I felt inspired by dVerse poets pub’s Quadrille prompt today to ponder possibilities. My quadrille came to me almost complete (short one word) in the shower.
Imagination’s Playground
The imaginative life
is a playground of possibilities
until all the door and windows
are locked and the bed
is on fire
then there are only two possibilities:
to dance or to cower
and soon there is one:
to face all the unimagined possibilities
It’s the last day of OctPoWriMo. Thank you, Morgan Dragonwillow, for hosting and for your inspiring prompts. Thank you to everyone who participated for your camaraderie and sharing your poetry.
It was a productive and creative month. I’m very excited about finally making the step in my exploration of klecksography to draw on my inkblots and write my poems on the inkblot page. I’ve wanted to get to that point for a long time. I’m also excited to continue exploring my new poetry form Tappswave and see where it takes me.
Recommended poem: Two poems by Ocean Vuong
Online journal: the Paris American
Poetry prompt The final OctPoWriMo prompt this year is light, dark, and shadow–pretty much my favorite topic.
Forms Parallelogram de Crystalline or Florette #2
For my final poem, I’m going to try an idea I had over a year ago. When I read (amazon associate link) Night Sky With Exit Wounds by Ocean Vuong, I was intrigued by his numbered poems in which the top half of the page had numbers typed in space as if notes or labels to the unseen and then those numbers were footnoted. The spacing of the numbers made me think of markers at a crime scene which led me to create my own crime scene photos with the intent to make poems that go with. I hope you will see what I mean below.
Into the Night
1. howling and yowling pull me from my bed into the moonlight
2. tufts of fur, ripped and torn bring worries of death
3. Don’t look up. I hold my breath as my ankle painfully turns
4. rustling leaves bare nerves aware I am not alone
5. on high alert, I do not turn around, but hurry, limping into the shadows
For today’s visual prompt, I chose this apocalyptic image
micro-story : When TV preacher Pat Robertson made his prediction I laughed and laughed. Watching Cthulhu rise from the waves in the light of a nuclear explosion, I have to ask myself: Whose laughing now?
Here we are. The insanity begins tomorrow. The time has flown by and though I am probably more prepared than I have ever been, I still don’t feel ready at all.
Tonight, my region is doing a costumed countdown to midnight. Since I doubt I’ll have any trick-or-treaters, and I’m not going anywhere, it’ll be nice to have an online Halloween with fellow writers.
For my final prep, I mowed the lawns and went to the Grocery Outlet where I stocked up on Amy’s frozen meals and a huge bag of coffee beans. This evening I plan to clean the bathrooms and vacuum, so I can start with a cleaner house.
One thing I learned throughout Nano Prep this month is putting my plans in these posts really helps me get things done, so here are my goals for the first week of NaNoWrimo:
I still haven’t decided what I’ll do here on this site during NaNoWriMo. I don’t plan on doing intensive daily posts like I have in the past. I want to get to my draft and write, but I also want to check in here.
What would you like to see on Experience Writing during NaNoWriMo?
I was thinking a daily photograph and something I find inspiring, motivational, or surprising while I’m writing. Other ideas?
Last night, I framed one of my fabricglass pieces. It was so nice to wake up to the sun shining through it.
I enjoyed the imagery in Rallentanda’s poem
Poetry prompt Today’s OctPoWriMo prompt is I am . . .
Layered
I am a filter
a sponge, a sea cucumber
transforming the discarded
I am a creator
a silkworm, an orb weaver
stitching new dimensions
I am a canvas
a cuttlefish, a chameleon
changing hues and patterns with each discovery
I am a seer
an eagle, a hawk
watching patiently for movement
I am a tome
an elephant, a whale
heavy with memory and wonder
For today’s visual prompt, I chose this image by Jakub Rozalski
micro-story : When the war ended, the meka warriors were left wandering the toxic borderlands. Always on alert, they were avoided by all but the suicidal and insane.
Today’s prompt inspired a new bokeh filter and photography project. I used wire and tape to create “tracks” on a square-cut bokeh filter. Then I put lights over paintings in my office to put those tracks into and through spaces where no tracks had been before.
