is a rich tapestry of metaphor and introspection, capturing the essence of writer’s block through vivid imagery and a deeply personal narrative. The piece navigates the tension between the urge to create and the paralyzing fear of inadequacy, using the metaphor of the Gordian Knot to symbolize the complexity of untangling creative thoughts. The work's mood shifts from anxiety to a quiet resolve, inviting readers to reflect on their own creative journeys.

Writing About Being Unable to Write: An Essay in Two Parts

Original Submission by H.M. Sebbie Leaño

Leaño

Writing About Being Unable to Write: An Essay in Two Parts

H.M. Sebbie Leaño

The Gordian Knot as Metaphor for Writer’s Block

The cursor blinks mockingly against the stark white page, each tick an itch beneath my fingertips as I wait for the words to come. Tick. Tick. Tick. Nothing. I can’t write, but I want to type. I can almost imagine how hypnotic it will be once I get into the groove of typing: the deep clack of the keys, the smooth downstrokes, the satisfying bump of each key press.

“This” is a word. “This” is a word typed on this keyboard. “This” is a word typed on this keyboard which I think feels very relaxing to type on. “This” is a—

These are the usual strings of words that I type when my brain can’t string together a coherent stream of sentences. The most salient thing before me is the desire to feel the glide and pop of the keyboard I so painstakingly modded to suit my tastes. Even if there is nothing to write, I want to type, and type, and type, and type . . . hitting an unseen combo chain that lights up all the dopamine receptors in my brain like a rhythm game. It is, for now, the closest I will get to ‘losing myself’ in my writing.

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

My fingers twitch. Nothing.

If I were writing this at fifteen, I would tell you that writing, to me, is a lot like breathing. A process so basic and innate to human life that I don’t have to think about it. Well, I haven’t been fifteen for a while . . . so, I won’t tell you that writing is a lot like breathing. Because it isn’t. The process of writing isn’t nearly as autonomous. Writing comprises a thousand and one considerations: of looking through a thesaurus for the most fitting word, of racking my library for the best metaphors, of rearranging words and using the right number of syllables, and properly deploying punctuation marks so the cadence is just right.

Once I figure out all those things and everything falls into place, writing becomes as easy as breathing. However, there is conscious effort involved in writing. So, a better analogy would be to say that writing is a lot like eating. Eating, too, is a necessary part of life. But I forget to eat sometimes. For hours. Maybe an entire day. Then I get that nagging urge called hunger. Maybe I’m dizzy, or I feel weak, or my belly aches, or my head hurts, or I’m shaking. So, I eat. And isn’t it sweet? And satisfying. And good.

That is what writing is to me. A hunger I need to fill, or it’ll consume me from the inside out. But today, I am full, and so writing feels more like sticking my fingers down my throat and making myself vomit. Today, my writing is tainted by dizzying anxiety and revulsion. Gordius of Phrygia has invaded my brain. A storm of letters rises in the wake of his advancing forces. He gathers each piece as he conquers the territories of my mind—the Isles of Ideas, the Great Settlement of Memories, the port city vital to controlling trade coming from the Sea of Emotions . . . I watch helplessly as Gordius orders his soldiers to pillage my treasury of words. They delight in the chaos they are causing, and all I can do is bear witness to the devastation. I am a prisoner bound by heavy chains, and the ground beneath me is quicksand. I am sinking, sinking, sinking . . .

Tick.

Tick.

Tick.

Precious words and ingots of letters fall before Gordius. They were mine, and now they are his by Right of Conquest. He takes them all, moving like a possessed maniac, and he weaves, and twists, and knots each syllable tightly, then tighter, until there is no fathomable strategy to untangling the monster he has created.

Gordius approaches me, his steps are heavy and loud, echoing like war drums in my skull. My bones rattle, my insides lurch, my tongue tastes of bile. Gordius stops before me, taunting and looming. His lips are stretched into an unnerving smile, manic, and all teeth. His eyes are so wide that his slitted irises seem to disappear into an endless field of white. I stare, entranced . . . trapped and horrified. Gordius thrusts his monstrous creation in my hands; with my wrists still bound, I fumble and struggle to grasp it. He laughs, and I sink even deeper into the ground.

