Tag Archives: Writober

#OctPoWriMo & #Writober Day 7: Balanced Between a Zombie and a Horror Story

Good Morning Monster Pooper by Maria L. Berg 2021

For Tourmaline .’s Halloween Challenge “zombie,” I wasn’t sure what to do. I’m not a fan of dead people walking around trying to eat my brain, so I avoid them. Yesterday, however, I had to go to the store, so I took a look at the slim Halloween offerings (my local Walgreen’s shelves were quite bare), and found a few fun zombies. This morning, I hopped out of bed and “unboxed” my wind-up zombie that poops candy. What a great way to start the day.

And speaking of zombies, I watched the new Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City trailer this morning. The movie looks pretty dumb, but it has some cool looking monsters in it.

Wind Up Your Pooper by Maria L. Berg 2021

OctPoWriMo

Today’s prompt is about finding balance. Living a creative life, it often feels like everything I do is work, and that I’m always working. However, I’m working at the things I love, and I am always playing (or should be). It’s a sad part of the human condition that ecstasy wears off. Everything, no matter how wonderful and enjoyable, becomes work eventually. How do I find that sweet spot where I’m improving, but still ecstatically enjoying the process?

The Balance looks like a fun form. I’m going to give it a try.

Waking the Zombies

talons balanced on live wires ignite fires
slicing and dicing upon flight
sparks in the dark excite
my mushy mind
to find

a sign
for these dark times
every monster alive
alert and flirting for brain-bites
meets ancient rites and smoke-filled skies from pyres

carefree banshees alarm like squealing tires
mired in blood the body still fights
a dance of duck and dive
freezing fear climbs
and chimes

through grime
I design crimes
against the monstrotized
the zombie hoard, now bored, alights
talons balanced on live fire-wires ignite

That form was fun, but didn’t feel like surrender, so I’m going to try a Cadralor to further explore my yearning for balance. Over at dVerse Poets Pub Björn challenges us to try this poem form made of 5, unrelated, numbered stanzas created by the editors of Gleam.

The Scales

1. moans and groans fill the blood-red morning
waking bones creak, seeking footing
then should-ing begins even before
pouring the mind-pricking poison

2. a dalliance with the day’s events
sends me scurrying through tales regaling
reveries, new discoveries, I flit like a feather
until sore eyes and worry lines retether

3. in the carnage brain-eaters stain two-seaters
like teenagers on a rampage hearty to party
after, their bodies teeter entranced like plants
to a heater, a sunbed of the well-fed undead

4. slanted light heightens delight as I search
out the angles and tangles to represent
my vision without derision or indecision
I click and snap intending dissection

5. The swell and the crest of the wave
rolling through each making day at play
equivalent gold dishes chained, swinging
fiercely alive, tamed, murdered, revived

Brains by Maria L. Berg 2021

Writober

With everything going on, I almost forgot about the fun writing prompts of A. M. Moscoso’s Halloween Prompt Challenge over at MY ENDURING BONES. Luckily, I saw her story, “The Lady in the Walls,” yesterday which reminded me.

I think Rafael and Anouk’s story which I am drafting today will cover:

  • Being lost in the woods at night and something following you
  • Losing any knowledge of who you are or where you live
  • A repetitive scary noise without any apparent source

Tomorrow, I’ll share the title and an excerpt, then I’ll find another image and microstory from previous Writobers to turn into a short story. Do you have any favorites?

#OctPoWriMo & #Writober Day 6: Treating Myself to Conquering My Fears & Bokeh Jack-o-Squashes

Jack-o-butternut by Maria L. Berg 2021

For today’s prompt at Tourmaline .’s Halloween Challenge, “treat,” I reworked the mouth of my Jack-o-lantern bokeh filter. Since my treat today is going to be homemade butternut squash soup, I thought I’d try my idea of putting jack-o-lantern faces on my squash. And it worked! So fun.

Jack-o-spaghetti squash by Maria L. Berg 2021

Since treats are usually associated with taste, other than the soup, I wanted to think of treats for all of my other senses. I’m thinking of reading Salman Rushdie in a nice bath with lavender epsom salts while listening to piano classic records, then putting on my footie pajamas and playing with paint. That might have to happen.

