What if we think of our writing as a tree? The idea itself sounds creative, doesn’t it? Then we can think of writing with or without branches, so it is not seen from only one perspective, with flowers on so it is beautiful, or with leaves so it is rich and alive; if it is evergreen, so it is not only for one-time occasion but for all time, and even if it bears fruit, so it is delicious and useful, or is it this bare stem that carries no branches, leaves, flowers or fruits and stand in the middle of nowhere giving shade to no one and being remembered by nobody.

However, the stem is the central part of any tree as your writing must have a stem on which you can grow all flowers, branches and fruits for soon the most beautiful branches fall if not being held by some strong stem.

The idea is when we go for creativity and beautiful language we may sacrifice the meaning; even though people enjoy reading our pieces, our words leave no effect on them and, therefore, our writing won’t be as memorable as we want it to be. Here is an example of a piece of writing that looks like a beautiful tree from afar, but when you come close and try to discern any meaning, you find out that there is no stem; there is no meaning.

Stemless Tree Writing

She grows out shining like stars with thousands of garments emblazoning her majestic blend of white and black; in one single surge, all of nature’s hordes want to be near her burning soul, and to feel her crystal glistening eyes that show the whole world how it once began to glow and how it may at once behold the birth of a great new star not to light the way for other stars, but to rename them as stars.

I would say that this piece is a beautiful one with a beautiful flow of words and all these words fit into one big sentence. It is poetic in sound, but when I read it again, I find that it is only beautiful like an only beautiful woman you feel like looking at and admire, but you can think of nothing you can talk to her about if you decide to spend the rest of your life with her.
A lot of us fall into this trap when we decide to write something without having the idea of what we want to write, so we go on writing without knowing what we are writing about, and the result could be a piece like the one above; full decoration to an empty house.
I would like to improve this piece we read by just adding a stem to this tree; by just adding a meaning and then I will try to use the same words to describe this woman, but this time, I will start form the idea I want to convey about this woman then the description.
I want to say that she is so beautiful, smart, spontaneous, modest, and strong. With these ideas in mind, let us see how we can improve the piece we just read above.

Original Stemless Tree Piece:
She grows out shining like stars with thousands of garments emblazoning her majestic blend of white and black; in one single surge, all of nature’s hordes want to be near her burning soul, and to feel her crystal glistening eyes that show the whole world how it once began to glow and how it may at once behold the birth of a great new star not to light the way for other stars, but to rename them as stars.

Beautiful:
When I looked at her, I thought I was looking at a star emblazoned with a majestic blend of black and white there’s in her eyes, and nothing shines as much in the wide dark sky as all others look so dark compared to her shining star.
Smart:
Then you never end up your journey in her eyes, but you start from their glowing enlightening view that taught the world to look at them and respect what’s even more beautiful than her beauty with all the wits she holds.
Spontaneous and modest:
She runs wildly with all nature’s hordes wanting to imitate her soul so that they can be called nature after her modest recall of grandeur and magnificence and the feeling of nature’s call in her heart.
Strong:
She leads the way as the entire world has to behold the birth of a new star not to light the way for others, but to rename them, and by setting the path for everyone to follow, she has given us strength to go on.

I know that I changed a lot in this new piece, but I used as many expressions as possible that would convey the meaning I have in mind and left behind the other expressions even though they might be beautiful, but in creative writing, meaning comes first. Let us see here the final text put together and see the difference in how the second one has a strong stem that carries beautiful branches and it leaves a better echo and a better literary effect:
When I looked at her, I thought I was looking at a star emblazoned with a majestic blend of black and white there is in her eyes, and nothing shines as much in the wide dark sky as all others look so dark compared to her shining star.  Then you never end up your journey in her eyes, but you start from their glowing enlightening view that taught the world to look at them and respect what’s even more beautiful than her beauty with all the wits she holds. She runs wildly with all nature’s hordes wanting to imitate her soul so that they can be called nature after her modest recall of grandeur and magnificence and the feeling of nature’s call in her heart. She leads the way as the entire world has to behold the birth of a new star not to light the way for others, but to rename them, and by setting the path for everyone to follow, she has given us strength to go on.

May life be on our trees all the time so strong that no storm can ever throw your words away from the hearts and minds of people.

16/5/2013