Solve this, he tells me, voice grating like rusted metal. Only then can you reclaim these lands. Fail and you will disappear into the Shadows of History. There is no glory in failure. Then he laughs, and laughs, and laughs . . . The ground swallows me completely. I plunge into darkness while Gordius and his soldiers engage in their cacophonous revelry.

I am no Alexander. I possess no great destiny. There is no grand narrative for me to follow, no one true meaning in my life except the one I deign to create. I am no conqueror. But I am desperate to conquer the Gordian mess in my brain. I must, or I will be the one made to unravel.

I like to write, but I am not a writer. An odd thing to say, considering I am sitting here now, agonizing over what to write . . . for a class I am taking for a Creative Writing degree.

I like writing because I have too many thoughts that, when bottled up, feel as though they might consume me. And, for as long as I can remember, I have always loved poring over stories, dissecting each part, and looking for the multitude of ways the pieces fit together into one coherent picture. Nevertheless, “Writer” has always felt like a title I was not worthy of. I was a Lover of literature. A Scholar, even. But not a Writer.

I studied Literature for my bachelor’s under the pretense that I would use my diploma as a ticket to a Juris Doctor. I liked to say, “I am someone who writes, but I am not a Writer.” I never thought I would pursue creative writing as a path. I was always hesitant to commit to the idea that I would (or even could) be a writer. It always felt like I had to live up to my father’s “legacy” in the business world, to earn the kind of big bucks he was earning before he retired. At the very least, I thought I should be “sensible” like my cousins or acquiesce to everyone’s expectations that I pursue a law degree.

I was terrified that I wasn’t “meant” for the things I truly wanted.

The World of Stories called to me . . . Like a Siren, I thought dismissively, against which the only salvation was cramming beeswax into my ears.

So, I did.

I forced myself into ill-fitting roles, to conform to what I thought was expected of me, thinking that if I could somehow gaslight myself into loving the things other people wanted for me, then I could be content. That, if I can’t pursue writing, then I simply won’t write. I’ll keep it all to myself, let it fester like a sore. And then it’ll just die with me.

I thought I was avoiding Catastrophe. Instead, I was lost—at war with myself in Troy, lulled by deceptive complacency in Aeaea, courting fleeting infatuations in Ogygia, drowning in thoughts of the past and all the what-might-have-beens in the belly of Hades. Always, always at sea, aimless, lost for so long that Ithaka had become an unreachable mirage. And yet—no matter how much I drank from the waters of Lethe, I could not fully rid myself of the utmost desire to write and be read.

Nevertheless, I feared rejection; no matter the form it took. So, I made myself believe that it was better to cram myself into something “unexpected” instead of going after what I wanted. Because, at least, if things don’t work out, I could say, “Well, I’m not surprised at all. It wasn’t my strong point, anyway.” Oh, but I could not bear the thought of being passionate about writing, of being utterly in love with it, only to be rejected. Isn’t that torturous? To have poured every fragment of your being into creating something, only to be shattered because of it.

I am not Alexander. I do not have a sword I can bring down upon my Gordian monster. Neither can I act with the same brashness. Alexander may not have cared how he loosened the knot, but it matters how I unravel the monster before me. I cannot hack at it with no care. If I do, I fear I will be left with nothing but broken strings of letters and words I have no hope of ever weaving back together. No, indeed, I am not Alexander. Yet, still, I burn with his insatiable lust for Glory. Where this king had hoped to conquer the whole world, I have grand delusions about conquering the ‘World Republic of Letters.’

Ah, but—

I think my desire is so much simpler. Look here . . . Lift this Curse of Gordius from my chest, tear my shirt, rip my skin, and break my ribcage open. Carve a place for your Self within me, piece by bloody piece of tissue and organ, until you can dive inside me so deeply we can never be parted. Fill my aching emptiness with your body and wear me like a second skin. Open my eyes now that they are yours, and see:

It isn’t Glory I am chasing after, but Remembrance.

