Writers’ Well – Hands

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creative collaboration, creative writing, creativity, hands, poem, poetry, writing, writing prompt

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

So this week’s prompt comes from another old favourite, in terms of theme: hands. I’ve used hands in different ways several times before, but this time I simply asked my fellow writers to make a list of up to ten things their hands had already done that day (it was 9.30 in the morning). Here’s what I wrote:

 

I then invited us to use those notes as inspiration for a poem, about our hands, written in seven minutes. This is my personal response. Enjoy 🙂

 

 

I couldn’t always use my hands,

couldn’t always control them enough

to make them do what I wanted.

But I learned, as we all do,

and now I take them for granted.

 

They call it muscle memory.

But that sounds like my hands have a brain.

If you x-rayed them I’m pretty sure

you’d find no grey matter,

but it’s true that they remember;

 

what a cake batter should feel like

when I stir so I can

guess at the weights when I

don’t have scales,

 

where the light bulb switch is

when I wake in the night

reaching out before I’ve even left

my dream to light the room

and start my day,

 

how to hold someone’s hand

when they need connection

and when to let go so they know

you’re there but they’re free

to connect or not as they choose.

 

What to write.

They seem to know

the words before I write them.

If I trust them.

Which I do.

 

Perhaps hands do have brains.

Mine certainly seem to.

 

 

What have your hands done for you today? 

 

And here are a couple of other posts, linked to this theme:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/2013/07/01/of-hands-and-humility/

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/2014/04/22/napowrimo-22-in-our-hands/

 

 

And, you can find more writing prompts on a variety of topics here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/upcoming-writing-workshops-and-some-prompts-for-you-to-play-with/

and here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/writing-prompts-the-elements/

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Writers’ Well – Opposites

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creative collaboration, creative writing, creativity, poem, poetry, writing prompts

 

Opposites…are fun to explore, because mostly, they don’t exist. Most things are simply a somewhere along a continuum, and the extremes are oversimplified and rare. I’m reminded of the beautiful children’s book. The Owl Who Was Afraid Of The Dark, where the owlet learns from his mother that night is actually a very wide range of shades, and is very rarely truly black. Sooo…

 

In this week’s writing group, we collected pairs of supposed opposites (an interesting process in itself!) and then used that gathering to inspire a poem.

 

 

This is what I wrote. Enjoy 🙂

 

Division is for numbers,

not for people.

 

Division is outside of life,

not in it,

because the essence of life

is indivisible.

 

Are you a lion

or a mouse?

 

Frankly, it should be clear

that I’m neither,

but I’ll answer.

 

Some days I’m small

and soft and timid,

prone to hide in my

bedroom and pretend

i’m not there in the hope

I won’t get eaten.

 

Other days I roar and rage,

wear my mane free and flowing

and say look at me, notice me,

hear me and know

my words count.

 

But my mouse is there on lion days,

and my lion hasn’t been extinguished

on mouse days, it’s just

everyone needs a rest now and then.

 

But I like it best when

my lion and my mouse

show themselves together

at the same time.

 

That’s when people really

stop to watch and listen

to see if anyone gets eaten,

and what will be left

to live.

 

 

I think ‘opposites’ is a rich theme, and it’s one I’ve explored here before, in a slightly different way.

 

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/2017/09/26/equations-of-opposites-writers-well/

 

 

 

And, you can find more prompts on a variety of topics here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/upcoming-writing-workshops-and-some-prompts-for-you-to-play-with/

and here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/writing-prompts-the-elements/

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Writers’ Well – Home

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creative collaboration, creative writing, creativity, home, poems, poetry, writing, writing prompt

 

Home. It’s a big word, in spite of being just four letters. There are other big four letter words… love, hope, free…but for now, let’s be with Home.

Finding myself currently between outer homes, this word has been very alive in me recently,  and I was reminded of a couple of lines from a poem I heard not long ago. I’ll paraphrase, as I don’t have the text to hand. A young woman, a refugee, said she had a home, put her hand to her heart, but that now she needed a house for it.

I realised I was at risk of disconnecting myself from my inner home, as a result of the stress of needing to find a new outer home. Not that I had any issue finding somewhere temporary, I am very blessed, but I am still unsure about where I will live longer term.

Inner Home.

Outer Home.

This became the reflection for one of our prompts during last week’s writing circle. First, we drew a circle in the centre of a blank piece of paper, writing the word Home inside it. Then we wrote words and phrases inside the circle, to represent ‘inner home’, followed by words or phrases outside the circle to represent ‘outer home’.

