(a) for 2½ mins., generate a list of words starting with
an assigned letter of the alphabet.
(b) Write an opening sentence or a story or piece, using
word(s) from your list.
(c) Write a sentence (that may or may not be connected to
the above) using some of those words to describe a setting
(d) Now for 10 mins., free-write based on
your list of words – using them or ideas/images they conjured up.
The J list:
Janet,
jam, janky, january, july, june, juaritas, jujubes, juicy, junky, jumbled,
jambled, jamboree, jackson, Jackson, jew, jewish, jewelry, jerk, jerky, jarrow,
jack, Jack, Jackie, Jummers, jankers, jubilee, jampton, jump, jumpy, jumping,
jumper, juniper, jantlon, jantlen, jow, jabberwocky, jackhammer, jarleston,
jamp-jamperoo! Jill, Jillian, jickers, jeepers, Jan, Juanita, jallieanna-oop!
Jettison, jet, jetting, jet-ski, jet-skiing, jeppie, jazzy, jazz! Jamerique,
juop-juop-jarroo! Jarrow.
___Free-write Prompt on “J”
Jantlon scanned
the room. It was white, the room: the furniture, the walls, the drapes. Hell,
even the clothes of the people in it, himself included. Beyond the room,
looking out the floor to ceiling French patio doors, he saw July in New
Hampshire. Jantlon shifted in his seat, trying to get comfortable. He was
conscious of not letting his linen suit get wrinkled. He placed his white
fedora on the delicate table beside him.
Jump, jump, jazz – yah! Jibbity, jibbity, bee
bop boo! Badadadada, badadada! Badadada, doop doop doop – biddity, biddity,
bop, bop, bop, Badadadada, badadadada! Jantlon remembered the old tune fondly.
He wished he were “Jackson,” still, but someone had to infiltrate, someone had
to make their way into white society and see if they could get some money and
bring it back to the community.
Jantlon shook his head. The soft notes of
piano floated in the air, all grace and calm. “The musical equivalent of
Valium,” he thought.
Not that there was anything wrong with
Valium, or its musical equivalent. It was just so different from his music. In his neighbourhood, if
someone was going to play a slow song, it was going to be a plaintive blues
number, filled with the wailing or crying of a singer. Instrumentals? They
existed for dancing. And even then...
Everything he listened to had a singer. Jazz
had vocalists, even if they were just making noises with their mouths, that
didn't amount to language, or language as we generally think of it, he mused.
He looked again, out the patio doors. The
grass went on and on. Such extravagance! So much space. A green soft carpet,
almost all one colour and texture: no dandelions or Creeping Charlie.
Breathtaking? No, not that. Maybe –- yes, it could be –- breathtaking in its
homogeneity. Like a painter who uses small amounts of paint on a brush, working
it into the canvas so the viewer can't see the texture.
There was a grove of trees to the left.
Apples? And at the very back of the lawn, Jantlon could see a garden – almost a
farm, really, it was so large. Perfectly manicured rows of short plants, brown
dirt between them, stretching off into the distance.
© 2014 Malcolm van Delst.
