Plotters Ink Workshop 1 (1/12/17) - Writers' Exercises

You can review the workshop guidelines here. 

We invited the participants to submit their stories and poems to the blog. 

Here is a sample of their creativity: 

Writing Exercise # 1.  

 Participants produced and then  exchanged lists of random words. They were then asked  to write a story or poem incorporating those words. Five minutes was the maximum amount of time to compete the exercise.  

Random words provided to PT DeBlois:

Dad, dog, forty, building, gnome, piano, empty, ape, fire, water, eighty, dead, black.

His composition:

Dad took our dog for a walk. While they walked, they noticed an ape run down the opposite side of the street. The ape stopped at forty Branch Street that used to be a warehouse. The ape started to climb up the warehouse fire-escape. When he arrived at the seventh floor, there through the window, sat a live gnome, playing a piano. Beside the elf was an old man. He had to be close to eighty.

The ape never came down the escape route. Instead, he looked as if he was changing into Cinderella. At the same time, it started to rain. The water made the beautiful lady turn dead-black in color.

Dad noticed the ugly thing fly away into the sky.

-------

Random words provided to Cheryl Palmer:

unknown...

Her composition:

Ommmm    

Om, Om, Om

“I am calm”

Go inside the body

Set off the bomb

Release the torrent

Flood cells to their edge

Disrupting stasis

“I’m on a ledge”

Quiet turns noisy

Says, “Don’t meditate”

Think of a message

Your cells won’t berate

 ---------

Random words provided to Miriam E. Waters:

dreary, rain, spring, headache, thirsty, mud, rushed, blank, quiet

Her composition:

The muddy quiet born from a spring rain

rushed through my thirsty soul.

The dreary rain washed the darkness from my heart,

leaving a blank beginning in its wake.

Exercise (2)- 200-250 words describing an OBJECT  using all 5 senses.

            Raoul Sanchez lit a blowtorch and adjusted the nozzle for a sharp blue flame. He waved the flame back and forth over the head of the branding iron, soon painting it orange. Ceremoniously, he carried the iron over to a cot perched in one corner of his basement. On that cot lay his latest victim. She was naked, face down, and unconscious from the knock-out drug he’d slipped in her drink earlier in the evening. His heart burned with sadistic elation as he pressed the hot metal upon one of her buttocks.

            White wisps curled up for a moment and the brief sizzle of seared flesh sifted into the quiet of the sound-proofed basement. The wisps vanished, replaced by odors reminiscent of fried bacon and burnt hair. He withdrew the iron. Delicate black flakes clung to its corners. After the iron cooled, he carefully wiped it down and placed it back in its special case. The heavy head nestled within, landing with a gentle thunk.

            It was a custom-crafted tool; the Spanish word for whore -- Puta -- was wrought in the head. Raoul had paid a friend of a friend of a cousin for such a creation. Six hundred dollars exchanged hands: two hundred for the labor and four hundred for the artisan’s silence, because Raoul’s worst fear was that the branding iron’s ownership might be traced to him…

-HT Longale

The Rocker

Maw-Maw’s gnarled hand clutched the worn knobs on the oak rocker where they had rested so often over her life.  The wood, smooth as her aged palms, was familiar and soothed her mind.

The rocker, a wedding gift from her father, had been carved with great care from an oak that had towered over her during her childhood.  The chair’s proportions were generous enough to bear the weight of a man as large as her massive husband while cradling a child in his lap.  The seat was so wide it could hold two of her great-grandchildren as they played in the rocker.

Maw-Maw passed her hand along the arms of the chair, tracing the grain of the wood as if reading the memories guarded by the rocker.  So many children had been loved, and some lost, while she held them close to her breast and rocked away endless moments.

She relaxed back into the chair and rested her head on the companion that had carried her through births, sorrows, and evenings’ rest. Maw-Maw studied the grooves etched into the rocker by anxious fingers.  Once reminders of a dark time, they had evolved into a space sought out by familiar fingers for distraction or comfort.

Maw-Maw pulled the patchwork throw from between the twin acorns adorning the back of the chair and wrapped it around her small frame.  She began a slow, gentle rocking to take her away, and away, and away into the beloved past.

- Miriam E. Waters

The Christmas Cup 

As I sit at my desk, I notice my Christmas cup, even though Christmas is gone. This cup means so much when I write. It was given to me by a dear friend, also a writer, as a gift for the season. I always keep this cup full of coffee or hot chocolate on my desk when I write. I call it my “writer’s cup.” I drink five to six cups of coffee a day, then I switch to hot chocolate in the afternoons. I also use it for wine now and then in the evening hours. So, you can see, I use my cup all day long.

 I’m not superstitious, but when I am having a bad day at editing, I feel I need to refill my cup. This makes me feel as if my “writing cup” will increase my brain power, to help with my work.

 My “writing cup” is ceramic and only holds ten ounces of fluids, but it serves the purpose. There is a Christmas scene on the front. It shows a beautiful red cardinal sitting on a pine branch. Red represents Christmas. With the long needles, it must be a pine tree. Two brown pinecones sit just above the cardinal. In the background, the color is light grey, representing snow. It has a red lid to prevent spills.

I will always have my cup on my desk. If it happens to break, I have an identical twin.

- P.T. DeBlois