Sealey Challenge Time with prompts Inspired by Natasha Trethewey

Today starts the annual Sealey Challenge began by poet Nicole Sealey ten years ago to encourage people to read more poetry! If you cannot read a chapbook or short collection every day this month, try to read a poem or a few from a collection.

Check out the site for a recommended reading list, for ways to connect to others and for other great ways to participate: https://www.thesealeychallenge.com. I loved the suggestion for parents to participate by reading poems to their children. You can also download the bingo card at the site.

I won’t be able to finish a chapbook and post prompts every day this year, but I hope to post more frequently this month than I have been. I will likely revisit favorite collections and chapbooks.

I reread Natasha Trethewey’s incredible Native Guard last night and cannot recommend it enough.

It was difficult to choose just one poem, but I have been thinking a lot about time and pathways and destinations, that nowhere I go can I leave all of myself behind but everywhere I leave pieces.

For the first prompt, describe a short trip you made: the road signs, scenery and your eventual destination.

The next prompt is to write a list poem of all that “will be waiting when you return” from a trip or a permanent change in your life such as giving birth, marrying or moving away the first time for a job or college.

For the third, use the line “someone will take your picture:” as your title or first line or as a ghostline (erased after you’ve finished the drafting your poem). Be sure to credit the poet for the line.

The last prompt is to write a story or poem using the following list of words: “home,” “south,“ “ticking,” “coast,” “stitches,” “threatening,” “blank,” “board,” “photograph” and “waiting.”

While I usually specify that a prompt is for poetry, a particular poetry form or a short story, please use the prompts for whatever writing you wish to do.

Bonus prompt: write whatever this photograph inspires. Good luck reading poetry this month! Have fun writing!

“Perhaps churches”—Prompts Inspired by Czeslaw Milosz

Czeslaw Milosz’s “At a Certain Age” is a fun poem. I love the idea of chasing clouds, the wind, people and pets for forgiveness and that ending image of the toad. I am too thin skinned to be a toad, more like a frog, skin slick and slime covered. But, yes, all along I was a frog sitting on my rump in the damp muck, perched and parched for kisses.

For the first prompt, write a confession in an epistolary (letter) poem or story and address your confessor directly.

For the second, write in prose or verse whose confession you need to hear. What penance, if any, would you assign?

The third prompt is to write a story about trying to confess, but, as with the poem, no person, no creature, nothing will listen. Nothing in existence or beyond can absolve you (or your protagonist).

For the next prompt, write an essay and use the poem’s title, “At a Certain Age,” for your own title, giving the poet credit.

The last prompt is to write a poem or story using the following list of words: “takers,” “succeed,” “order,” “immoral,” “conversations,” “vodka,” “prolonged,” “churches,” “noble” and “eyelid.”

Bonus prompt: write an ode (praise poem) to this frog or to its surroundings.

Bonus prompt: reflect upon poet Todd Dillard’s writing process/guide and write an essay about your own or a demonstrate it within a story or poem. Or create a meme for your own process and editorial guide. Have fun.

Good luck writing.

“thin light on water”—Prompts Inspired by Linda Gregg

How is your writing progressing? Are in you in a good flow? Do you write daily or sporadically?

I am still not finishing any drafts, although I am reading more again, which usually restarts my own writing practice. I am trying not to push too hard because the focus on a “finished” piece is counterproductive for me. I remind myself that even when I am not actively writing, I am still working on lines and fragments of poems in my “backbrain.”

What helps me most is finding writers to learn from. “We Manage Most When We Manage Small” is a lovely poem by Linda Gregg, whose ability to match content to form I deeply admire. The brief phrases, the breaking of lines mid-thought and the juxtaposition of images all embody the ephemerality of living.

In contrast to Linda Gregg’s poem, write a poem or story about permanence. Adjust line length, syntax and word choice to fit with this theme.

The second prompt is use the line “Fragile and momentary, we continue” for the starting point of a poem or story. You can then erase the line, still crediting the poet for the ghostline. If you prefer, retain the line, either in italics or within quotation marks, and complete it by adding a word or phrase such as “breaking” or “to transcend.”

