From Mr. Tambourine Man by Bob Dylan:
Then take me disappearin’ through the smoke rings of my mind
Down the foggy ruins of time, far past the frozen leaves
The haunted, frightened trees, out to the windy beach
Far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow
Yes, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free
Silhouetted by the sea, circled by the circus sands
With all memory and fate driven deep beneath the waves
Let me forget about today until tomorrow.
The following is by William Stafford, a member of Writer’s in the Grove.
He really did believe it could be possible.
He had been collecting possible all during his 70 plus years. He had stacked them in the corner of his room and the stack was about 4 feet high. The weight must be considerable.
He was always wanting to dig through it, but had a hard time. There wasn’t any light in the room, except for the light coming through the small gap at the bottom of the door and when that light was out it was a black, black place.
He knew that the basis of his possible was prejudice. He also knew that common consensus was prejudice was synonymous with racial problems, well he thought that was sin ominous. Prejudice was learned and perpetuated by all of those surrounding the younger generations and through actions and words planting bad seeds. We can be prejudiced with food, politics, weather, color, smell and almost anything else that we face daily.
What he wished for was a new plan.
He wanted everyone in the world to get a box and each morning write those things that they were prejudiced about, on a piece of paper. Vow not to be that way today. Fold that paper and put it in the box. At the end of each month everyone in the community met at a central location and burn those boxes. He hoped the heat would sooner or later end prejudice and end his search for possible.
The following is by Gretchen Keefer, a member of Writers in the Grove. It was inspired by the Prompt: Limerick.
There once was a group of talented poets
Who wrote and never did blow it.
Except there was one
Who wrote just for fun
And never could get that last line right.
The prompt this week was to write a limerick. A limerick is a poem style that gained popularity in the early 18th century and has a strict form and rhythm. It is such an accepted form of poetry, many can finish the last line if the writing compels them to do so with rhythm and rime.
According to Wikipedia:
Limerick is a form of poetry, especially one in five-line, predominantly anapestic meter with a strict rhyme scheme (AABBA), which is sometimes obscene with humorous intent. The third and fourth lines are usually shorter than the other three.
According to some experts, a limerick isn’t a true or pure limerick unless it has an obscene element, and that clean limericks were just a “passing fad.” Edward Lear (19th century poet) truly popularized the form and was published in the papers, though he claimed these were not limericks.
An example of an early form of limerick by an unknown author is:
The limerick packs laughs anatomical
Into space that is quite economical.
But the good ones I’ve seen
So seldom are clean
And the clean ones so seldom are comical.
A limerick consists of the standard form of a stanza of five lines. Using the measurement of a “foot” as the limerick’s meter and pattern, it is ta-ta-TUM, an anapaest. The first, second, and fifth rhyme with each other and have three “feet of three syllables each.” The third and forth lines are shorter and rhyme together with two “feet of three syllabus.”
The storytelling order of a limerick is:
One of the most famous examples of limerick forms is:
There was an Old Man of Nantucket
Who kept all his cash in a bucket.
His daughter, called Nan,
Ran away with a man,
And as for the bucket, Nantucket.
– Anonymous
The prompt was to write a limerick. Play with rhymes and storytelling, and attempt to create a twist at the end.
The Vernonia Writers met at the Library this past Thursday and worked on nouns and modifiers. As we began the class, each participant wrote a list column down the page of ten nouns; puppy, book, potato chips, etc. Each writer then made a second list column of ten modifiers; steely, damp, rotund, etc.
Once the list columns were complete, papers were traded around the table so that the author of the list was not the one working with the words. Participants were given 20 minutes to match or mis-match the two lists in an effort to come up with individual sentences, poems or complete stories.
It was more difficult than first thought, but several wordsmiths were able to use all the sets and put them into a story. Most were able to use about 90% of the sets. All of the writers were able to stretch their common vocabulary and sentence structure during this prompt.
This prompt can also be done alone with the words that you decide. Some have found the list by random dictionary pages. Try it yourself to see how you do.
The next class for the Vernonia Library Writers is scheduled for February 18 at 6pm. Hope to see you there.
The following was written by Writers in the Grove member, Lorelle VanFossen, inspired by Prompt: The Haven, to write an anthropomorphic description of something.
The car had a mind of its own. Warm morning starts were appreciated, purring with the welcome strokes of affection. Cold mornings were greeted with angry whines, coughs, shutters, and sighs, none too eager to leave the comfort of the cave.
On the flat, it raced and roared, a lion exploding from a crouch among the grasses with a burst of speed, seizing the nape of the road with blood thirsty glory.
Hills made it gasp and wheeze, an old man dragging himself, cane in one hand, banister in the other, up each dreaded step, questioning each one, evaluating the true reward at the top.
Downhill, I swear the car held its arms over its head and shouted “Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee” like a child tearing down a wintry hill barely holding onto the cardboard under its body. Downshifting to control the free fall brought little result save billowing clouds of blue smoke out the back in protest of being called home for dinner when there was fun still to be had.
