It’s all about inspiration. For Hemingway it was Paris, women, hunting, booze, Idaho, women, Africa, booze, hunting--not necessarily in that order. But how do you write a song? Gaining access to the muse is the main thing. Sometimes a song falls into your lap. This is a gift. Other times a song is the result of craft and work and sweat. Still other times, during a dry spell, you can’t believe you ever wrote a song, and you would do anything to write again. The desire becomes a dull ache in the back of your psyche, from which you seek relief in any form: a new guitar, a loud amplifier, late nights, early mornings, lots of coffee, travel, meditation, wine, Oprah, sensory deprivation.

You are not alone. I have found no guaranteed access to the muse, but I have learned how to open the door a crack for a peek inside, a glimpse that sometimes leads to insight, that sometimes leads to inspiration, that sometimes leads to a new song. What follows is a foray into that search for the muse.

WRITING FROM BOTH SIDES OF THE BRAIN

The important thing is to write. It took me years to realize that songs don’t happen unless I write them. Sounds simple. I think of it like fishing—you can’t catch anything unless you go to the water’s edge and put the line in. So I set myself up to catch whatever falls into my lap. When I am starting a writing cycle--because it goes in cycles for me--I begin with my journal. For 15 minutes before I play my guitar, I write down whatever comes into my head. It’s drivel for the most part, but it’s my drivel. I get used to putting words to my feelings. After a while themes show themselves. After another while I attempt a poem of free verse, a stream of consciousness that forces me to be more specific. I begin to use images and metaphors--you know, the stuff you learned in English class.

I don’t judge my journal. I don’t think I have ever pulled a line from it. It helps me begin to focus on something other than the mundane. I start to read books that appeal to me. Sometimes I read aloud. I want to know that words have worked for somebody else. Sometimes I read books on writing. They give me hope. If at any time I think of a phrase or a line I like, I write it in the back of my songwriting notebook. I start to listen harder. Lines like "He was much too good-looking for his height" ("Johnny Was a Pyro") and "The Book I’m Not Reading" came out of real-life conversations. What you hear around you becomes fuel for the fire. I listen to music. I listen to music I would never play—Beck and Counting Crows. I listen to Dylan and Leonard Cohen and Mary Margaret O’Hara, to angry young women and famous old men. I want to create a hunger to write. I want to witness beauty in order to create it. I want to feel passionate about what I do.