A simple and desperate need to leave proof that I existed, that I lived. A mark upon the earth or one carved so deeply in another human being as you have cleaved your Self to my soul. We are One and inseparable. The recognition I crave is more primal than being weighed by the same scales that deem the Classics what they are. The Canon can spurn me. The only joining I desire is the one with you. I want you to see me, to recognize me, to witness me. I want you, my Other, to remember me.

I don’t want greatness. At the end of the day, I just want to create something good. The kind of good that sticks with you long after you’ve forgotten the specifics. Something that leaves you with a distinct impression that something has changed within you, even in the most minuscule of ways, because you read it.

I am not Alexander, and despite all the metaphors I have used, neither am I Odysseus. I have nothing to fear if I pluck the beeswax from my ears and listen to the Siren that sings to me. Fear shoved me off-course, and it is her Song that will guide me back to my Ithaka—not a place to call home, but a Body to call mine, the Self I have spurned for so long out of fear, and all of my desires.

You, now, wearing my skin and cleaved to my soul, seeing with my eyes, hearing with my ears, feeling with my body—

Do you feel the caress of the siren-song too? The yearning that curls in and tugs at your chest, entreating you to spill forth in chorus with her Song.

There is no life without daring. The Siren draws me from the depths into which I have sunk and unshackles me. It is only in the House of Death where there is no Remembrance.[1] And what is fear if not an excruciatingly slow demise?

She kisses my eyes and gifts me with Clarity; showing to me that it is in my self-shattering that I will emerge a daring figure. The Gordian puzzle in my hands is not a monster to be slain, but a mystery to be wooed into acquiescence, patiently teased into unraveling itself before carefully weaving it into beautiful tapestry.

So, sing with me, the Siren says. Write.

And, indeed, it will be an empty life if I say nothing, show nothing; if I don’t open my mouth, if I don’t repaint my half of the world.[2]

The blank page before me doesn’t look so daunting anymore. Nevertheless, the storm of anxiety that Gordius left in his wake remains. Tick. Tick. Tick, goes the cursor, still mocking. I squeeze my eyes shut, breathe in through my nose, and exhale slowly out my lips. When I open my eyes, the cursor doesn’t grate on my nerves as much.

That point on the screen where characters appear is called the “insertion point,” and the blinking cursor that indicates this point is called a “caret.” In proofreading language, the caret suggests that something should be inserted somewhere in the sea of already written text. In my case, where the caret is tick, tick, ticking away on my screen, the thing that is missing is the entire sea of words.

And what a vast sea it is. Ithaka still seems so far away. The Siren sings and Gordius’s laughter echoes. What I still am is overwhelmed, and I cannot write like this even if I want to. So, I stand up and move away from my desk. I pace in my room. I look through my shelves and drawers for something to tinker with.

Pacing in a Room of One’s Own

Whenever I’m anxious, I like to work with my hands. Simple tasks. Mindless tasks. Tasks that do not require me to retreat into the darkness of my own mind. Some-things to ground me in the present moment. I am here. I am not floating away. I am not fading away. I am here. I am here.

I am here.

Before me is a disassembled shooting star puzzle.

The wood is rough. I like that it’s not coated in that bright, glossy paint that makes everything smooth and sticky. I hate sticky. Sticky is not a fun sensation. Sticky is caramel and melted ice cream on your fingers. Sticky fingers mean messy fingers. Messy fingers mean Mama will be angry with us, and I don’t want that either.

More importantly, no paint means I can see the wood grain. The streaks of dark veins winding all over the pieces are mesmerizing to look at. I am distracted, briefly, from my task of reassembling this broken star. I trace the dark lines with one finger, and I think about the history ingrained into each wooden block. Did you know that trees have memories? They record events far more accurately than the human brain does. Trees don’t have the same psychological and neurological hang-ups as mushy gray-matter. Ironically enough, though, the accuracy of interpreting tree-memory is limited only by the latest dendrochronological technology and dating techniques invented by mushy-but-brilliant gray-matters.

