Writing From the Heart: Nancy Julien Kopp

Writing From the Heart

Almost every day, I find a moment to write. A moment and more that take me away from everyday tasks and immerse me into a writing life filled with words from my heart.

I write essays, poems, and stories detailing the events that bring basic emotions into my life. Pain, anguish, joy, and hope visit me through the years, some of those feelings more intense than the others. My words spill onto the paper or screen, paragraph upon paragraph, a coping mechanism. At times, I become driven to put emotional experiences into words, both for myself and for others to read. My writing releases a sort of power that helps deliver healing or satisfaction. Four overwhelming emotions, four chapters of my life—pain, anguish, love, and hope.

Pain begins in childhood with a father who masters both verbal and emotional abuse. No marks on my body, only those buried deep inside. These wounds have scars that no one can see, but I know they are there. Each time a tirade began, and he told me how undeserving I was, my stomach clenched, and I steeled myself, willing the barbs to bounce before penetrating deep into my soul. Sometimes, they didn’t touch me, but other days they hit the mark, leaving me shattered on the inside but stoic as far as anyone else could see. It is years and years before I am able to write of my pain. A scene in a movie startles me into action. I watch the screen in horror as a man describes childhood abuse in vivid terms. I cannot reach home fast enough. Thoughts are spinning through my mind like a whirlpool in a river. I find paper and pen, and the words begin to appear, while tears slip down my cheeks, unchecked. I write verse upon verse of a poem, ending each with the word pain. The floodgates have opened, and my pain flows away until I feel cleansed and have forgiven myself. Writing about this intense feeling frees me forever. I’ll never wonder again if it had been my fault. The power of the words I write wipe away long-held scars.

Anguish tightens its tentacles each time I bury a child. Once is terrible, twice is more than the heart, mind, and body can absorb. Oh, I most likely look fine on the outside, maybe a bit worn down as I stand before an open grave, eyes fixed on a tiny casket nearby. But inside, anguish is chasing anger which is hunted by incredibility which has tripped over the deepest sadness this twenty-seven-year-old woman has ever experienced. All these feelings whirl faster than the tigers chasing one another in a beloved children’s story. Instead of melting into butter, they become lumps of sorrow. Like all wounds, time buffs the sharp edges of my anguish until it softens and subsides in a tiny corner of my heart, becoming only a dull ache. It takes many years until I am able to write of this part of my life, and suddenly the wound is no longer so deep. Time and my own words work together as I find acceptance and begin to heal.

Years later, we spend a week-end with a toddler granddaughter we love. She reaches out to her grandfather and me with chubby arms and a sunlit smile as we say our good-byes. As my husband drives us home, emotion rises within me in such strong waves that I can do nothing but grasp pen and pad and write of the joy this small child has brought. My poem compares her to golden sunshine, soft waves kissing a shore, gentle breezes skipping in a door. I write that I hear her in a robin’s pure sweet song and in silver drops of summer rain. I have found her, I write, in butterfly wings, in a green meadow’s sparkle after a shower, amongst all of God’s wondrous things. When I finish writing, I feel satisfied, and the pad with the poem remains on my lap all the way home. Much later, the poem wins a contest.

I write also about hope, a wish to be a writer that finds fulfillment more than fifty years after my birth. I send a devotional essay to a writers’ anthology telling of a strong desire to write that gets side-tracked when I attend college, become a teacher, marry, and raise my children. I keep the hope alive until middle-age when it turns into reality. I make time to write. I read about writing. I take classes and attend conferences before submitting my work for publication. Inch by inch, I move from hoping to be a published writer to seeing my work in print many times. I write that patience and perseverance are key to my writing successes. As I write that initial devotion, my reasons for writing rise before me clear and strong.

Yes, writing has served me well. Words from my heart have expressed great joy, soothed my anguish, washed away pain, and recorded my hopes and dreams. If they also bring encouragement and pleasure to others, perhaps I am twice blessed.

I continue to find a moment to write during my senior years on a regular basis. Those many moments have some of the best ones in my life. 

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Category: Contemporary Women Writers, On Writing