The job of the little car was to get me there and back safely. It took its responsibilities seriously, never letting me forget how hard it worked for me. Thus, it deserved its name: Martyr.
The following prompt comes from the book “Beasts in My Belfry” by Gerald Durell from chapter 2, “A Lust of Lions.” The following describes an official building at Whipsnade Zoo in the UK, one of the first zoos to attempt to provide “natural” quarters for their wildlife, and his adventures as a young man working there, determined to become a wildlife specialist.
The nerve centre of the section was a small, tumble-down hut hemmed in by a copse of tangled elder bushes. The hut wore a toupee of honeysuckle at a rakish angle, practically obscuring one of its two windows and so making the interior dark and gloomy. Outside it sported a battered notice-board on which was the euphemistic title “The Haven.” The furnishings were monastic in their simplicity – three chairs in various stages of decay, a table that rocked and jumped like a nervous horse when anything was planed on it, and a grotesque black stove that crouched in one corner pouting smoke through its iron teeth and regurgitating embers in quite incredible quantities.
The prompt was to describe something, preferably an inanimate object, using anthropomorphic descriptions. Make us see the character of the thing.
The following is by Writers in the Grove member, Lorelle VanFossen, based upon Prompt: Dumpster Diving.
“I need a foot stool,” I said, balancing on a chair to reach the cupboard over the fridge.
“Have you checked the streets? You don’t look safe on that chair.”
“Not yet. Just realized I needed one.”
“Here,” my husband said. “I’ll get this. Check the streets. You’ll find one.”
And I did.
The streets of Tel Aviv and much of the big cities in Israel are famous for three things.
Constant and never-ending reconstruction of the sidewalks. They tear up the brick and sand to lay down new pipes to supply water, electricity, and gas to the buildings. Then they tear them up to add cable and telephone lines, then rip those up to fix the pipes that were damaged by the cable, tear that back up to add improvements, then start all over again as one or more of these processes messed up the previous processes, and up goes the sidewalk. It’s a constant battle as you move through the city to walk in and around sidewalk construction and reconstruction as well as half-cobbled sidewalks.
Dog shit. Numerous attempts at poop-and-scoop laws brought little foot placement security to pedestrians as the laws are rarely obeyed by a society that decided a long time ago that many of these laws were for other people, not them. Certainly not them, the dog-walking owners.
Lastly, the streets are a treasure hunt for household items. Shops filled with second hand, used goods are rare in Israel. At the time we lived there, I believe there were four in the entire country. Decades of sanctions, import restrictions, over-priced and taxed goods, and poverty made every article of clothing, every dish or pot, every plant, every stick of furniture precious. Clothing worn out became rags at the worse, cut down and remade into something else to wear or cover a bed or warm toes watching television in the winter, a technique known today as “upcycling.” They mastered the technique ages ago. Rarely does anything go to waste. It was a necessity of life as it is around much of the world. Use what you have and make do with what you can find.
When you are finally done with something, you set it on the street corner. Someone would walk by and check it out. If it met their need, it would find a home. If not, it would wait for someone else, but not long. Rarely did anything last more than a few minutes on the streets.
Within two days a step stool appeared on the corner a block away. Two steps up, finely crafted stained maple, it folded up to a scant width for easy storage. Perfect. Home it went.
That night, my husband found me atop my new stool reaching into the cupboard over the fridge, now within my reach.
“I see I’m obsolete now.”
“Not completely.”
“Where did you find this. It’s beautiful,” he asked, examining the beautiful workmanship. A few nicks and scrapes here and there, but still a lovely piece.
“It was a street sale.”
“Of course it was. I wonder how many feet have been lifted up on this over the years, moving from home to home.” I stepped off and he picked it up and held it up to the light for closer examination.
We laughed and the stood became a part of our lives for the next four years, always there to lift our spirits and bodies to a higher level. When it was time for us to leave the county, it went out on the street corner to find another home, and continue its journey.
The prompt this week had to do with garbage. It had two flavors:
Dumpster diving – whatever that means to you.
Finish the line: “I met a man at the dumpster…”
Have fun cleaning up on this one!
The following is from Writers in the Grove member, Susan Schmidlin, and based upon the Prompt: Dumpster Diving.
I met a man at the dumpster
Or rather, our garbage met at the dumpster
His in his left hand
Mine in my right
We each swung our bags above shoulders
and arced them toward the square metal bin
The bags bumped together above the opening
Each bag refused to give an inch
and bounced unceremoniously outside the desired location
before hitting the ground
Mine on his left
His on my right
Busting open and spewing remnants of the last few days
Apologetically and with eyes down
we each traded sides
To clean up the mess that was created
Both of us unwilling and ashamed to have someone else
see the discards of our life
and know exactly who we really are
Writers in the Grove 