I’m writing today’s poem using a Write the Story prompt to create a Tanka, which is a poem of 5 lines with syllable counts 5/7/5/7/7. I used Matthew 18;22 as inspiration for the final line of the poem.
Prompt: Mash Up Two Classic Fairy Tales into One Story
Words to be Used: fireplace, sword, grove, stoke, underbrush, mourn, seven, friendship, cardboard, giver
This company also publishes “Write The Poem” which I will also share in an upcoming blog post
I was browsing through our local used bookstore on a lunch break last week when, on my way out the door, a book caught my eye. Its title, Write the Story, glimmered in gold lettering down the spine, as if to plead: Hey, over here! See my sparkle? Take me home with you!
Already reaching for the doorknob, I changed course and went back to check it out. I expected a how-to on the writing process. Instead, I discovered the hidden treasure of a delightful writing challenge. Each page bore a titled topic with ten pre-determined (seemingly random) words to be used in the writing of a story.
The pages appeared to be blank except for one on which someone had penciled a story to satisfy one singular challenge and apparently moved on with life, abandoning the book and donating it to the bookstore, where it now rested in my hands. Treasure, indeed!
Poems to be written. Winter seeds of poetry, all scattered between the covers of one book. Destined for me, cast off like a stray no one else wanted, knowing all the while that a cultivator of words and writing would be most likely to pick it up, fall in love with it, take it home, and feed it.
I bought it and realized that other members of my small-group Stafford Challenge writers must have a copy. When we commit to writing a poem a day for a year, we all need a little prompting from time to time when the well runs dry or life gets too busy to think deeply like a poet. Once back inside the car, I turned on the heat and warmed up. I ordered three more copies online from the parking lot to send to Glenda Funk, Barb Edler, and Denise Krebs upon their arrival. Then I took a few snapshots to send them in the mean time.
Today’s title: In the Middle of a Long, Cold Winter
concluding a futuristic opera treading frozen spring water
winter cleanses our lungs
razor-sharp alveoli icicles fall sun breaks out in a crescendo of seasonal transition melting the white powder milkshake from the mountainside grace of its forgiving kiss beckoning crocus, groundhog-like peepers stretching up through frozen ground ready to crawl out of bed emerge from quilted slumber shed their corm-sewn bud vests and sing a new song
Today, I’m using a comprehension strategy to get to know a book character by writing a found poem. I’m taking words and snippets off the page and writing a character poem about Basil Cannonfield from Theo of Golden by Allen Levi. In a classroom, this can help students remember characters; in the adult world of reading where we read books with so many different characters, a journal of character notes comes in handy to keep them all straight.
Happy birthday to my first-born child today! She’s a kid at heart, and she loves to read. When she was little, we’d pile up on blankets or beds for book picnics – – she, her sister and I would do nothing but read all day long while the boys were out fishing. Last year, she read 144 books, stomping my 20 down to a pancake compared to her skyscraper. She still calls them her “chapter books.” Today, instead of raising a glass to my daughter, I open a book. It’s what we do best in our DNA.
One minute we’re expecting snow along with the ice storm of the century, but the next it’ll be 75 degrees and sunny. There’s a chance of snowfall, ranging anywhere from 0″ to 145.” I’ve heard it all this week, and I guess it’s safe to say we’ve prepared for all or nothing, just as they’ve said: prepare for the worst, hope for the best. And The Weather Channel is the best place to find a time loop where you live the same ten minutes on repeat. It may well be the portal for time travelers to take a jaunt in time somewhere far more stable than here.
I’m not sure what I’d take with me, but no matter where I am, all I really need are books, dogs, a comfy chair and a cup of coffee. My TBR stack is taller than I am, and I keep reading blog after blog after blog. This morning, Tom Ryan’s Substack featured the most joyful photos I’ve seen all year ~ his dog Emily (Samwise in the background) leaping for joy. He and his two dogs have just move to Cape Cod from the White Mountains of New Hampshire and are walking the woods where Mary Oliver wrote much of her poetry.
Today will be a day of quiet, peaceful living here on the Johnson Funny Farm an hour south of Atlanta’s Hartsfield Airport, right on the flight path where we use our Flight Tracker app to check where all the planes have left and where there going. Fun times. Quiet: at least, that’s what’s planned, but things can go sideways here pretty fast. Fifteen times in the past five minutes, there have been earth-shaking gunshots out here in the deep rural country ~ deer? ducks? Who knows? The important thing is that the dogs are here tucked safely in our bed, the gas logs have plenty of propane, we’re stocked up on candles and have 12 pouches of tuna, a dozen boiled eggs, and cheese and crackers. And instant coffee.