Sci-Fi Fable by Mark Jones
Poetry prompt Today’s OctPoWriMo prompt is Exploring the Tracks
Forms Puente or Octain Refrain
When Concept Comes to Form
straight to work
her hands hurry
with nervous impatience
each step clear
she feels the possibilities
~when concept comes to form~
she sees the intolerable
specks of dust inside the lens
glaring in the light
but they are her signature
they are evidence of honesty
For today’s visual prompt, I chose Critical Mass by Photocosma
micro-story : When he began his experiments with black holes, the excitement of small discoveries, publishing and proving his theories, may have blinded him to the big picture. Now, staring into the powerful void of his creation, he knew the heart-wrenching horror of playing God.
Today I received my copy of Emporium by Aditi Machado (amazon associate link) Winner of the 2019 James Laughlin Award, so I thought I would recommend reading some of her poems.
Recommended poem: Four poems by Aditi Machado
Online journal: Conjunctions
Magic Spells by M.K. Vecchitto
Poetry prompt Today’s OctPoWriMo prompt is choices or journey
Forms Fable or Lannet
Choices Along the Journey
She faces threats with effort and courage
defends creative space from distraction
two choices arrive of equal value
Wishing balance, she refuses to act
until a unique solution guides her
as waters rise, she leaves comfort behind
Instinct, an ally, leads toward challenges
this new world is not as she imagined
unpredictable and tempestuous
but pushing through rewards with abundance
the journey back is restful and quiet
resurrected the fool, wide-eyed, renewed
beginning fresh, energized with passion
facing hope with a lucky, shiny coin
For today’s visual prompt, I chose this image of a woman on a cliff by a mausoleum
micro-story : When I had insomnia, I would often climb the hill just before sunrise. I enjoyed the creepy lone mausoleum on the outcropping, slowly emerging from the morning mist, otherworldly, full of mystery. These chilly daybreaks had become my ritual, so her first appearance was jarring, a trespass. At first, I believed my sleeplessness and the slanted light played tricks on me, but she lingered and I realized the trespass was mine.
Horror fiction story The Voice Within by Steven K. Beattie
Online magazine Aphelion
Poetry prompt Today’s OctPoWriMo prompt is Magical Halloween
Forms Terzanelle or Decuain
When the veil is thinnest
yearning for power
over fear of the unknown
chant into the night
ancient recipes
to command earth’s forces
and fight the unseen
something from nothing
symbols of knowledge reveal
the boundary torn
For today’s visual prompt, I chose this image by Anton Semenov
micro-story : Mikey had tricked the guardian into opening the portal to the depths of nightmares. He was starting to regret trapping his little brother down there. If he couldn’t bring him back, Mom was going to kill him.
Horror flash fiction story An Advocate for Nearly Any Situation by Hayley Ilso
Speculative online magazine Asymmetry
Recommended poem: Five Poems by Carolyn Forché
Online journal: World Literature Today
Poetry prompt Today’s OctPoWriMo prompt is What makes me different?
Forms Yesterday, we were challenged to create our own form. I got a start on it, but needed more time to play around with my ideas. I knew I wanted to incorporate internal rhyme and repetition with slight variation.
I wanted the form to reflect my daily interaction with my environment, so here it is, the Tappswave form:
The Tappswave is made of one or more eight line stanzas. The eight lines are couplets of sensation then reaction that repeat with variation. Each couplet has its own rules of rhyme and rhythm.
Lines one and two: Observation and attention like light shining on the water.
Line one: specifically describe a sensory experience
my example An odd sharp chirp came from my plum tree
Line two: memory or emotional response
my example making me think of children shooting laser-guns
Lines three and four: Choppy, all one and two syllable words, like a cluster of small waves.
Line three: Expand on the sensory experience of line one, include internal perfect and familial rhyme to the last word of line one.
I believed the tease or plea was a bird high on a branch unseen
Line four: memory or emotional response to line three with internal perfect and familial rhyme to the last word of line two.
the alarm bell rung, damage done when I was young
Lines five and six: Show what’s underneath the surface. Use words that rhyme with fish or types of fish for the internal rhymes.
Line five: Reveal a revelation about the sensory detail in line one.
At last my search reveals the perp on his perch
Line six: memory or emotional response to line five.
and I’ll pass on the sass of this non-bird’s wrath
Lines seven and eight: Reflection and refraction/ ebb and flow
Line seven: Line two slightly changed to show reflection
That laser-gun battle rages on
Line eight: Line one with a slight change
An odd sharp chirp from my plum tree
If I chose to write another stanza, I would start with a related but different specific sensory detail and explore it through the pattern of the eight lines.
