The exercise:
If Wednesday was Thing 1, then consider today Thing 2.
Write about: the unveiling.
Mine:
Perhaps that is too grand a prompt for this.
Perhaps not.
Either way, here it comes.
I have mentioned on more than one occasion that I've been devoting my creative efforts elsewhere since I've stopped writing on the prompts I post here. I have, quite intentionally, not provided any details, as the project I've been working on is a big one and completion has felt a long way away. It's still a long way off, but enough progress has been made that I'm comfortable with pulling back the curtain now.
I've been working on a poetry collection, about parenthood, intended for fellow parents. It has a title, but I'll save that for another time. I've recently finished a first draft of all the poems I was working on, which ended up being 152 in all.
Don't get too excited. There's a lot of haiku in there.
Anyway. Currently I'm working on organizing them, putting them in some semblance of order. Once that's done I'll see if any more need to be written (already added two more) and if any of the current ones can be culled. Then I will get to work turning those first drafts into final drafts. Which, for some, will require a lot of polishing. For others... they felt pretty final when I initially wrote them. But I'll obviously give those ones another hard look as well.
How long will this take? Who knows. I'm chipping away at this collection between work and taking care of the boys and all the other things that life seems to keep me busy with. I have unofficial goals for when I'd like to see it done but I'm not going to stress about it, as long as I'm still making progress. Momentum kind of stagnated over the holidays (which I'm basically okay with) but I'm gaining traction again now as routines return to what passes for normal around here.
I'll keep you posted as things near the finish line.
3 comments:
Ah, so that's what you've been doing! Reading your first full paragraph I was starting to wonder if you'd taken up sculpture, or maybe some form of art that only works on geographic scales, so it was a little bit of a relief that you were "only" writing poetry :) It makes sense though: when you're sat waiting for the perfect moment to assassinate someone, writing poetry is a great way to pass the time :-p
My advice on the culling would be to cull hard on the first pass. If you're at all unsure about it, cut it. You can always put them back in later if you realise they fit a particular niche or they're better than you thought at the time (and mood does affect poetry!), but once they've been there for a while it's harder and harder to cut them.
But... well done! It's never easy to pull a writing project together, and definitely not with so many other competing demands on your time. I hope it goes well, and everything comes together faster than you expect :)
So, with the title of the unveiling I'm going to bring in the first new world for -- pretty much a year I think, given the efforts I've made to revisit old characters and posts. This world and its protagonists have been knocking around in my head for about six months now, so it's probably about time they got out. So, without further ado, let's unveil:
Cutlet and Breaux
Grey clouds swathed the sky. It wasn't raining yet but the promise -- or threat -- was there. There was an odd golden nimbus at the edges of the lower clouds, a hint that maybe this would be a storm. Birds had already found trees and roofs to roost in, and the wiser people on the street were carrying umbrellas and buttoning their coats.
The patrol car was double-parked at the side of the road opposite a lemon yellow VW camper van, and the traffic had bottle-necked accordingly. Already two drivers had got out of their cars, anger at the queue bubbling up, and knocked on Breaux's window. He wound it down and shoved his police badge at them, watching with a mean satisfaction as their words of protest suffocated in their throats. They slunk back to their vehicles, their heads down and refusing to make eye-contact with the other drivers so that they didn't have to acknowledge their shame.
The road was actually so narrow that the car was half-up on the sidewalk as well, and Cutlet could hear the steady tsking of pedestrians who had to turn sideways to shuffle past. She watched them, her eyes glinting with malicious pleasure, while Breaux stared out of the driver's side window.
"Ooh, this should be good," said Cutlet, elbowing Breaux in the side. He winced; his jujitsu training two days earlier had left him with more bruises than usual and Cutlet was adept at finding the bruised spots.
"Huh?" he said, turning to look at her. "There's another five minutes I think, I'm pretty sure I saw someone go in just now."
"Look," said Cutlet, her tone impatient. She started to point, then realised that this would be visible to the people outside the car, and jerked her head forward instead.
"What?" Breaux looked through the windscreen, resisting the urge to tell her she looked like a bobble-head. Maybe when the bruises had healed. Coming towards them, clearly oblivious to the stalled traffic and lack of sidewalk space, was a middle-aged woman with a double-wide baby buggy. "Hah! Well she's going to have to go back the way she came then."
"I bet she starts shouting." Cutlet was clearly getting excited. Breaux half-smiled and turned his attention back to the shop.
"Oh crap, it's open!"
"You go," said Cutlet. "I want to watch this. And if that bitch tries scraping the car I'm arresting her and sending everything in that buggy to social services."
"You're all heart," said Breaux. "Apple fritter?"
"Nah, it's the start of winter and I need to stay warm. Get me six double-choc caramel doughnuts and a side of caramel cream."
Breaux was across the street before he let himself whisper "Fat bitch" under his breath. Cutlet was already screaming at the woman with the buggy, who'd tapped on the window to ask her to move.
[Hit the word-limit for a single post, sorry]
Greg - yeah, I'm useless in those creative areas, so I'm sticking to writing :)
I will remember your advice when I reach the culling stage. Which is coming up fairly soon now, I think.
Ooh, something new! (Also: six months?!? Yeesh.)
Oh man, you're going to have a lot of fun with these two, aren't you. Well I, for one, look forward to it :D
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