Tag Archives: Beltane

May Day and Your Imagination is wild! Dance with Me Around the May Pole Because it’s Fertile Ground for Book Growing. Writing Prompt # 29

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Wouldn’t it be great if you could plant manuscripts in the garden and grow them like wild mint?

What if your old work could be used as compost and seed to create fertile ground?

Did you ever try? I have been known to toss old writings into the fire. The next day, there are always new seedlings at my desk.

Sometimes I grow tiny dandelions out of my pen but you can learn a lot from those beautiful and hardy weeds too.

As I write to you, tomorrow is May Day, 2012. It’s the point in time where the first day of summer meets the first day of spring in the middle of the calendar. The ground has thawed and it’s time to plant once again.

Before visiting the garden nursery, imagine your perfect garden.

Imagine your perfect writer’s life.

Imagine your published books on library & bookstore shelves, effortless words flowing all the time, deadlines easily met, publishers beating down your door.

Why not? It happens only when you allow the vision (weeds and all) to take over your mind. Just add some discipline, and a little dance around a may pole and you’ll be skipping in no time.

WRITING PROMPT 29: Imagining the may pole

  • Happy May Day, 1900. Long ago, before television, blogging and Facebook, entertainment had way fewer options. I mean, the best people could come up with was to take a big pole, some string and dance around it. It was a celebration of fertility and lots of symbolism stemming all the way back to Beltane. Give your book, story, poem a May Day scene. The weather felt ____________________. The women danced ________________ and then the sky ________________________________________.
  • Go outside and pick a blade of grass. Ask: How did it feel being cooped up below ground all winter? Did it enjoy this year’s freakishly mild temp or did it miss the expected bite of snow and frozen ground? Use personification to the point of absurdity.
  • Imagining the Vessel. You know that everything you do, create, and are begins with imagination.  The image you see is a clay vessel, blue and gold with a hint of the sun beginning to rise. I pass its message to you from my art guru. Notice that there is a piece of paper inside of it. There is a very important message for you. It is the answer to your next writing project. What does it say? What is your next project? Free-write on the process from start to finish. Congratulate yourself on a job well done.

WHEN YOU FINISH WRITING:

  • Hit that REPLY button to post your writing! Share your words of wisdom and wit by posting a comment. What was the message for YOU inside the vessel? What did you IMAGINE?

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