Then we shared those thoughts, and in 7 minutes, wrote a poem.

This is what I wrote.

 

Keys,  rent, walls.

Silence, safety, pause.

Photos, laughter, food.

Roots, faith, pause.

Garden, kitchen, washing machine.

Song, heartbeat, pause.

Coats hung up to dry,

shoes leave mud on the welcome mat.

Spirit, freedom, pause.

A spare room to welcome, entertain.

When are you coming back?

Private, love, pause.

Worldly shelter, anchor.

Family, ancestor, anchor.

Pause.

Welcome.

Pause

 

What is Home to you? I’d love to read your thoughts…

 

If you enjoyed this prompt, then you can find more here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/upcoming-writing-workshops-and-some-prompts-for-you-to-play-with/

and here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/writing-prompts-the-elements/

 

Writers’ Well – An image speaks…

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berlin, berlin wall, creative collaboration, creative writing, creativity, stories, story, writing, writing prompt

Image from a postcard I bought in Berlin. Details on the back read:

Berlin, vermutlich 13, August 1961 – http://www.panorama-berlin.de

 

A picture speaks a thousand words, they say. So this week’s prompt started with an image. I picked up this postcard when I was in Berlin earlier this year, and I find it extremely powerful. I handed the image around for everyone to look at, and then simply asked them to write  few responses on pieces of paper, and lay them around the image. to share with the rest of the group.

 

Some examples of what people wrote included:

Ignorance of difference.

Poor mothers caring in the wake of destruction.

Grandmothers nurturing a more peaceful word for the next generation.

Why do we continue to place barriers between ourselves?

I want to touch you, but the obstacles are huge.

 

Hmmm, that’s almost a poem itself! Anyway, I then asked people to write a story in response, taking it in whatever direction they wanted. I was very moved by everything written, and the depth and courage with which everyone engaged with this prompt. I myself was actually reminded of something that I witnessed several years ago, so I wrote about that. Here’s my response – written in ten minutes.

 

Touch, simple touch. Where she’d grown up it was an easy, celebrated, joyous thing. A friend in the playground offered their back, and small, strong, nine year old hands began to knead and rub and stroke with kindness and warmth.

 

“Me too! Me next!”

 

Soon there was a queue, and others were following her lead. Those receiving stood with palms flat against the wall, as friends rubbed backs. Without being asked or told they understood the unwritten rule of give and take, and instantly reciprocated, changed roles.

 

The bell rang, and laughing, some holding hands and skipping back into class, they returned to lessons.

 

Later that day the girl who’d started it all was called into the headmistress’s office. Clearly and firmly, though not yet angrily at least, she was told that such behaviour was inappropriate, and not to be repeated.

 

Touch. Simple touch. Dangerous? Apparently they thought so. Touch. A reminder of our sameness, the warmth of aliveness, the anatomy we share, however differently, uniquely each body expresses it, the bones, sinew, nerves.

 

A wall was built that day, and hands, palms alive with intuitive feeling were made to wear invisible gloves they’d never be able to take off unless they developed the awareness to know they were there, a layer of interference between a natural longing to connect and a twisted, fearful perspective. I hope, when she grew up, she was able to take those gloves off.

 

 

If you enjoyed this prompt, then you can find more here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/upcoming-writing-workshops-and-some-prompts-for-you-to-play-with/

and here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/writing-prompts-the-elements/

 

Writers’ Well – Friendship is…

Tags

creative collaboration, creative writing, creativity, friends, friendship, poem, poetry, writing, writing prompt

 

I am blessed, as I hope and guess are you, with some truly incredible friends. This week’s prompt was inspired by gratitude for the gift of friendship.

We began by taking 3 pieces of blank paper each, on which we completed the phrase, Friendship is … 

We then put all those ideas on the table, and moved them around until we had a collective poem of sorts. See the stitched together version in the photo, now hanging from my wardrobe as a beautiful reminder. If you can’t read the writing, it’s typed out below..

Friendship is…

caring and worrying about them
integral to human community
a way to build community
surprising and lovely when it happens
a way of showing/spreading love
what makes the world go round
a walk in the park
the sun that helps me bloom
possible with trees and animals too
putting somebody’s feelings before your own
having fun and laughing
laughing with someone on your wavelength
something to celebrate
what I turn to when life gets too big and frightening
a gentle trusting between souls
nourishment to the soul
sharing a meal that lasts three hours longer than intended…

 

We then each used that as fuel and inspiration for an individual poem, written in just ten minutes. This is what I wrote. By no means a brilliant poem, but I think the sentiment is clear…and I may work on it more another time. For now – enjoy!

