 |
Grind Writer Elizabeth McLean holding up
the cover of Swallows Uncaged,
her book of historical fiction. |
The Grind Writers Group was invited to host a table at an
a daylong writing and publishing event, WriteOn
Vancouver, produced by the Vancouver Public Library at their iconic downtown
location on May 11th.
We accepted and everybody pitched in to copy handouts
(Margo, Glenn, Lorna); Glenn made a sign which was vital because otherwise we would
have been invisible in that lofty-ceilinged Promenade. And numerous Grind Writers manned our table and participated in a Pop-up Writing Group that
we hosted that day ... Beth Brooks who got the interactive Poetry and Story rolls
rolling ... Glenn Mori who made our sign and copied handouts and donated the
Web-press paper rolls ... Lorna Blake... Carol Flynn... Isabella Mori (A Bagful of Haiku: 87 Imperfections)... Gillian Krantz... Karen Shauber... Malcolm van Delst (Do The Wrong Thing)... Elizabeth McLean (Swallows
Uncaged); and Mark Plimley -- all of
whom who either manned the table, participated in our pop-up writing
group at the event, or both.
 |
The Promenade at the central branch
of the Vancouver Public Library downtown
l to r: Isabella, Carol; Lorna standing. |
We originally proposed holding our writing group meeting at
the WriteOn Vancouver table so people unfamiliar with how a writing group goes
could watch us, or join in and write with us. Because of space issues on the
Promenade and the fact that we’d have needed 12 chairs at least, the Library proposed
that we host a Pop-up Writing Group instead. They’d provide us the room with
tables and chairs, pens and paper, and we would provide the prompts. So that
was our other interactive activity, along with the table and the two
collaborative-writing rolls.
Round Robin writing can be quite fun. You never know what’s going
to happen—whether the collective output will be inane or profound.
ROLL ON: COLLABORATIVE WRITING
 |
Grind Writer Lorna Blake and the
interactive Story and Poetry rolls. |
|
The paper looped
over the table, and people could add to the story in different coloured felt
pens.
We decided to use that venerable and well-loved story opener It
was a dark and stormy night as the prompt. Here’s what people going by
stopped and wrote:
It was a dark and stormy night
and the leaves on the tree branches were shielding me from
the cold wind (Anastasia)
Two hawks flew out of their nets ad screetched:
Danger!!!
“Danger?!” a mocking voice cackled from the rose bushes
A crowd had gathered at the meeting place, nervously
fidgeting in silence.
As is customary in such scenes, nothing happened,
until it did. No
one expected… a 6 foot tall crow! A talking crow. A sarcastic crow. “I have loved you all my life,” cawed the crow. “Give
me warm. Give me soft.”
The crowd roared, its collective sound very much resembling the squawks of a murder of crows….
“Murder?!” said the head crow. “I have some details……..”
“It is three days from now, the aliens from the ‘Egoland’
are visiting here.”
“You’re losing it, ma. Back to Earth. We’ve enough
problems without that kind of company…”
So of he went, back to where he came from, but more
humble.
_____________________
THE POETRY ROLL
The prompt was Like
wigs that birds live in. If that seems a bit obscure, it is. Talking
with Beth Brooks one day I used the phrase (in another context, about how
complicated some things are) and she said, “There’s the prompt.” So we went
with it. It seemed mysterious enough to launch poetic images. Maybe.
Like wigs that birds live in
my hair also carries the blossoms of life (Anastasia)
These blossoms give birth to the next life (Harinder)
The next life…
will it be my last?
If it is, what do you
plan to do with it? (Gillian)
Eat chocolate, drink
wine, and dance (Bonnie)
Libraries—the people’s
university!!
Truly liberating
Liberating like the
energizing warmth of the May sun (Janna)
Digging … surfacing the
depth of emotions
Plumbing our feelings and reactions, hoping somehow,
some way, to make sense of
the incomprehensible (Margo)
The bang was given
The Trudeau was forgiven
We all hope health will
Be intro------ (?)
Spring by Hongyun Chen
Spring can never go far
The earth and the sun
are in a lifetime of courtship
The entanglement of one warm gaze
is enough to all over again
trap the heart.
