Full prompt available here.
Featured participant today is Narrative Paralysis, where the write-a-prompt prompt for Day Four produced an extremely zany adventure. I’m not sure if it’s a prompt, but it’s definitely a poem! Or a short story. Or, well, it’s something all right!
Today’s featured online magazine is Waxwing, which has been going strong since 2013, and is much admired for the high quality of the work found in its (web)pages. In their newest issue, I’ll point you to Alfredo Aguilar’s “Palomar Mountain” and Carly Joy Miller’s “Beloved Litany.”
Today, I’d like to challenge you to write a poem about a mythical person or creature doing something unusual – or at least something that seems unusual in relation to that person/creature. For example, what does Hercules do when he loses a sock in the dryer? If a mermaid wants to pick up rock-climbing as a hobby, how does she do that? What happens when a mountain troll makes pancakes?
Very close to the midnight deadline (there is no deadline) today, another busy one. I checked out Day 5 this evening on my phone and was able to read the featured poem and the two selected from Waxwing. I read a bit more of the magazine too. Read the prompt and then fell asleep (I missed my online group this evening)!
So here I am, dashing in a post! My laptop also decided to work reluctantly – I have spent about 30 mins trying to get sites to load!
AND BREATHE…
I appreciated the concept of Instructional Video for Your Poetry Adventure, today’s featured poem by Leonard Walker. I love the fact VCR was chosen over DVD/ or Blu Ray and all the REDACTED information which leaves the mind buzzing with possibility and also helps make the poem more unique/appealing to/for the reader. The elaborate nature of some of the prompts with specific details:
5. When your neighbor comes out to check on you (perhaps mid-stomp on your now broken mail receptacle) or, if you live on a busy street, a Good Samaritan pulls over in their 2013 Hyundai Sonata (Certified Preowned and purchased at NAME REDACTED), accept their gentle, worried affirmations that are made out of a combination of genuine care and moderate sense of obligation. Yes, you are correct; they do not know you at all. Yes, you might be broken beyond repair.” Sounds of Glimmering Horns “Turn it off! Don’t hit play until I tell you to.” Vague mutterings, the music stops. Excuse me. No, that does not mean you should chase the helpful hand on your back away with primal yelps and the large rock and/or pieces of the mailbox at your feet.
In contrast to the small instructions
16. Go to bed.
(which are sometimes epic in depth):
14. Wonder: Is this all I have left?
I read it many times.
Alfredo Aguilar’s “Palomar Mountain” in Waxwing was my next port of call.
I don’t want to use a SPOILER ALERT – so I won’t but that ending! Oh, WOW!
Next I read Carly Joy Miller’s “Beloved Litany” – another powerful poem.
How shall I clean
the yolk of us off the floor?
How ordinary: light.
Its currency, dust.
This economy of living
I also read
The Great Runway of Life
Sam Herschel Wein
Convento Santo Domingo
Sara Daniele Rivera
Prospecting
Leah Tieger
It is a great magazine with some impressive writing! Another added to my reading list.
Then it was time to write. I liked the examples given for today’s prompt and one day may use them as a starting point.
What does Hercules do when he loses a sock in the dryer?
If a mermaid wants to pick up rock-climbing as a hobby, how does she do that?
What happens when a mountain troll makes pancakes?
I decided that I wanted to seek my own for today. I used much loved Randomisers:
Mythical Creature Delighted by the result: Aspidochelone/ Medieval folklore/ Large whale or vast sea turtle.
The first plot generator I used gave me whole story plots rather than just an incident and also used mythological creatures… so I searched again for Inciting Incident Generator – this one provides a whole list each time you click, plenty to choose from!
One day, they become obsessed with BUMPER CARS and it changes everything.
So I had my creature and my event, all I had to do was a write a poem.
I did tiny research (a quick word into Wiki) and then had fun with the prompt. Basically a poem from the Aspidochelone‘s point of view and obviously with his new obsession with Bumper Cars, sending sailors to their doom became less likely!
I hadn’t banked on submarines and coastal defences.
I am more a monster than I have ever been,
awritersfountain 