For the third prompt, build a poem from brief interactions between people or creatures. Let the images speak for themselves.

The last prompt is to write a poem using the following list of words: “birds,” “hurry,” “reach,” “ignite,” “fragile,” “huddle,” “leans,” “quickening,” “touching” and “air.”

Bonus prompt: write whatever this photograph of ducks and sunlight shining on water inspires. Btw, I took this photo with a filter from the old app PaperCamera.

Good luck writing! Wish me luck too!

“A flinch of sky”—Prompts Inspired by Emma Bolden

Once again I am sharing a poem by Emma Bolden whose writing leaves me breathless and aching. I hope you like it “Postdiluvian” as much as I do.

For the first prompt, take an origin story or creation myth and make it your own.

For the second, blend two senses as the poet did in the lines “See in the distance the gray sound of a bird / without the gray bird.” If you experience synesthesia, anchor a poem or story with that phenomenon or reflect upon it in an essay.

The third prompt is to use the line “See we had lived so long in gleam” as a ghostline, erasing the line after you’ve drafted the poem or story and crediting the poet.

For the next prompt, write a poem or story using the following list of words: “flinch,” “iridescence,” “electric,’ “beasts,” “glint,” “abandon” “gleam,” “sore,” “wheel” and “world.”

The last prompt is to print out the poem and read it aloud, underlining the words that resonate for you and using those words to build your own poem or story. Btw, “Postdiluvian” was originally published in issue 32 of The Asheville Poetry Review; you can check out the entire issue here: https://ashevillepoetryreview.com/back-issues/issue-32/.

Bonus prompt: write a story or poem in which the water’s reflection breaks into a humming or soft pulling.

Good luck writing!

“Tomorrow, I’ll be at the table”—Prompts Inspired by Langston Hughes

I could not celebrate the 4th of July or the 250th. I am too ashamed of the harm we have done and are doing right now: building concentration camps, enabling genocide, removing aid to sick and starving people across the world and endangering the very land and water and all its inhabitants.

But we can build a better world for everyone and create a country that lives up to its stated ideals. If Langston Hughes who suffered injustices beyond my imagination retained hope in his lifetime, I can too.

For the first prompt, write about your place within America or the world. What future do you want to help create?

For the second, write about this nation’s birth in an essay or poem. What event or period embodies its founding?

The third prompt is to use the line “They’ll see how beautiful I am” as a ghostline. Remember to erase the line and credit the poet in an after statement or in your title after drafting your poem or story.

The next is to write a poem or story using the following list of words: “sing,” “brother,” “kitchen,” “well,” “strong,” “tomorrow,” “table,” “beautiful,” “ashamed” and “America.”

Bonus prompt: write about whatever this photo inspires.

Bonus prompt: write about taking the sentient skull of one of the Founders for a drive through modern America and answering his questions about what has happened since his death. What do you demand of him?

Mercy in Its Myriad Forms—Prompts Inspired by J. Sullivan

I am always fascinated by how differently people perceive kindness and how vast the distance is between intent and reaction in social interactions. J. Sullivan’s poem “Mercy” embodies these discrepancies in a clear narrative.

For the first prompt, write about a scene or a past event in which two people commit contrasting acts of mercy or kindness.

For the second, use the line “And I was about to leave you” as a ghostline, erasing the line and crediting the poet after you have drafted the poem.

The third prompt is to write about a time you attempted to save a creature and failed. Did the animal or insect understand you were trying to help? Did it cling to you or attempt to flee?

For the last prompt, write a poem or story using the following list of words: “garden,” “summer,” “praying,” “bright,” “fizzled,” “fingertips,” “save,” “pain,” “softly,” “surprised” and “mercy.”

This photo is of a luna moth I tried to rescue from a river. I am unsure if it had already drowned by the time I saw it floating on the water or if my movements and subsequent splashes are what ultimately killed it. Write whatever this photo or story inspires.

Good luck writing.

