Today’s the day. We’re drafting the first poem from the notes and pieces of the last three days. But don’t stress about it. You have everything you need to start. (I’ve been repeating to myself an odd and unfamous bit of Anne Lamott’s (very famous) “Shitty First Drafts” essay, when her friend tries to calm her about a restaurant review, saying, “Annie, it is just a piece of chicken. It is just a bit of cake.”)
So, our poems: a piece of chicken, a bit of cake.
Prompt #1: Leaping Couplets
Review all your drafts and notes and scraps from the first three days. Circle or highlight anything you like or are drawn to, looking especially for the places that surprise you. Those prompts are here:
Choose two or three surprising or interesting moments or observations and freewrite a bit. You could aim to write a page in connection with each, or set a timer for 7 minutes.
Shape those notes and drafts into your first poem. If a formal constraint helps you, two suggestions:
use one of your sentences from April 1 as your title
write the poem in a series of closed couplets, so that each pair of lines is a complete sentence. Feel free to leap between couplets—don’t worry about the logical link from one sentence to the next.
As always, I’d love it if you would share what you’re writing or let me know how this practice is going for you.
two upcoming events
This Thursday, April 7 from 2.30-4.20PM eastern, I’m cohosting a reading, discussion, and generative writing exercise to celebrate my new anthology, The Long Devotion: Poets Writing Motherhood. It’s part of Stockton University’s Visiting Writers Series, and we’ll have contributors Jasminne Mendez, Kwoya Fagin Maples, and Joy Ladin to share their work and talk about their creative process. Following the discussion we’ll have a generative writing exercise, with time to share. It’s free, and open to the public via zoom (and on campus, if you happen to be in south Jersey). I’d love for you to join us. You can email info@murphywriting.com to get the zoom information.
And later this month, on Saturday, April 24 from 1-4pm eastern, I’ll be leading a workshop at Rutgers-Camden’s Writers House titled Writing through the Confetti Time of Caregiving. You can attend the workshop in-person or via zoom. The workshop is $60 or $10 for Camden residents. If you’ve enjoyed the prompts in this newsletter, I think you’ll really like the workshop. You can read more and register here.
I’d love to hear from you. You can always reply to this email, comment below, or find me on twitter (@nancy_reddy) and instagram (@nancy.o.reddy).