Prompt: Take a long span of time (on the scale of several years or decades, for example) and condense it into several lines that summarize the change over time. Things to explore include describing a child growing into an adult, the fall of a civilization, or cycles of life.

Prompt: Find the words that correspond with your initials and use them to write pleasure into your piece.

Against a backdrop of silence, the dry grass whispered as bale was tugged against bale. I flared my nostrils, taking in the scent of warm hay. My hooves danced despite themselves, packed mud creaking beneath my weight. They would start at the far end, carrying dinner on a pitchfork and depositing it before moving on to the next stall, so I had seven minutes before the hay would be enclosed in my teeth, chewed and swallowed with reverence, then my blanket removed, my back scrubbed in small circles with a rubber brush, blanket replaced, and head bowed with sleep alongside my neighbors… seven minutes until the best part of my day. Not that anyone was counting.

Prompt: Share a line or two (or three or four) from a current writing project of yours that you are really proud of. Context optional.

As long as you get good at accepting the bad with the good and being grateful for all of it, the joy is yours. Invite it in, pray for it, wait for it, honor it.

Prompt: Write a piece, a poem, a few sentences that opens with “Oh shoot, not again” but without using the delete button. No cheating 😉 Commit to wherever your mind leads you.

Oh shoot, not again. Planned to get routine labwork done only to pull up to Kaiser to find out about a nationwide strike happening. Serendipity led me to meander the streets of the Inner Richmond ala Clement Street and alas I found myself at Arsicault. Serendipity tapped me on the shoulder and said, “You should take this opportunity to get a croissant”. I found myself smacking a ham & cheese croissant while walking by the most beautiful brick Art Deco middle school in the City. When plans go awry, you make new ones.

Prompt: Take the word season. Next, write down the first word or phrase you associate with it. Associate your next word with the one before it. So on and so forth until you reach ten words.

Season
Spices
Spicy
Sweat
Club
Bump & grind
Oh god, not him!
Dancing
Need it
Embodied

— — — — — —

Season - change - evolve - erupt - heartbreak - loss - empty - anew - effort - betterment

— — — — — —

season
change
me
please
I
can't
be
this
any
more

Prompt: Write a goodbye letter.

To my soon-to-be ex-husband,

Strange to be sharing this anonymously before I share with you. I’ve been circling this thought for a long time and I’m writing this out partly to see how it feels. The kids are grown and out of the house and theoretically that should open us up to a new stage of our relationship, right? I am not sure it has. In fact, I’m certain it hasn’t. We’ve regressed. We’re strangers. We’re together and alone. Outside of whatever we have, my life overflows and I must tend to it. I want to tend to it. For as much it is flowing, it flows my way and seeks me out. It calls for me. It needs me. You do nothing of the sort. It is a privilege to engage with me and your lack of action shows me your truest response. In fairness, I am not reflecting my desires for you in my own actions either. And so I admit we are both not putting in enough of ourselves to to continue on together.

You fail only if you stop writing.