OctPoWriMo

Today’s prompt asks what we do to achieve our dreams. The chess piece (representing strategies) made me think of a great puzzle I designed for Artifact Puzzles.

Tyukanov Cheshire Cat has Alice in Wonderland inspired whimsies including chess pieces. I love that the thickness of the wood allows the pieces to stand up. Wooden jigsaw puzzles are definitely a special treat.

The suggested form is a Villanelle. With its repetition, it might work nicely with sonic surrender.

In 2018 I didn’t write a poem for the day 6 prompt “Conquered.” The prompt asks the question: Does love conquer all, or is love just a battlefield? With words and poetry as the focus of love, I would have to settle squarely on both. “Conquers” has some great sonic surrender potential.

Strategies of Perpetual Patience

Fear’s conquered contours
linger on my fingers
eternal patience fills the room
with ginger blossoms and
persistence tastes like plum-halves
straight from the freezer
their sweetness teases my teeth
but fear conquered, I risk
fleeting pain and am rewarded
unguarded I eat my treats
at my seat meeting defeat
to the beat of my talking drum
squeezing it between my thigh
and side to hear it sing
and sigh, a seesaw of highs
and lows, to and fro
the daily dance, love’s caveat
emptor of risks taken
leaps leapt, hopes kept
to on-lookers bonkers
I endure and conquer

(I guess the Villanelle will have to wait for another day)

Jack-o-acorn by Maria L. Berg 2021

Writober

While figuring out my plot points and filling in my outline, I got curious about what the “obligatory scenes” of the horror genre are, so I headed over to StoryGrid.com and found Secrets of the Horror Genre.

Looking at the horror genre conventions, I would say, so far so good. I have a huge power divide between my body-burier protagonist, Rafael, and a mystical wild boar monster. Rafael is unable to escape the isolated forest and small village. Rafael is actively burying Reese in the woods and following/interacting with the man and the boar. The idea of a giant boar protecting a forest and needing human sacrifice every fall is pretty improbable. If the boar isn’t satisfied, it will lash out and kill the villagers.

Both Rafael and the reader (and me at this point) don’t know what the boar and the man with it will do. Rafael’s goal to stay alive and not be damned is a common goal. The boar cannot be reasoned with and I think Rafael will remember Reese telling him that it cannot be defeated (speech in praise of the monster). Rafael will be the last one standing/ live to tell the tale and I’ll need to end with an implication that the boar will be back.

So there we have it. Characters and an outline. Time to start the draft. Here’s the logline for this horror masterpiece: The man selected to bury this Halloween’s sacrifice to Anouk, the wild boar that protects the forest, has to face the price of mocking superstition, and ignoring tradition.

Hanging out with this guy is my favorite special treat.

#OctPoWriMo & Writober Day 5: Tricks Played Along the Path

Homemade Healthy Halloween Chocolates by Maria L. Berg 2021

How’s that for a trick? I found a simple healthy dark chocolate recipe, and a Halloween chocolate mold (glad I had one skull left, I already ate all the pumpkins). I think those little people are supposed to be cherubs (other chocolate mold), but I choose to see them as people running in terror.

Jack-o-Lanterns by Maria L. Berg 2021

My best trick, in my opinion, is my bokeh photography. For today’s prompt at Tourmaline .’s Halloween Challenge, “trick,” I made a new filter, so I can now put jack-o-lantern faces on every point of light.

OctPoWriMo

Today’s prompt, Follow you path wherever it may lead was the focus of my August “Pathways” project. I think most of you have already watched it, but if you haven’t, I read two poems about pathways over my original music and a video of bokeh footprints. So I’ll choose a different path and look at the 2018 prompt for Day 5: Denied. “Denied” has a great sonic quality. I used it in a song I wrote a long time ago called “Dry Your Eyes.” Here’s the first verse and chorus.

I feel it building,
coming up from deep inside.
Imploding bits of yearning, parts of everything denied.

But no don’t do that, girl don’t do that, please, just dry your eyes.

Maria L. Berg from Live Bait Machine 2002
Dry Your Eyes by Maria and the Aftermath from Live Bait Machine 2002

I hadn’t planned on sharing the song, but I’m enjoying listening to it, so I thought you might too. Does it sound like “denied?” I sure think so, but I’m a bit biased.

