We savor our horror especially this time of year to experience fears vicariously in dark safety to shiver and quiver while others face danger mouths filling with blood while we taste butter-flavoring and salty-crunch while the sound of bones breaking screams and mangling bring us no pain except that brought on by the empathic brain
my hands itch and tremble sweat breaks at my temple a freeze from my scalp shivers down as I wheeze My horror movie is titled The Gathering imagining the panicked drive through the rain in applied discomfort conscious of all the possible deaths along the way. White knuckles clutch the steering wheel knowing the true horror awaits questions, whispers, and plates tones, bones and nothing to say
No, I scream, No! shield my eyes but spread my fingers she has made it through dinner, her offering praised but then I shut my eyes tight I can’t take a sliver of projected light I must look away when someone says diet while she’s eating her cake I
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.
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 by Maria L. Berg 2019
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
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?
NaNo Prep
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:
Wake up early and go straight to my notebook for morning pages
meditate
butt in seat in office by 9:30 a.m.
take daily walks
read
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?
Here’s hoping we all write great novels and have a lot of fun doing it.
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
My fabricglass piece from outside
Writober
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.
Along the Tracks on a Bright Sunny Day by Maria L. Berg 2020
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.
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
Out of the Blue by Maria L. Berg 2020
Writober
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.
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
The Greener Path by Maria L. Berg 2020
Writober
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.
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
Writober
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.
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
Plum Tree Laser-guns by Maria L. Berg 2020
Writober
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.
Read for inspiration and craft
Horror flash fiction story “Shedding” by Deborah Sheldon
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
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.
Read for inspiration and craft
Horror flash fiction story Autumn Leaves by Paul Kindlon
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.
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.
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?
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.
Experience Writing 