_____________________
THE FREE-WRITE CHALLENGE
Our third interactive activity at our
WriteOn Vancouver table was issuing a Free-write Challenge to attendees. Depending on the kind of event, you can get a big response to this, or a
little. In this case, not too many people wanted to go off and do a 10-minute
timed free-write to a prompt we provided. But we are grateful for those who
did. Even in this small sample, genres ranged from poetry to sci-fi, social
essay, existential prose-poetry.
Free-write
A blade of grass with dewdrops on it. – Dr. Idrenne Lim Alparaque
_____________________
Free-write
Those green people? Are you shitting
me?! I mean they’re a few scales and a tail away from literally being
lizard-people! Don’t you guys read sci-fi? you really think all of sci-fi is
made up? no, don’t give me that look! I saw that flying saucer with my own eyes.
I saw that secret meeting of those so-called benevolent green-see-ers.
They see more than they want you to think,
for sure. But surely they ain’t benevolent. I don’t believe a word they say. Curing
addiction? Cleaning up tent-cities?
Please.
I’m sure they’re up to no good. I
don’t know where they’re taking all those poor people. Maybe they’re harvesting
them. And you know what?--when they run out of those, you and I are next. ’Cause
they can never get enough. Look!--there’s more and more of them each week! They’re
up in very corner! Where are all of these freaky monsters coming from? Where
have they been all this time? Oh, don’t tell me you actually believe their
stories of rebirth and being visited by the Great Green-Seer. These people are
not of this Earth.
I don’t remember any
of their faces. I mean, come on, this is a small town! It’s not like there are
so many strangers. How come none of us, or no-one we know has ever had a visit
from this Green-Seer dude?
You wanna keep waiting? Or you wanna give yourself
up like these poor folks? None have come back yet, you know. this whole
green-hub mumbo-jumbo is a sham. They’ve started with them ’cause no-one’s gonna
care I they go missing. No-one’s gonna get worried, start asking questions.
Well, I’m afraid, if we don’t start asking questions now, soon it’ll be too
late. – Kasra Hassani
_____________________
Free-write
Upside down… and mirrored.
Is it real? What is reality? Maybe that’s too much to think
about. Just take a look and let the light bounce off of the water, the trees,
the moss growing in the shade.
Take it all in without a thought of
doubt.
Do you feel it? This moment is real. –Luyi Wang
_____________________
Prompt: write a story or poem about someone struggling
with insomnia.
White Nights
Rain and wind
Outside the window
In my heart
Sleepless nights
Nuits blanches
What will I be
tomorrow?
Doors closed
Eyes shut
Soul’s a desert
Waiting for another soul
to come in
Et maintenant
Nuits Blanches. – Minh Karlsson
Free-write
Feelings are the sort of thing that
keeps an economy moving. Without feelings it would be utterly impossible for
CocaCola® to market their fizzy drinks to
teenagers by handing out free pops outside high school back doors on a hot
summer day when good-looking groups of teenagers hanging by. Unbeknownst to the
potential customers, as soon as the get hooked on it, as soon as they associate
a hot summer day with the pleasure of a gulp of a can of ice-cold Coke®, then they will forever be loyal customers to the
Soda Empire.
Without the feeling of fear and
uncertainty, home security system companies would not be able to scare single
women with the possibility of being attacked by a stranger, by their ex, by the
coworker who flirted with them at work, so as to sell them security cameras and
charge a hefty subscription fee.
Feelngs are what makes the economy go
around. Without the feeling of the need to be loved, admired, and recognized,
why would be need social networks and why would we be constantly checking our
phones? We check our iPhones®,
and realize that no-one has called, messaged, posted to our Facebook wall, the
feeling of emptiness and anxiety is unbearable.
That’s what’s driving the social networking and smartphone market. – Jon
_____________________
The
free-write rules --Set a timer for 10 minutes.
--Start
writing as soon as you’ve read the prompt; don’t overthink.
--Don’t lift
your pen from the paper (or fingers from the keyboard) for the 10 minutes.
-- Just keep
writing whatever comes to mind, no matter how silly or irrelevant it might
sound to you; and
--No editing while you write.
--Repeat every day, develop a writing practice. You can find writing prompts elsewhere in this blog.