In 2018 I wrote a short poem called “Denied” exploring all the senses of “denied.” I like the smell I came up with. So I’ve got a sound and a smell (laundry left in the wash overnight). But what is the texture of denied? Slippery, I think. I remember trying to get out of a pool of water that had been a treacherous jump to get into. The rocks were too slick and I couldn’t get out. It took one person pulling me from above and another pushing from below (embarrassing) before I finally found a foothold.

The taste? For me, cilantro. And these days, “denied” looks like rejection letter after rejection letter. The joy of the life of a fiction writer.

So I have my senses wrapped around “denied.” How do I sonically surrender to it? What’s the trick? Bring it back to this love of words and poetry. Accept that being denied is part of the process of the path I’m on. Let’s see what happens.

All the Judgy Jack-o-Lanterns by Maria L. Berg 2021

I opened the washing machine and I faced

forgotten laundry, wet, rotten, and tawdry
sodden limp bodies, whirled cotton underthings
left too long, waft wrong

a sharp reminder of efforts denied
intentions resigned, redefined
dallies-dillied, willies-nillied, paths-a-wandered
time squandered, thoughts pondered
monkeyshined attention bamboozled to other directions

but funkified clothes are but a sigh and an eye-roll
a stale-fail waste of soap and water
but taken in stride those whites get another ride
the flunk undone and a battle soon won

Writober

I did my character sheets: Time-consuming, but fun. I love when the random selections fit the character I have in mind, almost as much as when they create conflict in the character.

All my characters have names now. Harvey is gone. My dead body is now name Reese Tribble. She was the school nurse of the small village, but got murderously greedy. The wheelbarrow man is named Rafael Minghella. He was an introverted ap designer who thought Reese was his best friend. Anouk, the mystical wild boar, protector of the forest, is an egocentric idealist whose destructive flaw is impatience, has a bad habit of snacking, and is afraid of the number four. Anouk is accompanied by Boonam Funk who is also impatient and egocentric and is moved by evil forces.

The story so far:

Every year on Halloween night, the people of a small village by an ancient forest bury the body of someone recently deceased deep in the forest as an offering for Anouk, the mythical wild boar that protects the forest. This year, however, no one has died and people are beginning to worry about Anouk’s wrath. Raphael Minghella, this year’s designated body burier, doesn’t believe in Anouk, and gets in an argument with his friend Reese, the school nurse who has been offered a lot of money to “come up with” a body. Reese doesn’t like the way Raphael is looking at her, and assumes his lustful pass at her is an attempt to strike first. She evades him in such a way that she slips and impales herself on his high hat stand. He decides to bury her in the forest and try to collect the money she was offered. On his way out of the forest, he sees Boonam Funk, the man with Anouk, approaching.

As you can see, the micro-story has expanded, but I still haven’t gotten to the real story. What happens to Raphael? To the village? Where is the fear and horror of the story?

At the moment, I still think the story is from Raphael’s point of view and starts as he is leaving the forest. Maybe it starts with his thoughts as he is burying his friend, and the turn of the story is when he sees Anouk and Boonam approaching. Since everything with Reese happened because he didn’t believe in Anouk and she did, his world view would completely change.

Okay, I think I’m getting somewhere. Rafael’s main fears are separation and dying which are pretty universal fears, so I’ll dig into those fears as my themes. Now that I have my themes and my turning point, I can get started on a chiastic outline. This article “The Strength of a Symmetrical Plot” does a good job of explaining chiastic structure and has a great example created by Susan Raab using the story of Beauty and the Beast. I created a similar worksheet for myself to print out and use to brainstorm my story outlines. Hopefully I’ll have a completed one to show you tomorrow

Ghosts of judgy jack-o-lanterns by Maria L. Berg 2021

My Skeleton and Other Wild Animals: #OctPoWriMo & #Writober Day 4

From the Lake by Maria L. Berg 2021

Today’s theme for #tshalloweenchallenge is Skeleton. I’m so glad I found this challenge yesterday. I’m finding it very inspiring. Yesterday, I started looking through my Halloween fabrics and today, I started playing with my Halloween decorations. For once in a long while, my Halloween might not feel rushed and last minute.

