Prompt 16 - alternative interpretations

Take a newspaper headline, or a book title, a poem title etc., that you find somehow interesting or curious (ideally without reading anything but the title) and use it as the title of a piece of writing - any kind of text.

If you feel like playing along, then post up what you've written on your blog and leave a message in the comments here - one (or both) of us will be over to read what you've written.

If you have any ideas for future prompts then let us know, we'd love to hear them and would of course credit you with it should the prompt be used.

Prompt 15: Photos

Write something that links these photos together:

If you’d like to share what you come up with, post it up on your blog and leave a comment below with your post’s url.  At least one of us will come over and read it.

Thank you.

(All the photos were taken by me)

Prompt 14 - letter in a bottle

I had an idea for a prompt that I just couldn't quite put into words in a way that would make sense, so I'm shelving that prompt until I can find a way to explain it!

Instead, here's another one...

I read recently about a small boy in Russia who found a letter in a bottle on the beach, it was written by a German boy in the 1980s. The Russian boy's dad helped him to read it and wrote back. The German 'boy' is now about 30 and the two of them have written to each other.

As a child I was always fascinated by the idea of a finding a letter in a bottle, but never actually wrote one (I think it's something to do with having been taught only to throw rubbish in bins).

'Letter in a bottle' is this week's theme - either write one (even without necessarily sending it) or write one that you imagine finding on the beach. Or how about a story or poem somehow based on the idea?

'Letter in a bottle' ...you can see I'm feeling quite summery!

If you feel like playing along, then post up what you've written on your blog and leave a message in the comments here - one (or both) of us will be over to read what you've written.

If you have any ideas for future prompts then let us know, we'd love to hear them and would of course credit you with it should the prompt be used.

Prompt 13: But that's impossible

Think of something that could not happen.  Then write about it as if it did happen.  It can be as ordinary or fantastic as you wish.  Poem, story, whatever comes up. 

If you’d like to share, post it up on your blog and leave a comment below with your post’s url.  At least one of us will come over and read it.

Thank you.

NB.  I can’t take total credit for this prompt – it is an adapted exercise from the excellent book Writing the Life Poetic by Sage Cohen, and also inspired by the work of Shane Jones.

Prompt 12 - in one breath

Find a word in the dictionary that inspires you. Write a short poem inspired by it. Take a deep breath and read it out loud. If it's too long to read in one breath, edit. Make it shorter. The one-breath poem. Imagine being able to emit poems each time you breathed out...

Prompt 11: Four Lines

Write or type these four lines* at random onto a page…

“its kneading mouth”

“forgive me”

“arms full of fire”

“they were delicious”

Then go back to the top of the page and start writing, being aware as you do that you will need to incorporate these lines into whatever it is you are writing.  Resist the urge to move them from their spot on the page.  If you can’t make it make sense, then so be it.  If you can let go of a need to control and let in a bit of chaos, who knows what might happen.

If you'd like to share what you've written, however rough or polished, post it on your blog and leave a comment below with your post's url.  At least one of us will come over and read it.

Thank you.

*These lines come from two poems, Dylan Thomas's Ceremony After a Fire Raid and William Carlos Williams' This is just to say.

Prompt 10 - the empty page

Sometimes making the first mark on a page is daunting. Sometimes I prefer not to write, for fear of messing it up. 'Messing it up' is only an inevitable part of the process that's really more productive than not.

Take a sheet of A4 paper and a pen. Begin to write until you have filled the page ...both sides of it even, why not? Don't think before-hand. Don't have any expectations. Don't edit. Just write. See where your pen and your instinct take you. Only stop when the page is full. Have a read through. Put it away for a few days. Have another look. Is there anything you'd like to work with and develop further? Then do. If not, that's fine, it was still an exercise in over-coming the fear of the white page.

If you feel like playing along, then post up what you've written on your blog and leave a message in the comments here - one (or both) of us will be over to read what you've written.

If you have any ideas for future prompts then let us know, we'd love to hear them and would of course credit you with it should the prompt be used.