The “impulse to inhibit grace”—Prompts Inspired by Megan McDermott

Happy Sunday—or what is left of it. I hope your weekend was good and you are ready for the work week. I am not and should be in bed, but there is poetry to push me onward.

Megan McDermott’s “Not Me” beautifully questions the borders and definitions of identity. I hope you find it as compelling as I did.

For the first prompt, try to delineate the borders of yourself and those around you. How much of your father is smiling behind your mouth; was your sense of humor built upon his and the movies and TV shows you watched together? How much of your mannerisms are copies of your mother’s? How many of your favorite in-jokes with your partner or an ex came from someone they never met, that they assumed were yours and now shared between only the two of you. How much of your writing is a reflection or a rejection of the writers who came before you began making your own poems, stories and worlds?n

The second prompt is to imagine yourself as a stained glass window in a cathedral. Describe the scene depicted, if any. What or who is the light shining through you?

For the third, write a poem, story or essay that attempts to answer one of the three questions McDermott asks in the poem.

The next prompt is to fill in the last word of the line “Maybe every identify needs to stay a” with your own noun instead of the poem’s “paradox” and use it for a ghostline.

The last prompt is to write a poem or story using the following word list: “asserts,” “humility,” “cracks,” “impulse,” “grace,” “needs,” “blinkering,” “bulbs,” “unfastened“ and “hands.”

Bonus prompt: write about the differing sources of light and interplay of colors onto this castle’s shapes and textures as a metaphor for the soul/intellect and the body.

Good luck writing!

“We Turn Together”—Prompts Inspired by Ellen Bass

Here is another beautiful love poem. Ellen Bass is a treasure.

For the first prompt, write a love poem using the imagery of animal mates.

The second prompt is to use the line “we come to this. I bind myself to you,” as a ghostline. Remember to erase the line after you’ve drafted your poem and credit the poet in an after statement or in your title.

The third prompt is to write about the experience of sleeping with your partner or a former lover, not the sex but sleeping together in the same bed. Horror stories are equally welcome here as love poems.

The last prompt is to write a poem using the following list of words: “floundered,” “separate,” “bind,” “wrapped,” “current,” “steal,” “sleep,” “together,” “rocked,” and “pebbles.”

Bonus prompt: Here is Pebbles sleeping on a lap. Write a poem about cuddling with a pet.

Good luck writing!

“What is Not”—Prompts Inspired by Malia Maxwell

“In the not-not-woods” is a poem that rewards multiple readings. I hope you like it as much as I did. If you want to listen to the poet read it aloud, click on this link: https://poets.org/poem/not-not-woods.

For the first prompt, write about moving to a new place and missing the landscape you left, what plants or terrain would you look for and not find. I found the flat, cloudless skies in Texas hard to enjoy at first, although I fell in love with the wildlife and rugged landscape. I still miss its spring bluebonnets and the rocky ledges.

The second prompt is to describe the areas lacking public access. I was surprised by how much of the coast is closed off in areas.

The third prompt is to embed the memories of a loved one within descriptions of the land. What lessons can you remember; can you still hear their voice?

For the next prompt, write a poem using the following list of words from the poem: “gnaws,” “deflated,” “scab,” “fault,” “frothy,” “poison,” ”plumes,” “apologies,” “hemlocks,” “cedars,” “shake” and “wailing.”

The last prompt is to predict what your home will look like in a hundred years. Who and what will remain?

Bonus prompt: write whatever comes to mind with this autumn sunset.

Good luck!

Multiplying Gravities—Prompts Inspired by Maya C. Popa

Five more days to go! I hope you are keeping up (better than I am)!

I thoroughly enjoy the imagery and craft here. If you like the poem too, check out Maya C. Popa’s books and classes: https://www.mayacpopa.com. So many books to add to the towering stacks.

For the first prompt, define what a love poem is within your poem, relying on metaphor (or multiple) to explain.

For the second, build the poem around the extended metaphor of the poem as a room, inviting the reader in.

The third is to use the line “Look how we’ve made” a ghostline, erasing the line after you’ve drafted the poem and crediting the poet.