Let the reading commence! Wherever this day finds you, even if your power goes out, I hope you stay warm and cozy.
the book is better
than any movie ever
our own minds film scenes
pennies, nickels, dimes
won’t buy a movie ticket
reading a book: free!
I’m currently reading Theo of Golden by Allen Levi.
For the next 3 weeks, I’m taking our media specialists on tours of different media centers in our state to gather ideas for updating our own media centers. We were on a tour today when one middle school media center had a section completely dedicated to verse novels – and a poster definition, too! I felt my whole heart warm as I looked at the fabulous display and smiled – –here is a media specialist who is curating a collection for a kid after my own heart. Yes! I’m cheering!
Yesterday’s host for our third and final day of the January Open Write at http://www.ethicalela.com was Denise Krebs of California. You can read her full prompt, her poem, and the poems of others here. She is one of my small group writing members in The Stafford Challenge, and I’m proud to call her a dear friend. We met in person at the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) and have presented together there a few times. When she’s not busy writing books and poetry, she’s off visiting grandchildren or riding her bike through the desert with her husband, coming home to a long-standing family home that she, her sister, and her husband restored.
The Deep Sea Parade
an artistry of angelfish a buffoonery of blowfish a charm of chum a dazzle of dragonfish an eloquence of eel a flamboyance of flying fish a gallancy of grouper a harmony of humpback whales an illustration of icthyosaur a jubilance of jellyfish a kinship of krill a lumination of lanternsharks a majesty of manatees a narrowmind of needlefish an openarmory of octopus a pulmonation of pufferfish a quarrel of quahog a radiance of ribbonfish a soldiering of seahorses a thundering of trumpetfish a union of unicorn fish a vault of vampire squid a whiskering of walrus a xanadu of xiphosura a yubadubdub of yellow soapfish a zooband of zebra turkeyfish
and I joined the parade as the mermaid caboose come join in, mermaids and mermen!
We’ll be a murmuration ~ the finest mermaid nation!
For the second day of poetry in the ethicalela.com small group, Angie invited us to focus on using anagrams to inspire poetry. She hosted Day 2 of the January Open Write at http://www.ethicalela.com.
She encouraged using this anagram generator to help with ideas: https://ingesanagram.com. I wrote about the snow we had on Sunday.
snow
once upon this now he won sniffing his own spot in this cold-sown snow
Have you ever wondered whether you could write daily?
Do you love poetry and prose?
f Are you strapped for time and wonder about the commitment?
Wonder no more.
Come on, take my hand and walk down the shore. See the beauty?
Join the Year 3 kickoff of The Stafford Challenge today. It’s not too late to sign up, and you may just ask yourself what took you so long to join. This writing circle is completely free (you can make a donation only if you want – and I did not donate until the 3rd year). You will meet writers from all over the world, be inspired by them, and have the option to join a small group writing circle (you can join with others you don’t know or form your own like we did), where you will share and form some of the closest long-distance relationships you’ve ever had. Even if you don’t consider yourself a strong writer – – or a writer at all.
Come on, stick your big toe in the water. It feels refreshing in here.
My small writing group meets the first Monday of each month ~ Barb Edler of Iowa, Glenda Funk of Idaho, and Denise Krebs of California. We catch up on life, we talk about what we’re reading and what we’re writing, and we share our poetry. Sometimes we write during our Zoom. You know that poem The Cure by Kate Baer in her latest book How About Now? It’s how I feel about my writing circles. This is so much more than breakfast.
Today is the kickoff, and you can sign up at this link. I would love to see you there today. I’ll send you a wave from my tiny screen.
Come on, dive in! You can swim or float, and either is divine.
In the true Stafford Challenge spirit, I’m sharing a blurb of prose and then sharing a poem. That’s how William Stafford wrote as a morning practice each day, and it’s what his son Kim modeled two years ago at the kickoff of the inaugural Stafford Challenge group led by Brian Rohr. Write into the day with free thought, then channel the thinking into lines of verse. Here’s what is on my mind today: more time to write. I’ve chosen a Tanka as my poetry form for this morning, and I’ll add a link to a well-known William Stafford poem at the bottom. It gets me every time.
Common Threads 