Somewhere in the White Mountains of California is the oldest-living tree in the world. They call it Methuselah, after the oldest-living Biblical patriarch, as a testament to its great age. Scientists who have studied it estimate it to be just over 4,800 years old. Even older than Methuselah, by a conservative estimate of a hundred years, is Prometheus. Named after the Titan God of Fire, Creator of Man from Clay, Witness to the Rise of Human Civilization. The true story of why the tree was felled is shrouded in mystery. But hubristic thirst for knowledge certainly seems involved. How fitting. Today, only the stump of Prometheus remains in Wheeler Peak, Nevada. Slabs of the great tree were sent to various institutions for study. Some of these slabs are available for the public’s perusal. Prometheus lives on, in a way, still giving parts of himself for the enrichment of mankind.

As old as Methuselah and Prometheus are—nearly as old as the infancies of the Early Dynastic Period of Mesopotamia and the Second Dynasty of Ancient Egypt—there are trees that are even more ancient. These trees haven’t been cored for dating yet, but scientists estimate their age to be anywhere between 10,000 and 11,000 years. It’s astounding to think that there are trees out there, still standing, with memories of how human life came to be. The birth of our ancestors, the death of the civilizations they built, the threads of history that bind them to us in our present.

It is infinitely humbling.

I am here. I am a speck of dust, a grain of sand, a mote in the eye of God—and I cannot remember what I had for dinner last week.

I clench my fist around a wooden block.

I don’t remember last week’s dinner, but I remember the first time I ever solved this puzzle over a decade ago. The giddy rush of pride and satisfaction I felt. How I brought the puzzle with me to school, the mall, a pediatrician’s appointment. Look, I told everyone, look at what I can do.

Did you know that your memories are memories of memories, and not of the actual moment?

When you call the past to mind, you are remembering the memory of that memory of that memory ad nauseam.

Fickle memory. Fleeting memory. Fallible memory.

I grip the puzzle piece tighter. It pokes the palm of my hand. The sharp pain brings me back to the present moment.

I continue fiddling with the broken star. There are six wooden blocks. Each piece is identical to the other, shaped like pointier, edgier Toblerone pieces. Assembled, it reminds of a three-dimensional Star of David. I throw it above my head like a baseball. With a flick of my wrist and gentle nudging from my fingers, it spins, coming apart mid-air and clattering noisily to the floor.

I stare at the mess I have created, tracing each piece to the other in different, unbroken configurations—as if I were an astronomer discovering new constellations.

Allegedly, this puzzle was inspired by a farmer from a village somewhere in Ancient India. He was poor, but he wanted to present a beautiful gift to his wife-to-be. He discovered that he could fly, and he soared to the heavens and plucks one of the dazzling stars streaking across the night sky. But he drops it, and the star crashes back to earth in shattered, jagged chunks. Unperturbed, he gathers each star-piece, puts it back together again, and delivers it to his bride. Thus, the shooting star puzzle was born.

Out of all the gifts he could’ve given, why a shooting star? I wonder. Is it cliché?

I am but a humble farmer. But whatever you ask that is within my power to give, I shall endeavor to give to you. I want a piece of heaven. And the next night, the farmer finds that he can fly and goes off to fulfill her wish.

Did the star’s fracturing and restoration signify that he will remain her unwavering partner through adversity?

It is okay, darling, to be unsure, to be vulnerable, to fall apart. My hands are calloused and rough from toiling the earth, but they can be gentle too. I will care for you. I will be the anchor for each fragment of your unbecoming. I will love you until you are whole again. I will love you until the last star has fallen from the sky.

I guess it doesn’t matter. The story is an invention, anyway. A myth to make a wooden puzzle more radiant than it is.

The star is whole again in my hands, but it has lost all semblance of being a distraction. I will think of the Farmer and his Bride and their life together, and I will wonder about loving and being loved. Of the gnawing emptiness in my chest. I am the Farmer and I am his Bride, and I burn with yearning.[3]

I toss the puzzle on my bed. It remains whole while I am scattered.