The last is to write a poem using the following list of words: “window,” “remainder,” “whale,” “affection,” “patient,” “dissolving,” “convention,” “gravities,” “blink,” “gallery “and “likeness.”

Bonus prompt: write a poem about entering this reflected world.

Good luck!

“Even when it breaks”—Prompts Inspired by Kelly Grace Thomas

If you ever have a chance to join a workshop led by Kelly Grace Thomas or hear her read, I recommend you do. She is inspiring and encouraging. I love the simplicity and poignancy of her “Soft Discipline.”

For the first prompt, make a list of achievements and kindnesses and a second one of horrors and tragedies. Look at the two lists for resonance between items and build a poem from those.

The second prompt is to the last line, “Even when it breaks” as a ghostline, remembering to erase the line after drafting the poem and crediting the poet.

The third prompt is to write a poem using the following wordlist: “days,” “miracle,” “bullet,” “salted,” “born,” discipline,” “even,” “breaks” and “heart.”

For the last, write a response to this poem, addressing the poet in the title.

Bonus prompt: write about a redwood forest or whatever this photo inspires.

Good luck!

World Book Day—Prompts Inspired by Patricia Hooper

So today is another holiday, World Book Day, celebrating books and reading. I think Patricia Hooper’s poem “The World Book” is perfect for it. I love how the poem references volume “S” of the encyclopedia set (yes, the pun was intentional), expanding from the subjects inside its pages to the narrator noticing the objects around her. For me, reading opened doorways into new worlds, ones far from my small town, but also led me back to better understand that place and people.

If you want to hear Patricia Hooper read “The World Book” aloud, click on the link: https://poets.org/poem/world-book.

For the first prompt, choose a letter and build a poem around words beginning with that letter. For a really difficult challenge, write a poem about losing a letter and gradually omit the letter and additional ones.

The second prompt is to take a volume from the encyclopedia and flip to a random page. The first word you notice will be your subject. See what happens.

For the third prompt, use the lines “the woman get owned them skipped / to the solar system and said” as your first lines. You can choose to erase them after finishing your poem or keep them in, italicized or within quotation marks. Either way, remember to credit the poet for your inspiration.

The last prompt is to build a poem using the following wordlist: “volume,” “leafing,” “ships,” “skipped,” “saucers,” “diagram,” “miles,” “leave,” “swirling,” “world” and “secrets.”

Bonus prompt: what question does the bookstore’s feline guardian ask and what answer do you give to gain admittance?

Good luck writing!

Delayed Earth Day Prompts

Sorry for the delay. I wasn’t feeling well last night.

I chose this poem not just for Earth Day but also for its collaboration. I love the connections and responses of each piece. I would like to join on more projects with other writers and artists. If you would like to hear the poets read their pieces, click on the link: https://poets.org/poem/earth-day-collaborative-poem.

The first prompt is to write your own response, perhaps repeating one of the lines from the individual sections as entry point.

For the second prompt, use the line “until we learn to doubt its existence” as a ghostline. Remember to erase the line after drafting your poem and give credit to the poet.

The third prompt is to write about the changes you’ve noticed. Perhaps you no longer see fireflies as you once did or you notice summer comes sooner and lasts longer, that droughts are more common or storms are stronger and more frequent.

The next prompt is to write a poem using the following list of words: “frenzied,” “congregation,” “confetti,” “entwined,” “tipping,” “severed,” “drifting,” “tempered,” “excess,” “spiral,” “monstrous,” “husk” and “rising.”

The last prompt is to collaborate with another poet this month.

Bonus prompt: write a poem to (or from) this dolphin.

Good luck writing!

Whorl—Prompts Inspired by Rosalie Moffett

So much movement in Rosalie Moffett’s “Happy.” I need to read more of her writing. Today was a day in which I did not write; my head was stagnated, so I appreciate this poem’s motion even more.

For the first prompt, write a poem in which movement is predominant.

For the second, write about an interaction between two species even if one is unaware of the other, such as a cat watching birds outside the window.

The third prompt is write about technology and the natural world. How does one try to control or manage the other?

