This was a Grind Writers’ free-write combined with a round robin write. Here's how it worked:
·
First we set the timer for a few minutes and we
each created a writing prompt on separate sheets of paper.
·
Then we passed those prompts two people to the
right. Set the timer again, and we each wrote to the prompt we received. We
wrote on separate sheets of 8½ x11” paper.
·
After 5 minutes, we passed the writing we had
done to the next person. We set the timer an wrote for another 5 minutes,
carrying on from what the previous person had written.
You could carry this on, going completely around the table if you had time. We only
did the two. Then we read them. Here is some of that output. Person 1’s writing is in sans-serif font;
person 2’s is in a serif font. We were writing fast and loose—by hand—so indecipherable
words have a blank line.
You’ll find it interesting to see which of the writers carry on from the
previous paragraph; which people just ignore the first person’s writing and take
the thing in a different direction, sometimes even a contradictory one.
Do people write in first person? Does anyone try other POVs? Did anyone
put their contribution in verse? Or write screen dialogue? The field was wide
open.
You might read some of the prompts and think that you would never find
anything to say about that prompt -– and then perhaps be surprised to see what flowed out of
others’ minds to that particular bit of inspiration.
And then maybe you’ll want to take a stab at some of those prompts yourself?
We’d love if you shared your output with us.
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Prompt:
Sincerity & Senselessness vs. Common Sense
Sincerity
all the way. It’s all
_____ senselessness I don’t care for. I need/want to feel. Common sense – it comes
out of the multitude of us; it’s a generic common ground. Sincerity will pull
me out of it if necessary. With sincerity I don’t look out yet ___ deep inside
myself to grasp what is most authentic, most honest for me to say or do. I am
willing to step out of line and offend somebody.
I’ve
always loved you, I imagine myself saying, even though you tell me that’s not
what I really think. Like I’m lying to myself. The doors are big and hollow; a
gust of wind could blow me over, I think, if I wasn’t leaning against it. The
only thing keeping me attached to my old world.
He’s
with her. Three months.
If I’m
to rest with myself, I’ll try her. Tell them both what I really feel.
10:05
- I need another pack of cigarettes.
10:14
– The beer here is so expensive. Ad it’s not like they’ll let me talk much. He’s
so loud and she’s much more of a bitch than she used to be.
10:31 Yea, one more shot. Make it double, neat.
11:52:
They’ll ever listen.
________
Prompt: Traffic jam.
The metal strips
decorating his El Camino’s dashboard were like oven grates, frying our bodies locked
in an iron cage on wheels, _____ing silently like the stuck fat pigs on a
movable spit. 103 degrees, 111 with humidity, and he had to grab the chicken,
fried chicken steak and waffles, bubbling fat and cholesterol and sugar blended
together for the poor man’s health cocktail.
The
way he saw it, the grease will keep the whole thing moist. I-5 traffic was a
bitch right now, an accident on the bridge. Asshole rear-ended a Maserati,
probably jealous of some Asian tech kid making it big. He’d probably had done
the same, maybe. Marlene would skin his hide, what with the kids and the rent
and the non-existent health insurance he told her he got last week. Jana’s
teeth were crooked and Marlene wanted to get it fixed. His teeth were crooked .
He’d turned out fine.
He honked loudly. the bald black guy
beside him grinned in comradery. The owner of the red Honda Civic in front
flipped him the bird. The smell of waffles and fried chicken steak was making
him nauseous.
_________
Prompt: The last time
I took a trip I learned……
The last
time I took a trip I learned that tripping is not easy. Well, okay, it’s easy,
too easy actually—and a bit addictive, if you know what I mean. The brilliance
of the food for all the senses, powering reactions, unexpected moments of
exhilaration, but oh that disappointment, that crash when it’s over, when you
come back home. I
woke up the next day and decide to plan my next trips better. I opened my laptop
and scrolled to read online. I wondered what excited me about a new
destination, what meds more organized………
_________
Prompt: You are stuck
on an island with 99 other people. The island is ruled by a dictator who has
banned all mirrors and all communications between people.
All reflections are gone.
no one speaks. No one moves without twitching nervously or looking around to
see whether others have noticed what they’ve done. Mirrors are gone, shattered
into microscopic pieces. They said they weren’t allowed. What to do then if we
can’t look at ourselves? We then look at each other. It’s the only way to
alleviate the boredom. I don’t know any of their names. Not allowed, they said.
Focus,
breathe. Remember. Yes. Little did I realize when I signed up for this silent
retreat just what that would mean, how much, how strong are my impulses to connect
with other people. Silent sitting meditation for hours and hours.
Empty the mind.
Notice the thoughts. The feelings
flitting across my consciousness. Cramp I left hip. Let them flit, let them go.
My hip still hurts.
Breathe.
_________
Prompt: Leather skin.
Her hands from the dirt in
the garden for years there were vegetables and traffic now outside the garden where once there were just a few
cars, ow there was a constant stream.
She came out most mornings screen banging behind her my
grandmother’s stucco house grey one story walking in the sun as children we
spent hours picking the glass pieces off and secreting them away to our pockets
in the garden she pushed her hands into dirt the way her mother showed her as a
little girl she followed her mother across the garden she had her own little
plot where she scattered seeds or sometimes pushed them. today she grew beets
an carrots ad cucumbers.
