Day: February 26, 2020

I’ve enjoyed this Fabulous February of Writing Prompts, but it’s been a slight challenge to get a new one out every single day for the month. Most days it’s easy enough, other days have more things happening. I’m glad I chose the shortest month of the year to do it, that’s for sure.

Now that February is drawing to a close, I ask myself, and am asking you, the reader too, should I continue giving out writing prompts here, on my writing blog? I feel yes, but a scaled back version. I thought putting a new writing prompt out on Monday, every Monday, would be an easier way to go, while still giving writing prompts for those who like them.

So if you’ve gained something good from this month of writing prompts, and would like more writing prompts to keep on coming once February is over, please leave a comment here. If nobody says they’d like it to keep happening, if might stop …

Missy says, “Yes, please let ‘mum’ know how you feel, otherwise she’ll get that sad look, and she’ll stop patting me (and feeding me).”

So if you don’t want to answer for me, do it for Missy!

Puss in Boots here – “You know this woman, Carolyn, does lots of things to help other people with their writing, I know, because she takes me with her when she’s out and about doing her writing community stuff. She does things for others because it’s her way of helping, how about you do a bit of helping too, and let Carolyn know if you’d like a weekly writing prompt to happen on her writer blog!”

So Missy and Puss in Boots are both backing me up, will you back me up too, and leave a comment about whether you want the writing prompts to continue. Please? Pretty please with sugar on top?

Cheers!

as name

I like having my friend, Puss in Boots with me when I’m out in public doing writing group things. He’s a calm fellow, Puss, never gets rowdy, he’s just there, colourful, but not loud with it.

The images of me aren’t so colourful, I tend to have more subdued ‘Autumn’ colours, while Puss is always dressed in his lovely bright colours. He has no voice, so I suppose the bright colours speak for him, to some extent.

In this photo, Puss in Boots was taking part in one of the Adelaide Plains Poets Festival of Words events. It is a visit to a particular art gallery, then a train trip to Adelaide and back. Attendees are encouraged to write creatively about art works that took their notice. It’s always a fun event, and yes, new poetry does get written, for sure!

This is one of the artworks that attracted my attention at the last Festival, and the poem I wrote on the train about the painting. I was thrilled to hear from the artist recently to tell me how much she enjoyed my poem, and that she’d been able to sell the painting.

Art and words go together well, I’ve always thought that, well I have for quite a while anyway. When I first heard of the Japanese Haiga, which is haiku displayed with an image, I fell in love with it. The image and words each add to the other, bringing much more thoughts into it all, for the viewer/reader … One day, I would like to publish a book of Haiga, but the cost of coloured images in books makes it expensive …

Something to put on my bucket list perhaps, or I could forget about an actual book, and do something online instead, where no expensive print photo needs to be printed, simply displayed on the screen with the words instead, as on this blog post, for my poem and the image from the Festival … Thoughts and ideas happening now, for sure …

Open and Shut’ is today’s writing prompt.

Shut your eyes, and listen …
What can you hear, smell, feel? It is said that if you lose a sense, it can help to make your other senses work better. I don’t know if that is true, but doing this eye shutting thing, certainly makes it easier to hear, I think.

Write down what it was that your other senses could pick up, bird song, traffic, the winds? Was it cool, warm, hot? Could you smell machinery odours, kitchen ones, something from the garden? Write it all down.

Now open your eyes. Look around and write down five random things you can see. Give yourself ten minutes, and put those five things,  together with your awakened senses pieces, in a piece of creative writing. Then look at what you wrote. Are you happy with the results? Try to use as many of the senses pieces in there as you can.

I have a lot of faith in this five random words idea. I’ve been doing it for quite a few years now, and have seen/heard some amazing responses, as well as enjoying writing in this way myself.

Adding in the senses part is a new thing, and using both parts? It should be good, I hope and expect it will work!

So, this is an open and shut of senses working over time! Are you ready? Go!

Are you surprised at where you went with those five things? The randomness seems to get the brain going in unusual directions at times, and that can be a fine thing.