For the last, write a poem using the following list of words from the poem: “stops,” “fence,” “switch,” “crawl,” “barrier,” “foreseen,” “relief,” “whorl,” “disappear,” “prayer” and “scatters.”

Bonus prompt: write about what is happening here or whatever this photo inspires.

Good luck writing!

Abecedarian of Joys—Prompts Inspired by Arielle Hebert

I hope your Sunday is a good one. Perhaps you are trying to catch up on poems as I am. May this poem, its lovely catalog of joys, its generous spirit and its use of the abecedarian form all inspire you to cherish the day.

If you would like to hear the poet read Our Book of Delights aloud, click this link: https://poets.org/poem/our-book-delights.

For the first prompt, write an abecedarian of your own, a form in which the first letter of each line is in alphabetical order. If you would like the form’s history and more examples from the Academy of American Poets, here is the link: https://poets.org/glossary/abecedarian.

The second prompt is to write a poem starting with the line “Open the door. No one can” and completing the statement with your own verb. Remember to italicize the line or place it within quotation marks, crediting the poet in an after statement or in your title.

The third prompt is to describe spring in your area—the weather, wildlife and vegetation—as lushly as you can. Overindulge yourself; be lavish in your praise and excessive in your delight.

The fourth is to begin a poem or stanza with a barefoot child, that memory or image, and see where it takes you.

The next is of course the inevitable wordlist: “drizzle,” “tropical,” “palms,” “sugar,” “hand-picked,” “braiding,” “wine,” “surprise,” “match,” “bread,” “enough,” “door,” “zigzagging” and “coming.”

For the last prompt, read the poem aloud (or listen to the poet reading her poem) and write down the words that most resonate for you. That list will be your own from which to build a poem.

Bonus prompt: write about running water, moss and ferns or whatever comes to mind from this photo.

Birdsong—Prompts Inspired by Gary Young

The cats and I are enjoying all the birds visiting to eat our birdseed: cardinals, blue jays, mourning doves, red-winged blackbirds, sparrows and sometimes even an Eastern bluebird.

For the first prompt, describe the animal sounds outside your home. What birds wake you up? Do you hear cicadas or tree frogs? The screeching of neighborhood cats or dogs howling at a train? If you want, add traffic noise and sirens? Divide the day and night by these sounds, ending with an image/simile of the animal.

The second prompt is a writing exercise: rewrite the poem changing only the nouns, replacing the birds with the sounds of city life. See what happens. If you like a particular line, make that a ghostline and go from there.

The third prompt is to use the last line, “played on a flute carved from bone,” as a ghostline. Remember to erase the line after you finish drafting a poem and credit the poet.

The last prompt is (of course) write a poem from the following wordlist: “dawn,” “scold,” “feeder,” “screeching,” “course,” “canyon,” “break,” “mourning,” “breathy,” “echoes,” and “bone.”

Bonus prompt: write from the perspective of this cardinal, who is waiting for more birdseed.

Good luck writing.

Absence—Prompts Inspired by Richard Siken

Today I got to hear great poems and discussions about archival processes and hybrid collaborations. My head is too full to untangle, so I apologize if this post is even more disorganized than usual.

Richard Siken’s poem embodies the feeling I had as the tagalong little cousin, the youngest, at reunions, all the others so much older and bigger and more important. I often played by myself somewhere out of the way, lost in my head, in the clouds, invisible.

For the first prompt, choose a line from a move and let it become a powerful metaphor as the poet did with the quote from The Matrix. I like that the narrator says his stepbrothers wouldn’t take him to the movies but later quotes a movie he’d seen to describe himself.

For the second prompt, juxtapose a series of opposites as the poem does, “hypotheticals” and “real,” “capacity” and “nothing” and “full” and “empty.

The third prompt is to use the poem’s question “What did I know that no one else knew?” as a ghostline. Remember to erase the line after drafting your poem and credit the poet with an after statement or in the title.

