The hunt for the right words often takes place in darkness, while the waking mind rests. Hare Hunt (c. 1125) depicted in this famous fresco from the Prado seems a fitting illustration for my essay exploring my oneiric creative process—given much of my writing involves pursuing words that race ahead faster than I can record them, gifts from the subconscious delivered whole upon waking.
Hare Hunt, Hermitage of San Baudelio, Casillas de Berlanga (Soria)
Anonymous, c. 1125
Copyright ©Museo Nacional del Prado
From my earliest years, my creative process—whether literary or scholarly—has been curiously nocturnal. Much of my work, I have found, is done while I sleep. When faced with a task, I assign it, quite literally, to my subconscious mind and then close my eyes, surrendering to productive sleep.
As a student, this practice became a quiet ritual. When a paper was due, I would already know the topic, the sources I intended to use, and what I wished to accomplish. I would also, admittedly, wait until the evening before it was due—believing, and with reason, that fear brought a clarity of mind that was otherwise lacking. Thus, I would take a short nap before beginning. Upon waking, the entire outline of the paper would be present—clear, complete, and waiting. With a stack of books to my right, a blank sheaf of paper to my left, and a typewriter in front of me, I would set to work, and the paper would unfold almost as if dictated.
My professors noticed this strange fluency. The grades I earned and comments I received reflected it, but more telling were their requests to keep copies of my papers for their own files—something they did not ask of other students. I did not then understand that what they admired was less my discipline, or lack thereof, than the uncanny lucidity of the night mind that guided me.
Over the years, this oneiric gift has only deepened. I remain grateful for it. At times, an entire sentence or paragraph will suddenly appear either as I awake or will awake me in the middle of the night—perfectly formed, insistent, demanding to be recorded before it vanishes. At other times, these moments arrive unbidden, startling me out of unrelated thought; often, they are the flowering of a subject that I had briefly considered and set aside, unaware that it had continued germinating in the depths below consciousness.
When such inspiration surfaces, it comes in torrents. I rush to record the first few words, only to find myself laughing at the impossible speed with which the rest races ahead, leaving me chasing its tail through the air. Madness, perhaps—but a joyous one.
It is as if some part of the mind, working in silence while the waking self is distracted, composes and refines without interference. And when it deems the work ready, it releases it whole into consciousness—seed, stalk, and blossom at once. My task, then, is not to command this process, but to remain open to it, to receive it with gratitude, and to write before the vision fades. Refinement, if needed, may occur later.
What I once mistook for a personal oddity, I now recognize as a shared inheritance of the human mind—the work of the subconscious muse, the night mind ever at her loom, weaving thought into form before dawn breaks—although a nap in the midst of day will oft serve the purpose just as well.
Northcoast Antiquarian 