Tag Archives: prompts

always more possible like this

list photo 051314At last night’s Write Whole meeting, I invited the gathered writers to create two lists, one titled, “This is what my body knew,” and the other titled “This is what my body didn’t know.”

Over there to the left is what my list looked like.

And down here below is what I wrote (all the way at the bottom is what it sounded like):

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the responsibility of the writer to say yes

Monday was our first meeting of this spring’s Write Whole: Survivors Write group. For the second of our writes that night, I offered a series of three sentences/fragments — the idea is to choose one (or let one choose you), and let your writing flow in response. Here were the prompts:

When was the last time I told my story?
It is the responsibility of the writer to…
I don’t want to write about…

I used the second of those for my own writing; that fragment was inspired by Grace Paley’s poem “Responsibility.” Here’s what I wrote:

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Poem for a Friday – “if it’s not a secret”

My hands are covered with dirt, and my laptop is dusted with flour. These are good signs, I think.

A poem I love for this second Friday of WriOursWhoMo. Consider using that last line as a prompt…

Bodyweight
-Matthew Schwartz

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“May we reveal our abundance without shame.”

Good morning, good morning, writers.

Today I am hectic and rushing around. I want to give you something thoughtful and deep, but the puppy is calling for my attention, and the more I try to type, the more she bumps my elbow trying to get me to get up and take her out into the rain and play ball. So what I have for this second day of WriOursWhoMo is a poem and a prompt:

Prayer
Lisa Colt

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releasing the transition

Good morning on this Monday — are you settling into this new time? Now the dark is earlier in the evening and the light comes sooner in the morning; the pup and I were just getting acclimated to morning ball-catching time by the half-light. Full sun is cheating!

For you Nanowrimo-ers reading, have you already reached your word count goal for today? Listen for me cheering you on from your sidelines! I’ll be joining you later this morning, pushing out my own 1670 words.

Today I am in this new life all the way. Friday was my last day at my day job at UCSF. The goodbyes felt complete and honest, and today I’m here wondering how all the pieces are going to come together. That perseveration isn’t at my surface, though. A calm has lifted in me, one that I’m not sure yet I can trust. One that feels like — like what? Faith? Is this what faith feels like? Continue reading

the shift of our stories

graffiti detail: bright slashes of red blue black yellow silverGood Monday to you. Here is candlelight and cooling tea, here is the chill of late October morning, here is the click of keys into a quiet kitchen, here is the ache of morning. What is hovering inside and about you at this time of faeries and visitations?

Today I am thinking about story: the stories we share with others in order to explain ourselves, the way those stories, our storying, shift over time — and what those shifts can tell us about how we are healing. Continue reading

bodylove (again)

graffiti of a bird (a penguin) with the words "love me" on its round bellyThis morning the candles led me into the notebook, and I’ve got to be up and out early, so this is a short prompt today:

If you are in a place where you can, I want to invite you to put your hands on a part of your body that you have hated, that has been a place of shame or loss or embarrassment, that has held trauma for you. If you don’t want to actually rest your hands there, imagine doing so. Just rest your hands and/or energy there for a moment. Notice what rises up in you as you give some energy to this part of your body — or maybe to your body as a whole. What does it mean to deeply love and cherish your body, all of its parts, exactly as it is — as you are?

At this point, I like to invite a love letter to that part of the body that you’re cradling in your good hands (and it might be a love letter to your hands, too!) — notice what tone such a letter might take: adoring, apologetic, rueful, sweet, seductive, tender. What do you want to say to this part of your body? What does this part of your body want to say to you?

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sailing into this big

graffiti/wall mural of a bird and vining flowers taking over the side of a brick buildingGood morning — it’s stillĀ  morning, right? Outside the day is fully open, and I’m just getting into the blog at nearly 10. The notebook called to me during the dark time this morning, so I lit my tall candles and fell forward onto the page, recollecting what I could of my dreams, and my intentions for this day, this week, these unfurling next few months.

Just went into my thesaurus to look up synonyms for the word unfurl, which has become one of my standard-bearers (alongside thick and generous and grateful and slick and lit — the words that I find myself reaching for over and over, almost without thought, words that carry an extra load, words I am a bit obsessed with, words I ask to do more than their share), and I found that the thesaurus that comes standard on the Mac had no synonyms for ‘unfurl’ available. So I tried the dictionary, and my little Mac came back with this:

make or become spread out from a rolled or folded state, esp. in order to be open to the wind

Mmmhmm. Right, yes. That’s exactly how I feel right now: unfolded, exposed, stretched out and vulnerable, buffeted; a thing to be of use, to catch the wind, to ride what’s already available and freely given. Oh. Continue reading

photo prompt: what’s growing today?

graffiti of a flower (with a bright face!) growing up the cracks between two buildings

Good morning! An image/photo prompt for today: What stories are pushing at the edges of you today, what words are growing up out of the cracks inside? Spend a moment with this thought, with the image, then let yourself drop down into the page — Take ten minutes this morning, and follow the tendrils of your words wherever they seem to want you to go!

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together we will dismantle the systems that broke our hearts

Companer@, I know that you are hurting but you are still alive you will survive and together we will dismantle the systems that broke our heartsThis stunning bit of graffiti was right near the lake where I live — what systems are you dismantling this morning, inside or out? Where is your heart broken today? Whose hands are you reaching for?

Here’s some gratitude today for your broken heart, your reaching hands, your good and reaching and resilient words.