OctPoWriMo

Today’s prompt is about the turning of the season. In the word prompts “change of direction” speaks to my interest in forces (In physics, a force is an influence that can change the motion of an object – Wikipedia) and peripeteia (noun – a sudden turn of events or an unexpected reversal, especially in a literary work). I also like “fresh starts” and “cool nights.”

The suggested form is Pantoum. I enjoyed how Michele Vecchitto used the form to talk about the comfort of traditions in her poem Change of Season, Change of Heart this morning.

In 2018 the prompt was “_________________ and other strange animals.” In my journaling this morning, I remembered it as wild animals and for some reason I’ve decided my skeleton is a wild animal. The poem I wrote back in 2018 “The Guilty Man and Other Animals” also removed the word strange, and the imagery is definitely more in the wild, or feral category.

I don’t think I explored the prompt much back then because I’ve never read My family and other Animals by Gerald Durrell or seen the film. I watched the first ten minutes this morning and I think I will enjoy it.

The suggested form was Kennings which will be a great compliment to sonic surrender. A Kenning is a two-word phrase describing and object through metaphor. The example given often is “whale-road” meaning “sea” from Ezra Pound’s The Seafarer.

What’s a Kenning for skeleton? bone-train, internal-frame, calcium-hoarder, marrow-storage, organ-armor, giblets-cage, meatless-me, meatless-motion, sated-dermestids (flesh-eating beetles), people-stands, people-poles, maggot-leftovers, X-ray-art, radiation-picture, X-ray-white.

What a great way to get the mind thinking metaphorically and to generate imagery. I’m so glad I came back to this prompt and really played with it.

So much to play with: surrender to sound, repetition of the Pantoum and metaphor-fun of Kennings. Here we go!

The Bone-train Symphony

I listen for the tones of my X-ray-whites
the meatless-me meanders along the tracks
the bone-train, pops and grinds when gravity fights
groans and moans, creaks and cracks

the meatless me meanders along the tracks
a shell of elemental elegance sketched
groans and moans, creaks and cracks
a schism, a radiation-picture etched

a shell of elemental elegance sketched
rattling, prattling, tattling organ-armor
a schism, a radiation-picture etched
why does action bring on such a clamor?

rattling, prattling, tattling organ-armor
the bone-train pops and grinds in gravity’s fight
why does action bring on such a clamor,
a cacophony of tones from my X-ray-whites?

Writober

So far I came up with an idea: A man coming out of the forest with a wheelbarrow and a shovel passes a man in dark goggles and a leather trench-coat, carrying a large suitcase and leading a tusked boar by a sheer scarf. Okay, that’s not really an idea, more of an intriguing image.

Then I did some research and found that there is mythology around boars as protectors of forests and that they are tenacious and hard to kill (especially if supernatural 😉). They may symbolize luck and fulfilling desire for some, but betrayal for others which fits well into a story.

The collective noun for boars is a Herd, a Singular, or a Sounder; as in how did this boar get separated from his singular? Or why did this boar choose the company of a man over his sounder? Yeah, anything other than “herd” would probably just confuse the reader.

Then I started to develop my characters. I need another day to develop these characters, so I’m going to put off theme and outline until tomorrow.

Any of you working on fun spooky story ideas for #Writober?

#OctPoWriMo & #Writober Day 3

In the Mirrors by Maria L. Berg 2021

OctPoWriMo

Fun News! The prompts are up at OctPoWriMo 2021! Today’s prompt is “Contemplation.” This prompt made me think of the work I did on “reflections” last month, and inspired me to take some mirror in mirror photos I had been too insecure to do before.

The OctPoWriMo prompt for Day 3 (from 2018) is Insecurity and finding ways to chase away doubt and just enjoy. I feel that sonic surrender and play as my practice for this OctPoWriMo is helping me get over my insecurities. However, contemplating the issues that came up last month with reflections, reminds me that I have many insecurities to overcome.

The poem I wrote in 2018 “In Security” has some interesting moments. I like the sounds in “embrace a bramble” and the “orn” sounds of “thorn, shorn, and pouring” (there should be a torn in there). So those may be good places to start. Maybe add “ornament, ornery, horn, corner” move that “orn” around.