The last prompt is to build a poem using the following list of words: “blades,” “pressing,” “tools,” “solid,” “bounce,” ”absence,” “hands,” “shapes,” “blurry,” “capacity” and “invisible.”

Bonus prompt: write whatever this photo of the sky inspires.

Good luck!

Greening—Prompts Inspired by Ada Limón

There was good news in the world today, but it has been a hectic week, and I needed this poem. I hope reading it helps you too. If you want to listen to the poet read it aloud, click on the link: https://poets.org/poem/instructions-not-giving.

For the first prompt, write what spring (and hope) means to you.

The second prompt is to write about what you see outside your window or on your way to work: what ordinary thing—the neighbor’s tree, perhaps the trilling bird calls, or the purple house you pass by—brightens your morning or welcomes on your way home.

I love the descriptions: “cotton candy-colored,” “taffy” and “confetti.” While I enjoy the narrator’s admiration for the steady green leaves, let’s celebrate the gaudy. Describe a world of sweets and carnivals.

The next is to write a poem using the following list of words: “funnels,” “limbs,” “slate,” “taffy,” “trinkets,” “confetti,” “plodding,” “skin,” “slick” and “palm.”

For the last prompt, use the partial line “When all the shock of white” as a ghostline. Remember to erase the line after you’ve drafted the poem and credit the poet in your title or in an after statement.

Yes, I know I should post a photo of a tree in all its green glory, but this bottlebrush is the one I see outside kitchen window. This is the tree that welcomed us into this home and entertains us and the cats with the birds it provides a landing, the same tree we thought lost to the harsh winter and had to cut down to almost the ground. It is back and beautiful. The shadow is mine, as I admire its healthy blooms.

So for the bonus prompt, write about coming back from the cold in glorious fashion.

Good luck!

Revived—Prompts Inspired by Jesse Arlen

I am fascinated by multilingual poets, their ability to create layered meaning in multiple languages, how one language can set the frame for another and all the choices required in translating from one language to another. My friends who write bilingual poems convey meaning and emotion even if readers do not speak both languages.

If you wish to learn more about the poem’s languages, including the Egyptian hieroglyph, and hear Jesse Arlen read it aloud, you can click on this link: https://poets.org/poem/tree-1.

For the first prompt, write a poem in your first language and provide an English translation or vice versa.

The second prompt is to write how you would discover or recreate your history, that of your people, your family or your individual self. Where would you search, what items you use and whose testimonies would you gather? 

The third prompt is to write a poem using the following list of words: "bearer," "extinct," "parchment," "secret," "potion," "herbs," "elixir," "barren" and "revived."

The last prompt is to write a one-sentence poem, broken up into stanzas, that represents an essential goal of your life. 

As always, these prompts can be used for short stories and essays. 

Bonus, prompt, write about these mushrooms that appeared the next day after a rain. One seems to be wearing another mushroom as a hat.

Good luck writing.

“A Break from Dread”—Prompts Inspired by Suzanne Cleary

I had forgotten how much I enjoyed receiving a great poem emailed to me through poem-a-day and discovering new poets to enjoy. Today, as the poem's narrator states, I do "need a break from dread."  I admire how even though the poem begins by telling us no one was hurt, I still didn't expect the precise details or the clear visualization of the dog at the poem's ending.

Click on the link to hear the poet read “Mercury”: https://poets.org/poem/mercury.

For the first prompt, write a narrative poem that begins by telling the story's end (that no one was hurt or that someone was or that someone died). Focus on the building of details to bring about a satisfactory conclusion. 

The second prompt is to use the line “no one seems to be at the wheel” for a ghostline. Remember to erase the line after drafting the poem and credit the poet perhaps in an after statement or the title.

A third prompt is to write a poem entitled “Mercury” that incorporates the car model, the metal and the planet. Bonus points if you include the fact that mercury, the only metal liquid at room temperature, tarnishes in humidity.

For the last, write a poem using the following list of words: “buttons,” “brake,” “mercury,” “speed,” “leveled,” “break,” “wheel,” “circles,” “circuitry” and “living.”

Bonus prompt: write whatever this photo inspires.

Good luck writing.