“Sarah,” her mom would say, “you
need to cultivate your plants or they’ll
never yield.”
Sarah, four, wasn’t altogether sure
she knew what cultivate meant. Or yield. But she would work quickly, and
imitate what her sister Beatrice did, if only to get her mother to leave her
alone for her real work. She worked quickly so she would have time, each day,
to move to the remotest part of her small patch and—pretending to weed—she’d
peer into the soil, under the plants, at the insects and…..
_________
Prompt: Glithy
Glithy – if this is a
word, what might it mean? Mostly, good for a parlour game. Keep the others
guessing.
Glithy – let me
attempt to explore the sound, sight and images that arise from this od and
unknown word. If my approach is onomatopoeic, I confront an entity both shiny
an slick, arising from word associations to “glittery” and “slick.” But let me
cast my gaze beyond the most obvious. Can I go further, deeper into the
psychology or entomology of the word. I think of “lithesome”—a slim and
graceful being, but must not overlook “pithy”—tough and strong.
_________
Prompt: When X died, I
thought he would ever come back...
I’ve
heard lots of stories about people who come back after they die; well I guess
just ghost stories. I always figured that these ghosts or returning spirits
might just be a fabrication in the mind of a living person that maybe their
loss is so acute, the one left behind creates
He
never really died. He appeared dead, but he woke up too early, after people
left him. So it appeared he was a ghost He walked up fro the table, went home
quietly and then proceeded to pack an ____ of his bags and straightened out his
affairs. The police and the Interpol in England and France helped him to take
his death. Some very bad people were after him. He packed everything, got all
his money and passports, and ID and flew all the way to Olaine, Latvia to
become Dave Seglins – or Dave Lorbergs – one of his Latvian ancestors. He spoke
fluent Latvian. And it was arranged to stay with his many rich relations there.
Sheiks. They were royalty, owning a lot of land. There he would be ______
playing Backgammon, cards, all ay in the local pubs.
_________
Prompt: Describe a memory
with a tree.
Trees
have always been somewhat majestical and mysterious, yet sturdy and safe,
especially while I was young but still it seems to have a hold on me,
today. So many times my twin and I would
go out and sit under a particular tree about (maybe) 50 yards from our front
door. Between the
door and the tree was a field of wild grasses and in spring the poppies and dandelions
would shoot up, racing to capture the sun before the grass could overtake them.
Once they were one, seeds and blooms blown away and dried, the grass would
reign supreme, rising to two feet high before they would turn to seeds
themselves. My cat Maples would disappear in there an I remember sitting on the
porch, looking for movements.
_________
Prompt: Pathway.
The
pathway underneath the bridge reminded me of my old school. Claustrophobic. I walked
out and the light engulfed me. I walked along the left side. Old homes dotted
the street, apartment buildings disrupted the flow of design. People were
friendly.
“Good morning,” said the woman with the
large dog. I said good morning back and smiled.
That was nice, I thought, as I
continued walking Feels good to be here. Feels familiar. And people are
friendly. I can relax now….
“Excuse me.” I heard the woman again.
I turned around quickly.
She came back towards me with her large
dog.
“ I don’t think we’ve met,” she said.
Her ice-blue eyes seemed to penetrate my soul.
“No, I’m new around here.”
_________
Prompt: Fencepost.
Some
poet said, “Fences make good neighbours” True. They keep people out, though,
while protecting your property. Of course, they keep animals and kids in. A
fence is basically a mini-wall. We’ve heard a lot about Walls lately. We’ve had
several famous walls through the ages – the Great Wall of China – Hadrian’s
Wall – and more recently The Berlin Wall which, when it came down was
celebrated globally What walls do we put up, and why? It does always seem to be
about self-protection—or hiding. We have firewalls to protect our data. Some
argue that if we have nothing to hide then
we wouldn’t mind. But thi is also about tone, attitude, plus bigotry,
judgement, as well as perception. Look at many work camps, whether in Third
World countries, prisons, concentration camps, etc.
_________
Prompt: A life ambition never realized.
·
Marriage
·
Children
·
PhD
·
Travelling
the world
·
Full
time work
·
Meeting
The Queen and family
·
Meeting
Nelson Mandela
·
Getting
the Nobel Prize for Literature
·
Having
a relationship with my father
·
Getting
to know my Grandpa G_____
·
Having
siblings
·
Stepfather
She
put the list down and walked outside. It was sunny and the grass was wet on her
bare feet. The list remained in her head, lit up like a sign. So much undone.
She wondered when the list had first formed. As a child, had she listed PhD as
one of her ambitions? When did she first decide that marriage would be an
ambition and not merely something that happened, often by accident? When did
children stop being something to be avoided? And when did those items o the list
slip from being needy things she would do tomorrow, or the next day, to things
gone forever, lost into the sands of another person’s life, a person of the
same shape and size of herself but whose life charted a different course,
filled perhaps with the chaos of children, a half-angry husband, a house, a
degree?
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