I pace in my room.

I turn to my desk, stare, and stomp toward it with purpose. I’ve had this desk for as long as I can remember. Over a decade, maybe. So, it’s been my desk half my life. With a passing glance, and a not too critical once-over, it still looks like it can pass as mostly new. The underside is riddled with holes and sticky-tack. I attempted to macguyver hooks and pegs onto it, to give my unused peripherals (two keyboards, three controllers, a mouse, and one pair of headphones) a place to call home. The desk is scuffed in a place or two where I’ve accidentally banged something against it, but the paint hasn’t chipped off at all, and its colors are still vibrant. Pastel yellow and dark peach, a combination made to match the rest of the custom furniture in my hot pink room.

I hated my room. I hated pink.[4] I hated my brightly painted shelves, and desk, and cabinets. I hated the idea of being girly. I hated girly things. Girly was weakness. Girly was cringey. Girly was not me. I am still not-girly. My hair is shorter now and my style is more masc. But I no longer shun my femininity. I tell people I am They and Them because I am not one but many. I contain multitudes within me. A myriad of contradictions and differences that make up a whole that shifts and changes (and ebbs and flows like water).

“It is necessary and sufficient that the best of herself be given to woman by another woman for her to be able to love herself and return in love the body that was ‘born’ to her.”[5]

When I first read this, I hadn’t understood what Cixous meant until I realized I had grown to love every feminine aspect of my being. I felt comfortable in and empowered by my femininity—all because I had come into the fullness of my love for other women. Granted, Cixous might not have intended Medusa to be interpreted in terms of queer attraction, but the fact remains: I can no longer fathom the idea of hating my femininity because it disparages the love that I have felt and am eager to give.

I wonder if my younger self would be horrified to find that pink has become our favorite color.[6] Sorry, kid, looks like Mama’s subliminal coding (well, as subliminal as hot pink walls can be) worked! My eyes drift to the side. Look, that’s our favorite mug, and it’s a permanent fixture on our desk. It’s a chalky shade of pink, and when we look at it, we think, This mug sparks joy. When I first picked it up from the department store shelf, I turned to my cousin and said, I’m buying this one for the serotonins it’ll give me. You plan on chugging caffeine? he asked, amused. Yes, I told him, but also no. I grinned and thrust the mug to his face. Because it’s pink. Look at it, it’s soooo pink.[7]

To the left of our mug is our keyboard. We chose it, bought it with our own money, and we put a lot of work into making sure it was exactly what we wanted. It’s sky blue and white, with accents of peachy pink. The colorway theme is called ‘Doll of the Princess.’ It’s cutesy. It’s girly. It reminds me of Sanrio’s Little Twin Stars. The keycaps aren’t quite smooth. There’s a hint of texture to them. It’s like white noise. It’s only there when you really pay attention to it. I press the keys randomly. On the monitor I can see letters come up—askdjsdlkghqeiouwcvmx—disorganized and garbled like my thoughts. I can’t write when I’m anxious. Nothing makes sense. It’s all keysmash in my brain.

Imagine the night sky on New Year’s Eve. The symphonious explosion of light and color, the way the fireworks fade like twinkling starlight. It’s loud, but it’s entrancing. When the sky is dark again, you anticipate the next brilliant burst with rapture. Everyone is cheering, demanding more, more, more! The pyrotechnician, in their haste, trips on an errant wire. The matchstick they are holding sets an entire line of fireworks ablaze. Clumsy, pyrotech. Look at what you have done. Lalahon curses your ineptitude.[8] Her wrath burns you, and no trace of you remains, neither charred piece of bone nor sprinkling of ash. You have become nothing. You are no longer here.

When your senses are utterly overwhelmed, you end up feeling numb. There is too much, and then there is nothing. You have become nothing. You are no longer here.

I am nothing in this moment.