My first Tappswave poem
Searching Out the New Sound
An odd sharp chirp came from my plum tree
making me think of children shooting laser-guns
I believed the tease or plea was a bird on a high branch unseen
but the sound an alarm bell rung, damage done when I was young
At last my search reveals the perp on his perch
and I’ll pass on the sass of this non-bird’s wrath
The nerve-shredding laser-gun battle rages on
as an odd sharp chirp from my plum tree
For today’s visual prompt, I chose this image that was hanging on my friend’s wall.
micro-story : She had always been told she had statuesque beauty. Once she had a fully integrated neural implant, she spent all of her time in the virtual world. Feeling no attachment to her gangly limbs any longer, she decided to fully embrace that beauty.
Horror flash fiction story “Shedding” by Deborah Sheldon
Horror online magazine AntipodeanSF
Since I finally got started drawing on my inkblots, I continued and made this two-headed gator creature.
Recommended poem: An Approach by Roger Lewinter
Online journal: BOMB Magazine
Anxiety by cie
I liked how the two Joseph’s stars fit together to tell the challenge of facing fear.
Poetry prompt Today’s OctPoWriMo prompt is Breaking the Rules
Forms Create your own poetry form
A sprig of parsley
I bite into a parsley sprig and as its slightly bitter flavor reaches my tongue
I remember a time full of possibility
of juice bars and homemade fashions
utopian ideals of altruism
heady philosophies, discourse and exchange
I nibble at tasty lacy leaves and remember easier beliefs
For today’s visual prompt, I chose this epic fantasy landscape
micro-story : As his canoe rounded the bend, he gasped and pulled his oar to slow his approach. The recent earthquake must have caused a mudslide, revealing that what he had always believed to be large white stones was actually a giant skull. He heard a rumble and his canoe rocked. He couldn’t help but personify the quaking of the earth.
Horror flash fiction story Autumn Leaves by Paul Kindlon
Horror online magazine Mystery Tribune
This certificate may say I’m prepared for writing my novel, but I’m not feeling it. Luckily, I still have time.
My main goal for this week is to read. I’m going to read as many of the novels and stories I’ve selected as comps as I can. I also want to finish up my futurist thinking classwork.
Recommended poem: In the Dark Times by Andres Rojas
Online journal: Diode Poetry
I Still Believe in Magic by Esther Jones
Poetry prompt Today’s OctPoWriMo prompt is doing something you’ve always wanted to do
Forms Joseph’s Star or LaJemme
Ever since I started playing with klecksography, I intended to draw on my inkblots and put poems on them, but I couldn’t get myself to do it. I even made photocopies of a lot of my inkblots, but still couldn’t get myself to draw on them. So to go along with today’s theme, I grabbed one of my inkblots, drew this happy creature on it and wrote my poem on it. I dared to try a poem form I’ve been wanting to try as well: a grid in which the poem can be read in rows, columns, and/or diagonally.
For today’s visual prompt, I chose this still from The Double by Richard Ayoade
micro-story : She was tired of running up the stairs only to stare into an empty room. What did she think she would do if she saw the source of the banging, the footsteps? Her nerves were quickly fraying. What could she do?
Horror fiction story each thing i show you is a piece of my death by Gemma Files and Stephen J. Barringer
An entertaining epistolary work.
Horror online magazine Apex magazine
Today I have a regional prep workshop. I’m excited to see what they have to say and to get to know the participants in my region better.
Dodge Poetry Festival Eleven days of poets reading their work online.
Poetry prompt Today’s OctPoWriMo prompt is being grateful
Forms Trolaan or La’libertas
Satisfied Stillness
Thinking of gentle calm
thankful for this time
tender moments together
tension melting in his soft breaths
Having this time to appreciate
harmony in closeness
home in the curl of cuddles
holding soft warmth between us
Achieving ataraxia wrapped in fuzz
appeased by a wave of lethargy
aware of each choice left unmade
abounding in snug sloth
Coziness breeds gratitude
clinging this cool, rainy day
cautiously hoping time will stand still
cramming all the good into now
For today’s visual prompt, I chose Last night together
micro-story : Suddenly I was standing in a circle of light, like a spotlight was shining down from a star in the night sky. Then I felt a tugging sensation and my feet lifted from the sidewalk.
