I've read several posts in answer to Marcela's open call on writing.   In these responses, many OS bloggers allude to experiencing a trance while composing.  I am similar.  I refer to this trance as the garb of my muse.

 Before writing, I want to sit and think. When wanting to think, I first seek a view, a window, a ledge.  As a child, I was prone to escape to the third floor of a very large barn.  In college, I found the exit stairs an island of sanity.  Later and for awhile, I wandered to an empty sanctuary. Once settled and while beginning to deconstruct a topic, if it is raining, or if the day is dark, I am especially pleased.

Once I find my spot an internal door closes; I no longer respond to the stimuli surrounding my life.  If I am not in a secluded spot, do not tell me for at this point I know it not. Detached and contemplating, I begin to exist in a world blotted with impressions where my need for accepting and channeling entrancement attracts no commentating gawkers.

The mental process always begins with a long, blank stare.  Next comes the glazing of the eyes and finally a cataleptic state that occurs best in isolation.  I want no intrusion.  No sound.  If an outside voice breaks this silence, it is probable that I will not hear.  

Sometimes nothing happens.  Sometimes I just pack up the impressions and exit my nook.  When this occurs, over the next few days, the thoughts come back to me in glimpses, and I turn them around in my mind.  Then the post-night will come where I will fall asleep pondering where these images seem to be leading.  I know what comes next.

After such a night, I wake and often the words spill forth in one fluid rush.  If I am lucky, I have remembered to place a tablet near the bed the night before.  The gale is full force and the form is pre-established as I wake.  I have learned that a quick recording is essential for if I don't write immediately, the words are apt to evaporate, and what survives will not hold its intended shape.  

Sometimes this crack in consciousness takes more time.  Sometimes I have just enough breath to climb down the stairs, brew the beans, step outside and look to the sky.  Words are looping in the clouds.  Words are chanted by the birds.  Words are rustled by the leaves.  On these mornings, I am a simple observer.  With rote collection and steady pacing, I  note and balance the flow atop my head.