I am hollow. I cannot write. The words don’t feel like anything. They are signs with nothing to signify.

acszxcbtqiyrohgjfpiu

I jerk my hand away from the keyboard and my mindless tapping of the keys. I take a small step back, turn slightly to my left, and kneel. I yank the bottommost drawer of my desk, diving into the chaos I have accumulated over the years. Loose knick-knacks everywhere. Arcade tokens and poker chips. High school grad pics (gusto ko with dedi’ ha!).[9] Palanca letters[10] from classmates I haven’t spoken to since grade school. Cardboard cutouts from snacks with pretty packaging. Papers with random doodles and math equations. Essays from high school. Chinese prepaid cards. Train tickets for Hong Kong’s MTR. My first ever passport—it’s so old the information on it is still handwritten. An envelope opener that hasn’t worked since I was four. I keep it because it looks like a mini-Encyclopedia: dusty maroon-brown cover, golden lining, plastic textured like the pages of a closed book.

I am a sentimental person by nature. I collect bits and bobs, sometimes needlessly. I think I’m terrified I’ll forget the happy moments without these physical anchors. They are mementos, and I cling to them. Even if you can, and justifiably so, call some of these items trash. Any worse, and I’ll be a hoarder. Luckily, bouts of restlessness make me—as I’m doing now—rummage, reorganize, and make space for the new generation of trinkets. I begin to sort things. Trash in a plastic bag. Keepsakes in a paper bag. Did I really collect all these decks of cards? I don’t mull over each item too long. Because if I do, I’ll think about how this is a betrayal of my Self, a physical representation of the erasure of my history.

So, I just sort, and sort, and sort until my hand lands on a book.

A book?

I pull it out. Lois Lowry. A Summer to Die. The girl on the cover is holding a flower. The stem is pinched between her thumb and forefinger as though it were a quill. Dozens of petioles branch out from the stem, emerging into compact clusters of tiny white flowers. It looks like a tree. I think it’s yarrow, Achillea millefolium, named after Achilles, who used the plant in a poultice for the wounded Myrmidons during the Trojan War. In the Victorian language of flowers, yarrow signifies “a cure for a broken heart.” Paired with a hawthorn, it signifies hope.[11] I wonder if the choice of flower is deliberate. A Summer to Die is a story about sickness, loss, and grief. But it also talks about healing. I haven’t seen this book in years, so I don’t quite remember the details of its story, but I remember there was a quote that caught my attention before. I flip through the book. I end up on the last page, eyes skimming over the Afterword. By chance, I find what I am looking for there. “After a while,” writes Lowry, quoting one of her characters, “you remember the good things more often than the bad.”

I laugh. The sound is so sudden that I startle myself. The situation feels so absurd that it snaps me out of my anxious mood. Not entirely, mind you, but there is genuine levity there. Stubborn hope blooms in my chest, chasing out the initial onslaught of bitter cynicism.

I push myself upright and place the book on my desk, propping it against my monitor. I reach down, cram the paper bag of memories into the drawer, and kick it shut. I put the plastic bag next to my door. I’ll throw that out later.

I go to the bathroom to wash my hands. Turns out, memories tend to be dusty. I wash my forearms too. Then, I splash my face with cold water. I lift my head and stare at the mirror. Hi, says my reflection. You okay now?

I blink.

I am here.

I take a deep breath . . .

I am here.

. . . I exhale slowly.

I am here.

Yeah, I’m okay. My lips twitch into a smile that reaches my red-rimmed eyes. I dry my hands and face, and I step out of the bathroom. I return to my desk and look at the book, and I say, Hey, Lois. Did you know that in 2018, exactly one month after my birthday, the British Journal of Clinical Psychology published a study that found people who suffer from Major Depressive Disorder have a tendency to remember more negative personal memories? They called it having a “‘depressogenic’ autobiographical life structure.”[12]

I also read somewhere that mood disorders have a physiological effect on the brain.[13]

No, Lois, that’s not a misspelling. I wasn’t trying to say ‘psychological. ’ I really do mean a physical, biological effect. It’s subtle, but it’s there. Further studies need to be done, but here’s the theory: apparently, mood disorders don’t just affect the kind of memory your brain latches onto; it also impairs your very ability to form memory.