 

You are not alone

I am here with you

 

And it doesn’t matter

that the new pasta sauce

you wanted to try

spices the roof off our mouths

because the food is the excuse

not the main source of nourishment

 

friendship doesn’t come

with cooking instructions

sometimes soul spills over

and I try hard to mop it up

without the mess

and the need to clean

being seen

but you’re too quick

 

let me help you with that

and the light in the soul

we mop up brings

a shine to us both

 

and though I am me

and you are you

now there’s a bit

of me on you too

 

because soul spills

stain in a way that can’t

be washed out

 

the more I spill and break

the more I share and lose

because the less of me

I hold on to

the more room I make

for pieces of you

to stain me too

 

Mosaics are colourful

broken bits breathed into new life

that feels an image that’s whole

and finds a place for every broken

piece until the rediscovered beauty

is complete

 

Because it is not alone

but surrounded by beauty that

is like its own but

shaped differently

 

I was tired

you were tired

but time had lost its power

and the ‘move on, move on’

refrain fell further

and further away

 

friendship spills

from diary notes that

say it ends at nine

 

You are not alone

I am here with you

and there is always time

 

 

What are your thoughts on Friendship? Comments section is waiting! And don’t just tell me – tell those friends! Let them know how special they are.

 

Love and blessings all…

 

If you enjoyed this prompt, then you can find more here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/upcoming-writing-workshops-and-some-prompts-for-you-to-play-with/

and here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/writing-prompts-the-elements/

 

Writers’ Well – Safety

Tags

creative collaboration, creative writing, creativity, poem, poetry, safety, writing, writing prompt

 

This prompt began with each writer being asked to complete each of the following three half sentences five times, with their own thoughts:

 

I feel safe when… (x 5)

I don’t feel safe when… (x 5)

When I feel safe I can… (x 5)

 

We then, individually, re-read what we’d written and used that as a springboard to write a poem in ten minutes. This is what I wrote:

 

 

First do no harm

First find a place

A space of no harm

Then, like a turtle

or snail coming out of its shell

let all that you are

be available to you

 

Can we look for a bigger shell?

If safe spaces are too small

we risk shrinking and disappearing

into fear

 

So what is safety

in a world full of risk

where all life is vulnerable

like spring blossom

soft and delicate

 

waiting for the bee

with no control over the weather

that might deny

its destiny to fruit and feed

 

but the blossom will not refuse to

reveal itself when the conditions are right

we cannot wait for guaranteed safety

before offering to serve

only blossom with trust

that we have played our part

and given the bees the opportunity

to play theirs

 

I was quite surprised by the questions this exercise brought up for me. Safety is sold to us as something that can be guaranteed, and for which certain individuals and/or organisations are responsible for ensuring. But the truth is, life is by its very nature vulnerable and risky. So, what do we do with that truth when we face fear? I don’t have answers, just sharing my questions…

 

If you enjoyed this prompt, then you can find more here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/upcoming-writing-workshops-and-some-prompts-for-you-to-play-with/

and here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/writing-prompts-the-elements/

 

 

Writers’ Well – Listening

Tags

creative collaboration, creative writing, creativity, listening, writing, writing prompt

Photo Credit: http://www.theguardian.com/uk

The prompt I’d like to share this week is inspired by the young people who took to the streets of the UK last Friday to campaign for action in relation to the Climate Crisis. On Thursday, the day before the action, I heard an interview on the radio with a man whose name I’ve forgotten, but the derision and patronising tone was unmistakable and unforgettable. He is one of those who is not listening, does not hear what these young people are leaving their classrooms to have heard. Not being listened to hurts. It’s not about agreeing – of course there will be, should be, must be, differing opinions…but please, Listen.

To warm us up on this topic, I asked each writer to complete the following half sentences five times, with whatever thoughts came:

When I am not listened to…

When I am truly listened to…

When I truly listen…

I then asked everyone to re-read, just for themselves, what they’d written and take that as inspiration to write a poem – in ten minutes.

 

This is what I wrote:

 

 

Be careful what you wish for

You never know who’s listening

 

Good listeners are fishermen

Patiently sensitive to the

Slightest movement on the line

Letting it drop down deep

 

Good listeners are bakers

Letting the yeast of your story

Feed their understanding and curiosity

Until there’s enough to nourish

Many more but it must

Be baked daily

 

Where are you

Fishermen

Bakers?

