Nite’s Nifty Nook
7 posts in this topic.
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Okay so this seems fun and a great way to get writing consistently.
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Prompt 1: New Years resolutions
This will be the year,
we say as December ticks away
into an empty calendar,
a future begging to be scribbled out.
We buy planners and gym memberships
and swear that this time we will change.
We will have to find new goals next year.
But by the 15th, we are eating fast food,
our motivation lost with the shiny planner,
and we slip back into the monsters
we always are. -
Prompt 2: freedom, no pronouns
to wake up at noon, no alarms, no ever-expanding
list of shoulds, musts, have-to-dos,
only coulds, only maybes, only want-to-dos.
no fear of dwindling bank accounts,
no sitting at desks from 8 to 5,
no jealousy of filtered lives,
no fear of calories or scales,
no struggle to fit into too-small clothes,
no more feeling like a caricature of womanhood
because who would dare leave the house without makeup,
no more dependence on medications
to tie a diseased mind to the bounds of sanity.
nothing left but a soul that knows
nothing is impossible. -
Prompt 3: historical event. Too lazy for my computer so excuse the formatting. Also not really an event, but I think it fits the spirit of the prompt.
I was a man once,
a farmer of the flood’s bounty.
I had a wife, a son, a name.
Now I am but sand and stone,
tongue dried out by the sun,
the only river I know the sweat on my back
as we build for the glory of Pharoah,
so his soul will know its way home.
When Anubis takes me,
it is mercy.
My heart is light,
and Ra takes me to my brothers in the reeds.
Together, we feast and laugh
and our souls remember their names again.
Our wives and children follow us,
and all is well.
When he stands before the gods,
his skin is leather, his bones frail,
but we know him by the gold he wears.
Paradise grows silent as we watch.
Osiris shakes his head as he swears
that he has never made anyone weep.
His heart is heavy, and he screams
as he finds out that no riches can save you from the beast. -
Wow, haven't done this in a hot minute. Anyway, here's my list poem:
Spoiler
To-do every weekend
1) wake up ready to leave the day un-wasted, to accomplish all the things you claim to be too tired to do on weeknights
2) pick up the floor so you don't trip on things the way you trip over your words in front of a beautiful person.
3) actually clean so you look like a real adult and stop hiding all your messes in the closet like a cliche of secrets poised to tumble on top of you the second you pull something out in hopes of finding last year's winter hat.
4) do laundry because buying clothes to have something clean to wear is an expensive solution to an unnecessary problem.
5) put on your mask and face the grocery store masses, picking healthy food so maybe you won't be fat anymore and might even be lovable.
6) stop saying you're unlovable because your therapist says that isn't true, but you're pretty sure she says that because she's paid to pretend to like you
7) rest in the joy of accomplishment, ready to tackle Monday with a smile
What is done every weekend
1) wake up, fall back asleep, pee, doomscroll on phone, fall asleep again, wake up at dinner time, the day already wasted
2) panic and pick up one item, try to find where it goes, realize there's nowhere it belongs (just like you belong nowhere)
3) clean one thing, reward yourself with a break, forget to clock back in to finish the job
4) take clothes downstairs, forget to go back down to put them in the dryer until the next morning, now they're gross and soggy and you have to start over (like I've had to start over, try to fix my mistakes time after time)
5) too tired for the grocery store, get takeout instead, realize you'll never be good enough to cook anything you can't microwave, which means you don't deserve love
6) write more about all the reasons you need to keep hating yourself, because if you loved yourself the way your therapist thinks you should, you will never want to improve. Not that you want to improve now.
7) it's Sunday evening, another weekend of doing nothing, yet somehow you have a headache, swear to god that you'll get through the week and next weekend you'll be better. there's nowhere to go but up, right? -
Okay so I actually attempted to write a poem that expresses emotion without characters or personification, but it's sooo freaking hard. I do use "you", but I mean it as a more general "you" rather than a specific person, so I think it's okay.
the summer air is stagnant
unable to shift the debris
from beer bottles and cigarette butts.
heat bakes the ground
and funnels sweat of your back
until the energy is balanced
and nothing can move.
the lake is still
like ones larynx when one decides
that some words are best left unspoken .
you cling to the willow
sheltering you from the noontime assault
of the sun.
your brain has melted
like a popsicle on the ground
and you can't recall how you got here,
let alone how to leave.
by the time the sun sets,
releasing nocturnal life
and daring you to move again,
will you remember how?
or will you become
another piece of broken glass
shining and useless in the day. -
Great job nite! This is a really hard exercise, I've been trying myself and can't seem to figure it out. Those first two stanzas have so much atmosphere you can almost feel how sticky / uncomfortable the scene is.
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