And, isn’t that terrifying?

You aren’t forgetting—there is simply nothing to remember.

I don’t have MDD, Lois. But I do have a mood disorder that douses me in icky muck every so often. My depression is ferromagnetic slime, and I am a neodymium magnet. The slime swallows me into its great maw. It’s so heavy and suffocating that I can barely move. Its darkness shrouds the light of remembrance. Nevertheless, I’d like to believe that you’re right, Lois. After a while, I’ll remember the good things more often than the bad.

In a way, I suppose, whatever you lack by not possessing the near-perfect recall of trees, you gain by having the capacity for self-interpretation.[14] To retrieve your memories from the labyrinthine folds of your brain and make a record of it on paper, in the hard drive of your computer, or in the Cloud somewhere on the Internet. You can pore over those memories. Analyze them, overanalyze them. No need to wait for a scientist to reach into your core to tease out the secrets of your psyche. Although, of course, it doesn’t hurt to be unraveled by someone else. Isn’t that why they call it ‘talking cure’? It is revitalizing to know that you are heard, that you are understood, or that someone is trying to understand you. After all, isn’t it our greatest and most human desire to be recognized by the Other?

I see you. You are here.

Even the memories of trees are corroborated or studied based on the memories of nature around them. Be it other trees or plants, sediments found in bodies of water, or even algae deposits. Moreover, certain conditions can affect how growth-rings take form in trees, or if they even grow at all. Poor conditions lead to narrower rings. Good conditions lead to wider rings. Rapid-cycling conditions lead to multiple rings. In other words, different environmental conditions affect the formation of tree rings just as different states of mind affect the formation of our memories.

Perhaps trees are a lot more like our mushy gray-matters after all.

The issue, then, isn’t in our inability to create, store, or remember our histories in perfect, vivid clarity. Rather, it is in how we will be perceived, received, and remembered based on the marks that we do leave—and it scares me to admit that I want my words to be the tree rings of my existence. It terrifies me to admit, plainly and with utter simplicity, that I want to be remembered (or, even, to be known) for my writing . . . Saying this makes me feel as though I have been immersed in the tales of heroes for so long that I have inherited their hubris. But is it hubris to want my words to matter to someone else?

I suppose the only way to truly answer this is to write. To risk rejection.

Ah.

My hands are trembling. I have been pacing for so long that I’ve grown hungry.

I must eat. (I must write.)

The Siren’s Song is ringing loudly in my ears now, louder than Gordius and his laughter and his taunting. The cursor’s tick, tick, ticking has become an accent to Her melody.

I can finally see the way to unravel my Gordian mystery.

I sit down, scoot forward, and straighten my spine. I bring my fingers to my keyboard, and I begin to write.

________________

“Room” was written around November 2022, and “Gordian Knot” was written sometime in April 2023. This current version was edited recently for submission to Hashtag Kalakar’s Global Poetry & Creative Writing Competition.

Weirdly enough, both essays fell a little short of their individual prompts. I wrote “Room” about being too anxious to write, but I ended up being a little too preoccupied with ‘memory’ and ‘remembrance.’

Meanwhile, “Gordian Knot” was supposed to be a Why I Write essay, and since I didn’t know how to justify (not explain, but justify) why I wrote, it ended up being dense with metaphors about why I didn’t (couldn’t) write.

I can’t really remember what inspired me to try combining the two essays together, but I’m glad I ended up doing it. Hopefully, they fit as well as I think they do. (It’s still really funny that they have very different vibes. I think “Room” feels a little more grounded while “Gordian Knot” is more figurative. But I think it works if you want to interpret the difference as a metaphor—okay, okay, fine, I just love metaphors—for “getting out of my head.” So, when things feel muddled, they’re buried underneath layers of metaphor, but when your head is clearer, things are more straightforward. Granted, “Room” is still steeped in metaphor.)

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[1] To quote Achilles in Il. 22.458. The exact line is, “…the Dead forget their dead in the House of Death.” (The Iliad, trans. Robert Fagles)

[2] Paraphrased from Hélène Cixous’s “The Laugh of the Medusa,” translated by Paula and Keith Cohen.