I got excited about “br” sounds just the other day, but didn’t do anything with them. Guess I was psychically prepping for today. And look at that, right in the Word prompts from the prompt from 2018 and 2021: embrace.

The suggested form is Florette. Will sonic surrender and play work with a form with both syllabic rules and a rhyme scheme? Guess I’ll find out.

Looking in the Mirrors

Today, I may embrace a way
to contemplate the faults I see
and break the patterns I abhor
look around a different corner, where my joy plays

and stay with it a bit longer
surrendering to my own song
vibrating to my frequency
without worry of destiny or doing wrong

I may embrace both brows and bones
emboldened by entrusting tones
choosing gooey oozing pleasure
over what’s expected of her, and drop the stones

After today, I’m not sure how I want to proceed. I’m excited about Surrender as my personal theme this year, so I’ll stick with that. And I’m enjoying looking back at the poems I did do in 2018 as jumping off points for finding sounds. Looking back at the poems from 2018 also keeps with this year’s focus on revision. But I think I want to surrender to the now and go with this year’s prompts. I’ll probably end up mashing prompts together, like I do.

The Burning Skull Inside Me by Maria L. Berg 2021

Writober

Today for my boar man and wheelbarrow man story, I’m going to work on character development.
What I know so far: I have four characters

  1. the boar
  2. the man with the boar and large suitcase
  3. the wheelbarrow and shovel man
  4. the person he buried in the woods
  1. The boar is a magical creature, symbolic, paranormal entity that protects the forest. Why is it with the man? Why does it allow the man to lead it? How does it protect the forest?
  2. Who is the man with the boar? How did he meet and join the boar? Why does he return every fall? What is his connection to these particular woods? What’s in the suitcase? What’s with his outfit? Why the scarf to lead the boar, or is he leading the boar? Does the boar have power over him?
  3. The wheelbarrow man is local, lives near these woods and knows them well. He has just had a horrible experience and done something terrible. Knowing more about this character will help me with the plot of the story.
  4. This character is pivotal to the plot. I need to know the relationship between this person and wheelbarrow man to put all the pieces together.

Let’s start with Character 4, since I have the least ideas for this character and s/he could really inform the plot.

On Sundays I often enjoy joining the #StoryCrafter chat on Twitter. Today was a character chat where you answer questions as your character. I don’t usually participate in these, but it was a “what if” about putting your character in spooky situations, so I broke through my insecurity and discomfort, and took Character 4, named him Harvey, and let him answer the questions. It was fun. I learned he likes pumpkin pie, has seen the man with the boar, and the wheelbarrow man (Dalton for the chat) feels guilty about his death.

Now it’s time to turn to my character creation spreadsheet to flesh out these characters. I use Official Random Number Generator to randomly pick from my columns. If I don’t like what I get (which I haven’t much so far today), but like something nearby, I go with whatever appeals to me, or I just press enter and get another number.

I’ll work through my characters and tell you what I came up with tomorrow when I start outlining the story.

How are your spooky Writober stories coming along?

#OctPoWriMo & #Writober Day 1: Surrender

I like the idea of surrender as giving in to each of these little butterflies

Welcome to the first day of October!

OctPoWriMo

I woke up excited to get started on my first poem of October’s yearly poem-a-day challenge, and headed straight to the OctPoWriMo site. Though the heading on the Home page says “OctPoWriMo 2021”, the prompt is still the Day 31 prompt from last year. So, I had decisions to make.

I have been slowly working my way through In the Palm of Your Hand by Steve Kowit. It’s a great generative workshop in a book that includes revision in the process. I highly recommend it to everyone working on their poetry craft. I thought I could bring some of those prompt ideas into #OctPoWriMo, maybe put a spooky spin on them, but that didn’t feel right.

It’s week four of ModPo. ModPo is a free, interactive Modern & Contemporary American Poetry course/discussion offered online by the University of Pennsylvania through Coursera. The course focuses on close-reading and discussion of poems. There’s a live webcast every Wednesday. This week was mostly focused on Gertrude Stein. ModPo can be a large time commitment, and it would be nice to use the poets and poems studied and discussed as inspiration for generative work. I could do a Dadaist cut-up a la Tristan Tzara.

