Just returned from Mississippi, where I felt as if I were trying to swim through molasses. I am not productive at home and seem to be even less on vacation…yikes.

But the new year has begun, and it is not a kindly one so far. More of the same. I am approaching this year on tiptoes and with my fingers to my lips.

My daughter of course chooses the opposite approach.

For the first prompt, write about your approach to the year. Will 2022 be cat lounging in a beam of sunlight, a china shop, or a raging bull?

The next prompts are inspired by Kate Baer’s “New Year.”

For the next prompt, take the first line, “Look at it, cold and wet like a” but choose another noun, not a newborn. Use this as your jumping off point. You can use this modified line as ghostline, erasing it, or keep as your opening line. Regardless, make sure to credit the poet.

The third prompt is a ghostline: use part of the last line, “It only wants to live” and describe how it (the year or something else) wants to live. What does living mean to you or to the subject.

For the last prompt, write a sonnet for the year to come using the description and language for a lover rather than that of a newborn.