Write On Wednesday, Music Madness, Writing Madness, Inspirational Madness

Tuesday, November 8, 2011

We Are Learning To Make Fire

Write On Wednesdays Exercise 23 - Write the words of Margaret Atwood at the top of your page "We are learning to make fire". Set your timer to 5 minutes. Write the first words that come into your head after the prompt. Stop when the buzzer rings.
I went a different route with this one. Though still trying to keep the prompt. As always, I love a good challenge. Hope all of you enjoy reading this! :)

I glide along the paved streets, taking in the fragments of the earth that surround me. Night lights of a neon glow converse in languages of a tiredness that I cannot seem to notice. Cars are fleeting down the streets with their music of choice. The late night conversations of left over dinners pass me by.

A couple who seem to be in the arms of the ocean, are looking at me with such oddity. This woman flounders in the ocean, waiting for her husband to save her. She feels as though love has escaped through her pores, evaporating with every second she has left on this earth. I avoid the fluid conversation with them and continue to walk towards my humble path.

Rusted mailboxes pour with unopened letters. A night of a grief stricken mother who is in fear she has lost her son. No words of coming home or see you soon written for days. The tears will soon trickle from her face as if they were a permanent marking. I still strive towards my shelter.

A map that was perhaps buried in the cracks of a building, fell from the sky. A hidden treasure lost in the depths of life, will soon be discovered. The map landed on your feet and I looked into the eyes of my future. I could feel the earth shatter, but yet everything was still.

We walked together with silent wonder. The park was our stopping point. Trees and moss surrounded us as if we were in a lagoon. Everything was quiet and still, except my heart. My spirit felt a warmth that I had never known. It was as if you were teaching me how to build my own fire - a spark that never would go out.  In that moment, I knew that I was home.

9 comments:

Madmother said...

Now I think my take on this was way off, lol.

A lot of people have taken the prompt and written about relationships and conflict. And you all have done it so uniquely and so well!

spring days, new growth said...

How interesting, I first read this as an apocalyptic piece, but on rereading can see the layering of relationships and conflct.
Madmother, any take is a good take on a prompt, because there is no "right" take!
great piece, very sparse and initially despairing, with light at the end.
Kate

No one said...

Wow! I couldn't decide if the protagonist was receiving psychic knowledge from everyone around her, or projecting stories onto the people she saw, or had simply smoked something you can't buy over a counter! This piece was very surreal and poetic and intense. Well done!

sjp said...

I liked the mysteriousness of it all, how the character was some quiet observer, flowed very nicely.

Lillie McFerrin said...

I love the descriptions of life going on around her as she makes her way towards him, towards 'home'. Awesome job!

Jayne said...

You had me hooked at this line : "Night lights of a neon glow converse in languages of a tiredness that I cannot seem to notice"
Breathtaking imagery. I also loved the couple "in the arms of the ocean"

Your blog is gorgeous btw :)

Rain said...

I also loved the languages of tiredness. From the first or second sentence and all the way to the end, I imagined the world being drenched in an unfading mist, a haze through which everything is blurry and cold and distant -- and therefore absolutely beautiful. Even after the narrator arrived "home" and sat in the park with the other person, the mist did not go away; perhaps the lagoon and the moss and the quiet and the stillness all had to do with that.

A spark in the mist... that's a beautiful vision, Stephanie. =)

/ Rain

Zanni Arnot said...

Hi Stephanie. Your words really carried me into a different place. I was lost in your 5 minute world. Thank you.

Stephanie said...

Sif - You made me LOL when I read your comment! Haha!

Thank you all for your sweet comments. I value each one of them, for they help me become a better writer.