 

If someone speaks

And there’s no one to hear them

Did they say

Anything at all?

 

I listen to the song of the river

The drums of the earth

The whisper of the wind

And the hum of the sun

 

They don’t interrupt

When I ask them to listen back

And when I let them

I am free

The wild in me comes out

And hears itself

 

Until life gets noisy

And it runs away

Like a startled doe

 

Not lost

Just gone deeper

 

Listening is a topic I’ve returned to a few times, because I seem to regularly need the reminder of its importance, both in the receiving and in the offering.  Here are a couple of links therefore to other posts on this theme:

 

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/2015/02/13/a-personal-motto/

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/2014/10/26/listening-a-good-deeds-post/

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/2014/04/19/napowrimo-18-listen/

 

If you enjoyed this prompt, then you can find more here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/upcoming-writing-workshops-and-some-prompts-for-you-to-play-with/

and here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/writing-prompts-the-elements/

Writers’ Well – Stop/Start

Tags

animals, creative collaboration, creative writing, creativity, insects, start, stop, stories, story, webs, writing, writing prompt

It began with a brainstorm of Stop and Start (one person wrote stop…(something) and then passed it on, for the other to write a start response) which I’d intended to leave as an exercise in itself…but the lists were so heartfelt, and the suggestion came to use it as inspiration for a story.

This is what I wrote. Please remember this was written in just ten minutes, and has not been edited. This felt like a huge topic for me and at the moment it’s a bit fragmented, as a piece of writing, but I wanted to share it exactly as I wrote it…thought I may play with it in future. This was inspired by:

Stop cruelty to animals, Start recognising the value and vulnerability of all life.

It was small things. Pulling the legs off daddy long legs, frying ants with a magnifying glass, treading on a spider that was rushing for the safety of a dark corner. She didn’t like it, but that was just what boys did. She raised her eyebrows, but didn’t intervene. They’d only tease her, call her wet, a sissy, after all – these were just insects – there were millions of them, and surely, they were too tiny to feel.

*****

“The grass is made so green by the nitrates,” he explained. “Farmers add them to bulk the grass up so their cattle will produce higher milk yields.”

He continued, “but that grass is too tough for grasshoppers. They decrease in number, and the birds go hungry.”

*****

She took photos, that early morning, of the spider webs lining the hedgerows that had caught the morning dew and were sparkling like nets full of diamonds. She’d cupped a small spider in her hands once, felt it tickle her palms as she took it to the window, more scared now of squishing it than of this mini eight legged beast itself.

*****

The little things. Ants will sacrifice themselves for the good of the whole, build bridges of their own bodies for others to walk safely over.

*****

The web of cruelty was out of her hands, distanced from her supermarket cheddar wrapped in cling film and far from the green fields where grasshoppers no longer fed and birds went hungry. But she didn’t pull the legs off daddy long legs, or fry ants, or tread on spiders.

 

 I found a couple of links you may be interested in reading as a follow up.

https://www.princeton.edu/news/2015/11/30/ants-build-living-bridges-their-bodies-speak-volumes-about-group-intelligence

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2018/jun/17/where-have-insects-gone-climate-change-population-decline

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/oct/18/warning-of-ecological-armageddon-after-dramatic-plunge-in-insect-numbers

 

If you enjoyed this prompt, then you can find more here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/upcoming-writing-workshops-and-some-prompts-for-you-to-play-with/

and here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/writing-prompts-the-elements/

 

Writers’ Well – Six word stories

Tags

creative collaboration, creative writing, creativity, play, six word stories, stories, technology, writing, writing prompt

 

The six word story was made famous by Ernest Hemingway, and I decided we’d use the idea as one of our playful prompts last Friday.

 

First, I gave the group Ernest’s example, along with a few others I’d found during a brief internet search (see Guardian article link below).

 

I then placed a pile of small blank pieces of paper in the centre, turned my three minute timer, and invited people to write as many six word stories as they wished, within that time, and place them in the centre to form a circle.

 

We read them aloud in awe…

 

 

Then, I asked each writer to choose just one, which they would then explore and expand into a longer story, written in just ten minutes.