I’m also enjoying How Writers Write Poetry 2015, a free MOOC offered by the University of Iowa’s International Writing Program. Session 2: Content and Form, focuses on sound and goes well with ModPo week four, so I may find myself making a lot of repetition and playing with sound.

However, all of those things are things I was already doing, and not #OctPoWriMo to me, so what to do?

Back in 2018, before the world of pandemic and sequestering and such, I was playing reunion shows with my band, The Rubber Maids, in New Orleans. I tried to do OctPoWriMo in my down time, but didn’t get very far. Since the focus of Experience Writing is revision this year, I thought I would revisit the OctPoWriMo prompts of 2018.

The Day 1 prompt in 2018 was Surrender. That feels like a good way to face this OctPoWriMo. Morgan was talking about surrendering to love and all its messiness, so I will surrender to my love of words, and poetry, and creating in all its ups and downs and mess; to the pleasure of the sounds, and rhythms I create, letting go of my obsessive need for meaning and understanding, if only for one poem a day.

Suggested form: free verse

In 2018 on day one, I wrote a poem called Callistemon. I like the lines at the end, so in the spirit of revision, I will start finding my sounds there, and yield to whatever comes.

To Whatever Comes

I yield, I will yield, yielding
to bliss, a kiss of mist
peeled feelings come to being
fizz blitz, bubble, tumbles, bumbles
then fizzles, puzzling the quickness
am I fickle? My sickle swings
back to beginnings with abandon
coming undone
craving raving, not saving
unbuttoned, loose
sluice then juice
slather and lather longer
I yield, I will yield, yielding
to blissful song longer
ignoring boring inklings of wrong
gone the gong, the hook,
the harm and alarm, I
entrust this thrust of
crispy crust to crumble
to dust in my lust
to wield all the words
this word sword salad
whirls now in the world
swirled, swirling
I do not resist, but go
under, give in, give up
succumb, submit, surrender

Feel free to link to your OctPoWriMo poems in the comments. I look forward to hearing how you’re approaching the challenge this year.

Writober

As I mentioned in my post, Thinking About #Writober, I’m doing things a little differently this year. I looked back through all my years of #Writober and the image and microstory that resonated with me today is from October 22, 2020. The image is “Lost” by Alex Timmermans and this was my microstory:

The stranger arrived with the fall, leading a wild boar by a sheer scarf. They approached silently from the thick wood to the east, as if they did not possess enough weight to crunch a dry leaf. Yet everywhere they walked, trouble became too heavy to bear.

~Maria L. Berg

The image and story reminded me of a time I was taking a walk in the woods and a man passed me going the opposite direction with a shovel in a wheelbarrow. Today, I thought, what if the strange man with the wheelbarrow passed the man with the wild boar?

I think there are the makings of an interesting, spooky story there, so my tentative plan is to do some research and brainstorming tomorrow, develop the characters on Sunday, come up with an outline on Monday and draft the rest of the week.

This is the first time I’ve tried Writober this way, so the main point is to have fun and be flexible.

I hope you’ll join me in writing some spooky stories for Writober and tell me about them in the comments.

Happy Reading and Writing!

October 30: I am . . . #OctPoWriMo #Writober

In One Ear and Out the Other by Maria L. Berg 2020

Last night, I framed one of my fabricglass pieces. It was so nice to wake up to the sun shining through it.

OctPoWriMo

Spotlight Poem from OctPoWriMo Day 29

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


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.

October 28: Choices Along the Journey #OctPoWriMo #Writober

The Golden Path by Maria L. Berg 2020

OctPoWriMo

Read for inspiration and craft

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

Spotlight Poem from OctPoWriMo Day 27

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

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.

Read for inspiration and craft

Horror fiction story The Voice Within by Steven K. Beattie

Online magazine Aphelion

October 26: Tappswave Poetry Form #OctPoWriMo #Writober

Tappswave by Maria L. Berg 2020

OctPoWriMo

Read for inspiration and craft

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

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

Horror online magazine AntipodeanSF

October 24: Daring #OctPoWriMo #Writober and #NanoPrep

OctPoWriMo

Read for inspiration and craft

Recommended poem: In the Dark Times by Andres Rojas

Online journal: Diode Poetry

Spotlight Poem from OctPoWriMo Day 23

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.

Writober

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?

Read for inspiration and craft

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

NaNo Prep

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.