Week Two Creative Writing Class

Sarah Gray Rice

Monday: No classes

Wednesday: Did the reading, excused absence (dentist appointment)

Friday: Did the reading and came to class

Wednesday:

Try This 2.1 From Imaginative writing:

Liberty

Culture

Rights

Freedom

Politics

Movement

Slavery

Reemergence

Persuade

Balanced

Reemergence:

The crisp crackle of the cocoon breaking

Water slipped off her head and back into the ocean as she rose

A shower after a lifetime of filth

Brocken shackles

Persuade:

Cat’s tail caress your leg

Open hand with finger smoothly curling a couple of time

A group of friends smiling from a car with an open seat

Try This 2.2 From Imaginative writing:

Food

Sweet

Candy

Chewy

Starburst

Strawberry starburst

Strawberry star burst toasted on a fire

Caramelized crunch of a strawberry starburst toasted on a fire

Food

Grown

Boiled

Corn

Corn on the cob

Corn on the cob with butter

Try This 2.3 From Imaginative writing:

Dulled down-

Someone comforted me while I cried. I hadn’t saved Meryl. I failed. She died. If I hadn’t distracted her she wouldn’t have died. If I hadn’t taken so long, her failure wouldn’t have mattered. Now she was gone and it was my fault.

Redone-

A large coat fell over my shoulders as he handed me a handkerchief. I couldn’t bear to look because I knew she was gone. Only a few feet from safety had she fallen. If I had pumped my arms faster. If my heels had struck the ground harder then, perhaps, I could have given her those few feet. My short legs and small feet had failed me, the very had swallowed my toes as I tried to go faster. As friends gathered around me in an attempt to shield the pain from breaking my heart like glass, I knew. I knew non of them felt the sagging weight of guilt on their shoulders. However, my shoulders were dripping with it. With clingy, thick arms I could feel it consume me. It fell on me because I was in control of her fate and I had failed.

Try This 2.4 From Imaginative writing:

An old minivan drives up to McDonalds. A woman pokes her head out of the drive-through. A brown nest of hair sat on her head that looked about as ready to bust at the seams as she did. She might as well have been a kooko clock for the number of times she had to come out to consult the menu before popping back in to get her children's approval. The cars behind her honk as she retreats into her window in defeat, hoping she had gotten all the orders correct. Like an octopus, she grabbed and passed each bag of food to the corresponding seat. However, the worker at the window extended his arm once again, this time bearing a gift, the coffee she had forgotten to order throughout the pecking, scratching, and yowling from everyone in the car. Tears filled her eyes as she looked at him as though he had just given her a thousand dollars. She thanked him with the rigor of one who had just had their life sparred and drove off knowing she would inevitably return tomorrow.

Try This 2.5 From Imaginative writing:

Freedom dawned in the east

The smooth layers were as thin as water

The words flowed freely onto the page

Friday:

Response to Runyan “How to Write a Poem” Chapter 1+2:

A concept from the reading that I have never understood is the concept of free verse. Why can’t it just be a paragraph if there is no rhyming, no rhythm, and no purpose? I know this sounds harsh and unsophisticated. I have heard a lot of free verse, but it doesn’t hit me nearly as powerfully to me as old poems that had rhythm and rhyme. Reading those poems makes your heart beat to the rhythm of the words. When the words rhyme it feels like a beautiful song pouring through. Freewrite feels like disconnected thoughts like sticky notes in a drawer. It feels like there is no reason to present them as poetry because they would do the same thing in a paragraph format. I am open to learning and being proved wrong, but for now, I am confused and unexcited to write freeform. I would rather write fancy poetry or write a story, freeform feels like someone who couldn’t decide between the two.