 

 

Here are a few examples, made easier for you to read:

• I’m waiting. He’s coming. I think.
• Hundreds of people saw him fall.
• Two drinks. Two chairs. One empty.
• Why me? Why now? Burn it.
• “I’m over here.” “Who said that?”
• My favourite dress. Too big now

 

The results were stunning. As I have often found to be the case, offering a very simple, playful prompt can be the most direct route to genuinely profound and moving pieces of writing.

As it is, I only have my own to share,  but the variety and vitality of the imaginative responses was breathtaking.

Written in just ten minutes, unedited, inspired by the six word story;

 

“Will it grow?” “No!” It grew.

 

“What are you doing?

“Planting.”

“Planting what?” He pushed her aside, “I don’t see anything?”

“That’s because it’s in the earth. Now we wait.”

“It won’t grow! No!”

 

She looked up at him , a stretch from her bent knees. The question was almost out, before she caught it. Just wait. Gardeners know all about patience.

 

He stamped his foot on the loosened earth, where the bulbs had just been nestled in. She stood, shocked.

“Stop it Shane!”

“It won’t grow. Nothing grows. Everything’s dead, dead, dead.”

He ran. She let him. She poured water over the footprint.

***

He had the photo in his cell. Bright yellow daffodils. He was allowed to receive post now, and she wrote to him often.

“It’s not a prison. It’s earth. You’ve been planted. Don’t be scared to grow.”

Her words journeyed him through the seasons he could barely see, let alone smell or touch. Seasons turned into years.

“The air tastes different,” he said, the day he was released.

 

 

This is an interesting article with other examples of six word stories, written by some contemporary authors, some of which I shared with the group as inspiration:

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2007/mar/24/fiction.originalwriting

 

I’d love to read your own six word stories in the comments, if you’d like to have a go…

 

If you enjoyed this prompt, then you can find more here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/upcoming-writing-workshops-and-some-prompts-for-you-to-play-with/

and here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/writing-prompts-the-elements/

Writers’ Well – Sensible/Sensitive

Tags

creative collaboration, creative writing, creativity, poem, sensible, sensitive, writing, writing prompt, writing workshop

 

“Too much sensible really isn’t good for one.”

I wrote this phrase in another recent piece of writing, so maybe that’s where the inspiration for this prompt came from. It is also a nod to my background as an English Language teacher, and the concept of false friends. Sensible in English is one thing, but the same word in French, pronounced sensible…means something entirely different – sensitive!

So, we began by writing sensible is… and then completing that with whatever word or phrase came, passing sheets of paper around the circle, until we’d collected some ideas. For example:

…thinking before you leap

…not putting your head in a lion’s mouth

…always carry an umbrella, just in case

etc etc

 

 

Then we turned the page, and began sensitive is…, and the circle became quieter and more earnest, while writing things like:

…what it must feel like when a bee lands on a flower and tickles its way to the pollen

…allowing joy and grief – all of it

…really being able to listen deeply

etc etc

 

 

The invitation was then to take that inspiration in whatever direction you wished, and write a poem in ten minutes! This is what I wrote:

 

 

Comfortable shoes

eight hours a night

eating less cake 

when my jeans get too tight

putting my wellies on

when the rain falls

answering the phone

when my mother calls

paying my bills

and being on time

live life like this

and you’ll see how the time

ticks by with the monotony

of my grandfather’s clock

on a shelf out of reach

so it doesn’t get knocked

or damaged in any way

but it’s clockwork

so when I don’t wind it up…

 

I don’t know the time

so I look at the sky

and pretend I can feel

each moment fly by

I linger to chat

to a snail on the path

tell it “don’t be so slow!

The bikes go pretty fast!”

 

I’ve forgotten my water

so I follow a sign

I’ve seen for a cafe

but I never had time

 

now I have a black coffee

though I know I won’t sleep

and it’s hard to keep

in the laughter that creeps

into cells that have known

my routine for so long

they’re confused and excited –

what on earth has gone wrong?!

 

the heartbeat, the smiling

the caffeine, the song

I do hope she won’t

keep this up for too long!

 

I pay and I leave

with a bounce in my step

now where’s that next promise to me

I’ve not kept…

 

I had a lot of fun writing that, and thoroughly enjoyed all the other poems that came out of that gathering of thoughts and ideas. Such variety! Care to try this yourself? You’re welcome to share or link in the comments below.

 

If you enjoyed this prompt, then you can find more here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/upcoming-writing-workshops-and-some-prompts-for-you-to-play-with/

and here:

https://wordsthatserve.wordpress.com/writing-prompts-the-elements/