[3] Sometimes, I think it’s a curse to be so immersed in stories. I crave to have my own hero’s journey. But I am paralyzed, and so all I can do is hope I will be thrust into a world outside my own to fulfill a destiny. There must be more than this. More than me. More than the four walls of this room. Just more. (Or is it that I crave the comfort of predetermination? Of having a path to follow so I know exactly where to return even when I am knocked off-course?)

[4] I think that what I truly hated about the color was not having a choice. You are a girl, and so, you must like pink. When my mother asked me what color I wanted my room to be, our conversation roughly went like this:

“I want it to be blue!” I say excitedly; at twelve, it was one of my first ‘big girl’ decisions.

But my mother shoots it down immediately, “No. That’s too dark.”

I press on, undeterred, feeling clever. “Okay. Light blue.”

My mother doesn’t find my cheekiness amusing. “No, ‘wag blue.” Not blue.

I frown. I begin to realize there might be a ‘right answer’ to her question.

“. . . light green?” I try hesitantly.

My mother simply looks at me and our conversation ends.

Days later, I find Kuya Rex popping open a can of paint. It is neither blue nor green. Kuya Rex dips his brush in the can, once, twice, swirling the liquid. The shade of pink is so deep it almost looks like blood.

[5] From Hélène Cixous’s “The Laugh of the Medusa,” translated by Paula and Keith Cohen.

[6] Once, a friend told me that my favorite color can’t be black. It’s the absence of all colors, she said. Or the sum of all of it, I answered. Still, she insisted, black can’t be your favorite color. I humored her. I told her, I liked green. One of my favorite colors—though it does not trump pink—even as I’m writing this, is a deep shade of verdant green: it’s the color of my dad’s garden under the moonlight, the scales of glistening dragons and slithering snakes, and rough-cut emeralds.

[7] I’m adding this in the footnotes because it slipped my mind that I’ve dyed my hair and painted my nails shades of pink multiple times. In fact, my hair still has traces of pink in it. This will likely not be the last time I’ll wear pink so near-permanently on my body either.

[8] I know most fireworks shows are automated now. But think of this as a double-metaphor for how certain things that come naturally (or “automatically”) for other people sometimes need to be done with conscious and deliberate effort by those of us that are ‘neurospicy.’

[9] “I want [it] (gusto ko) with dedication (with dedi’)!” Basically, it’s someone asking you to write a note on the back of the picture.

[10] Not sure where the term comes from, but these are basically letters of support from friends and family.

[11] See Floriography: An Illustrated Guide to the Victorian Language of Flowers (2020) by Jessica Roux.

[12] Technically, the paper talks about how culture affects the aforementioned “‘depressogenic’ autobiographical life structure.” But, obviously, to get to that, the paper has to outline what that means, as well as citing various related studies. So, still counts.

[13] More than that, it goes deeper into identifying “biomarkers” for early diagnosis of mood disorders. (You were right, it was all in my head! I scream, slapping the fMRI scans of my brain on the table.)

[14] Although, I suppose it’s better to describe the memory of trees as objective (i.e., based on hard data) rather than subjective as it is with humans (i.e., tinted by biases, transformed experiences, or clouded with time).

About the Competition

The Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026 by Hashtag Kalakar is a prestigious platform celebrating diverse voices in literature. It brings together writers from around the world, offering a space to share their stories and poetic expressions. This annual competition emphasizes creativity and originality, fostering a global community of writers passionate about the written word.

We extend our heartfelt thanks to H.M. Sebbie Leaño for contributing "Writing About Being Unable to Write: An Essay in Two Parts" to the Global Poetry and Creative Writing Competition 2026. Your reflections on creativity and the human experience resonate deeply, offering insight and inspiration to fellow writers navigating similar challenges.

About Hashtag Kalakar

Hashtag Kalakar is a creative platform dedicated to providing artists, writers, singers and other creative talents with opportunities to showcase their work and reach wider audiences through competitions, features and creative initiatives.