Freewrite to Runyan: A best friend that you have fallen out of touch with

A best friend is someone you always talk to. You bear your soul to them. Growing up, you promise to be at each other’s weddings and live near each other. I think growing up I knew these things wouldn’t happen. I was a missionary. Making friends only to leave them as part of how life worked. I would make a friend and leave to make new friends. However, as the one always leaving it wasn’t till recently that I realized what it felt like to be the one left behind. When I was the one leaving I never worried about who I would hang out with because there is always someone new to introduce yourself and even if I am an introvert there are still ways to make friends. However, being the one left behind it feels like there are no new people. The person you spent all your time with is gone and everyone else has already grouped up with their friends. You can still introduce yourself but it feels different. When you become friends with someone it’s because your both, or at least one of you, are new. But when your friend leaves and you have to fill the hole they left the people around you are all people that you passed over in order to hang with your friend. They can be friends, but I am always afraid that it makes them feel like my second choice. How do I become friends with someone I have known for months and never introduced myself to? How do you ask someone their name when you have been working with them for a year? I feel stupid and unworthy. When you are a new person you have so much grace given to you for not knowing people and needing to find a friend. But when your friend leaves you are left with the awkward situation of being the leftover that didn’t connect with people despite knowing them for years. I am scared for my friends to leave because I will still be here. I will still go to the lunch room but who will I sit with? I may even work on campus but I won’t know anyone here. I can become friends with my new coworkers but those are work friends. Can you be close to a work friend or are they only friends with you at work and don’t care about you otherwise? I am scared, terrified, and slightly angry. I know that I will still have my husband who is my ultimate friend, but where will I find new girlfriends that I can hang out with and tell every story? My husband can make a friend at a drop of a coin but I have never had to make friends outside of an opportunity given to me. Where do I find that opportunity? If I don’t find it will I be forever alone with my husband?

You bear your soul to them

I think growing up I knew these things wouldn’t happen

I realized what it felt to be the one left behind

You can still introduce yourself but it feels different

afraid that it makes them feel like my second choice

I feel stupid and unworthy

I am scared for my friends to leave because I will still be here

I am scared, terrified, and slightly angry

where will I find new girlfriends that I can hang out with and tell every story to?

Where do I find that opportunity?

My Own Version of Jamaica’s Kincaid’s “Girl”:

This is how to make it to class on time; this is how to sit where you won’t get called on but can still be close to the board; this is how to cough in class without people looking at you; this is how to make you backpack heavy- because you can’t be caught without something you may need; this is how to guess what the teacher wants; this is how write what the teacher likes- not what you believe; this is how to ignore being tired; this is how to put other people before you; this is how to appear to procrastinate- because you don’t really, you just can’t understand how much time to spend on each thing and end up wasting time on something not required; this is how to pray every day; this is how to do a quick sketch; this is how to overwork yourself to blend in with people who can do it easily; this is how you pray when you need or want something; this is how to be angry; this is how to be sad; this is how to be empty even when you are full; this is how to feel lost in the center of it all; this is how to really pray- how to spill your guts out in worship; this is how to fill a planner you will never keep up with; this is how to realize that you are not alone.

Manipulated six-line poem:

The calmness of blue with the anxiety of orange (blue sky, tart oranges)

One-way roads everywhere and not clue how to navigate (roads)

Strong winds and heavy rain lull me to sleep (storm through a window)

I wish depression was not hanging so close (storm overhead)

He listens to my pain and heals me with a hug (bandaid)

Next year at this time I will still be here but it will be different (butterfly)

The calmness of blue with the anxiety of orange (blue sky, tart oranges) {

One-way roads everywhere and not a clue how to navigate (roads) {

Strong winds and heavy rain lull me to sleep (storm through a window) {the storm outside calms me to sleep}

I wish depression was not hanging so close (storm overhead)

{but the one overhead hangs too close}

He listens to my pain and heals me with a hug (bandaid) {He lets the wound bleed and then bandages it up}

Next year at this time I will still be here but it will be different (butterfly)

Responding to someone else’s image:

Vibrant colors in the sky. Flying high in their dance across the heavens. No word need be spoken, no truth be told because what was hidden has been displayed for all to see. Standing under it it’s a wonder I hadn’t seen it before. It feels natural, like a part of my soul had been missing but has returned and fallen into place. Like a part of my emotions that had lain dormant suddenly plugged in. I feel again, I see again. For a single instance, all things appear to make sense. I grasp onto it knowing that the feeling will not stay. I fight, I grab, I pull, begging to not return to the darkness. I don’t want to live in the dull tones of my life but to dance with God’s freedom and color across the sky. No longer to be bound. No longer without care or worry. Freedom in translucent color across the sky. Like a kite without strings. From a butterfly bullied by the wind to an eagle soaring in and above the strong gust. Free. Free indeed.