Tag Archives: Writing Prompt

An egg does not fight a rock – Malagasy Proverb

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Sorting out boxes with books that moved with me from the UK, I found this small pamphlet. Manchester poets Steve Waling and Francesca Pridham edited poems by members of Manchester Poets. Copies were sold at the Didsbury Festival to raise funds.

Here Fran tells us about her connection with the Madagascar Development Funds and shares some wonderful proverbs – writing prompts for your poems, flash fiction, short stories.

Madagascar

“My first contact with Madagascar came in 2013, when my husband, interested primarily in the country’s unique wildlife, persuaded me to take part in a trekking holiday there. The scenery is awe inspiring. A melting pot situated between Asia, Africa and Australia, Madagascar is the mysterious land of the ancient baobab tree, a land where pachypodiums thrive, the cat-like fossa hunts and lemurs swing from tree to tree. The most revered lemur, the Indri’s strange call wails through the rainforests, echoing the ancient isolation of the island.

The people

Despite this beauty, what however most caught my heart were the people. There is little infrastructure in the country and most villages consist of a small collection of adobe houses made from the spectacular red mud that Madagascar is famous for. The people have nothing, just the land they live on and any livestock, such as chickens or the zebu cattle that represent their wealth. Their generosity and welcome though is infectious. I gave a biscuit to a small child, four others appeared instantly, and the biscuit was shared immediately.

Credit: Puabar via Pixabay

Water

Their water supplies are often limited to streams that trickle into small muddy ponds, polluted sometimes by cattle who too have to use the water. Standing by the side of a small dirt track nearing the end of my trekking holiday I drank thirstily from a litre bottle of water I’d brought with me. Staggering down the track was an old man with his grandson, pulling and pushing at a makeshift trolley, carrying four battered plastic water containers. They had walked five miles to the nearest water supplies and were coming back to the village. 

Credit: via Pixabay

The Madagascar Development Fund

When I returned to England, I started raising money to develop water supplies and build wells in Madagascar. We are lucky enough to work with The Madagascar Development Fund, a small charity run by the ex British Ambassador to Madagascar and have provided enough money now for four wells. The charity specialises in small projects which because of the charity’s experience are achievable and can bypass the complicated political situation in the country. 

We have been lucky enough to attend the opening of one of the wells where we were welcomed into the village by singing, dancing, and drumming. We were given a welcome feast and a poem, written specially for the event was read by a young man, resplendent in what looked like a doctor’s white coat!

Malagasy Proverbs

The Madagascan culture is infectious!  Their proverbs or ohabolana capture the learning and wisdom of centuries, inspiring both thought and writing! Enjoy the poems they produce!”

Truth is like sugar cane: even if you chew it for a long time it is still sweet.
Words are like eggs; when they are hatched they have wings.
Like the chameleon keep one eye on the future and one eye on the past.
Let your love be like the misty rains coming softly but flooding the river.
Those who know how to swim are the ones who sink.
Don’t be like a shadow: a constant companion, but not a comrade.
An egg does not fight a rock.
Only thin dogs become wild.
A canoe does not know who is king: when it turns over everybody gets wet.

First lines – writing prompt

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Matthew Sweeney

We’re staying with the Writing Poetry paperback that Matthew Sweeney and John Hartley Williams wrote together for the Teach Yourself series.


In Chapter 12 they’re looking at first lines of contemporary poems, and the need to hook the reader:


Someday I will go to Aarhus
Hitler entered Paris the way
The strangest thing I ever stole? A snowman.
Brethren, I know that many of you have come here today
We gotta make a film of this, Jack.
After she left he bought another cactus.


All these lines are intriguing, but they work in different ways. The first is a vow, then we have the first half of a comparison that the reader needs to complete. The third is a question with its own answer, followed by a resolve in dialogue. Number 6 is a story that begins in the middle.


Here are first lines from some of the poems in my pamphlet A Stolen Hour (Grey Hen Press, 2020):


For just one minute of the day
If we were strangers,
His binoculars rest on the windowsill.
The week before I’d given my pleated dress away.
Bedrooms are for hiding white.
One hour was stolen from the time
I am the last stonemason.
Date of refusal decision: 13 September 2017


What do you think? Which is the one that intrigues you most and why? Feel free to use them for your freewrite, your ink waster. If you get a poem or flash fiction from a line, I’d be pleased to know!

Miniature French Suite – writing prompt

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Credit: fsHH on Pixabay

It’s a rainy weekend here in Holland. So, I’m writing the blog piece for this month’s guest poet: Steve Waling. That reminds me of this poem which I wrote on a short workshop with Steve. And it was in January 2011 that I heard the countertenor Andreas Scholl sing in the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester, UK. It’s such an experience seeing and hearing your heroes live!

Writing prompt: Combining a place and the music you (might) have heard there. Or, you could use write a miniature suite, like I did. Or, the end of the poem could come back full-circle to the beginning.

Miniature French Suite

Allemande

Do you mind if I borrow your man?
The old one with the beard that has
sparrows nesting in it. It’s only
for the Open Gardens weekend.
He needs to wear something
beige-brown, corduroy and I’ll
provide food. Tell him to wear
a cap or a southwester – something
to keep the fledglings dry.
He can hum to them. It might rain,
it could snow, warm boots.
Rameau or Telemann, I don’t mind.

Sarabande

Rameau or Telemann, I don’t mind.
A countertenor can’t be that choosy.
A voice like that is a rare find
but keeping it alive and strong taxes
me and my agent, bless her.
She tells me to let go of worries
and fears. It’s her domain to get
me engagements, book flights,
the new portrait and such.
She says a voice like mine is a horse,
that needs to be whispered to,
not broken in.

ErikTanghe on Pixabay

Gigue

I’m warming up in an empty church,
on a grey Sunday afternoon.
It’s winter, the radiators gurgle,
the conductor is late.
I let my eyes wander in order
to keep my thoughts at rest
but now they take flight,
filling the gallery, the arches
and the painting of the old one
with the beard that has
sparrows nesting in it.

(published in Another life, Oversteps Books, 2016)

On the bright side, there’s always – writing prompt

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Credit: Geralt via Pixabay

This week I’ve been going through my files and folders with poems, deleting old ones that aren’t going anywhere, finding forgotten ones, losing others because I changed the title but not the filename – you get my drift.

Prompt: Here’s a sort-of-abecedarian list poem. What would be in your alphabet?

On the bright side, there’s always:

avocados and the alphabet, a
bridge over troubled water and
chocolate, Fairtrade or not,
days which travel at their own pace into
evening and other
favourite places like Venice, beaches, the
glorious counter tenor voice of Andreas Scholl,
hairdressers who waited for us,
ink to waste, as the poet has it,
jazz, all that jazz,
kilograms to worry about,
lessons that return until learned,
maria, martini, marina,
nautical miles and naughty but nice.
Oh, let’s stop, there is a
picnic bench with a view, think of
questions, the certainty of death, taxes,
rescuers in anoraks, accompanied by
sniffer dogs, so we’re fit again to
tango, show us a leg or two,
uniformed bouncers taking them off,
victory which will be ours and
whiskey or gin, double measures, that
xtra mile we will go.
Y, the fork in the road and Frost.
ZZZ, a comfy bed for a rest.