>>Pascoite

Thanks, Pasco:

I'd say there's a solid first draft here, and I'll definitely be working on it for submission to the various markets.

Mike

>>Pascoite
>>Heavy_Mole

Thanks, folks!

I've only been in places where there's snow, I think, three times in my life, and the three adjectives that've stuck with me from those experiences are "cold" and "wet" and "yucky." But yeah, I can't help getting humorous about stuff... :)

Mike

>>QuillScratch:

Thanks for the comment!

When I checked last week and saw that no one had submitted a prompt, I found myself getting all nostalgic for the good ol' days 'round here. So I thought I'd do some sorta take on nostalgia and went looking online for well-known poems that deal with nostalgia so I could get a title. Nothing struck me in any way, and then I remembered that first line of "Howl," the way Ginsberg positions himself as a survivor looking back.

And then I just let myself get goofy with it. :)

But yes, I'm glad GGA got one in here, too. The more, the merrier!

Mike

>>QuillScratch
>>Pascoite

Thanks, folks!

My immediate thought when I saw the prompt was that "possession" needed to mean a spirit getting into a place where people didn't want it to be. The stone around the leg, then, would be a method of settling that spirit down. Not that the final poem quite ended up that way... I came up with the final line pretty early in the process and was shocked to discover how few things rhyme with "subscribe."

A little tweaking of the couplet, though, and this one'll be ready to start making the rounds of the SF poetry mags. :)

Mike

>>cometheartphos

Thanks!

And welcome to the site. Hope to see entries from you soon, too. :)

Mike

>>Pascoite
>>QuillScratch

Thanks, folks!

For the past month, I've been putting together the outline for a possible poetry collection to be called "The Frog Wizard's Notebook." So I've got these characters and situations bouncing around in my head, and seeing the minific contest coming up, I submitted this prompt in the hope that it would get picked, and then wrote this little squib to clarify my thoughts on how magic is going to work in this talking-animal universe I'm building.

One of the narrative conceits I'm playing with is that Our Hero--I haven't come up with a name for him yet and might just have everyone call him the Frog Wizard throughout; I dunno--always has this inner monologue going on with an eye toward the autobiography he knows he'll eventually be writing. What we're seeing is the notebook he's constructing in his head while the actual events play out around him. But again, I'm not sure if I wanna really do that... :)

Mike

Ha!

Got it in!

Mike!

I was really, really hoping:

I could have this story I've been working on all weekend finished, but it's not looking good...

Mike

>>Pascoite

Thanks, Pasco:

The distinction I'm trying to make here is "the magic of inspiration" versus "the magic of perspiration," so I need to make that clearer. Actually, Professor Nacreous could just use those very words in the first scene, couldn't she? I'll look at the last scene, too, now that I haven't got a deadline tapping its foot at me. :)

Mike

>>Pascoite

Thanks!

Yeah, I'll definitely need to whole phoenix idea in there better when sending it out. Oh, and if you're looking for a form where the half-line is supposed to rhyme with the B lines, check out the Roundel. It's got fewer lines, too, which makes it work a lot better in English. :)

Mike

I had to:

Run the prompt through Google before I voted, but yeah, I could do something with this. Unfortunately, I've got three other pieces of writing I need to work on this weekend, so, as with "Plasma," I may not get a chance to work on the idea I've got here for another month and a half.

There's always so much going on!

Mike

Turned out:

I didn't have time this weekend. So it's looking less than likely that I'll have something finished by the deadline.

Mike

OK!

This prompt fits an idea I've been wanting to write out for a while now. I might even have time this weekend, too... :)

Mike

>>Pascoite

Thanks, Pasco:

The form's a rondeau redouble', and I was aiming for one of those Edgar Allan Poe "crazy narrator" characters. :)

Mike

>>Pascoite

Thanks, Pasco:

This is all based on the relationship between the red knot sandpipers and the horseshoe crabs of Delaware Bay. The crabs lay their millions of eggs just as the red knots are passing by on their thousand-mile migration from South America up to the Arctic. So this is looking at things from the crabs' POV: either the eggs hatch and become crabs, or they get eaten and become the birds who eat them. I'll look for a way to make that clearer.

Mike

Congrats to georg!

My story here would need a fair amount of work to become a Pony story. But the same amount of work, I think, could turn it into one of the de-Ponyfied fics I've been selling to Frank Coffman for his twice-yearly magazine JOURN-E. So I think maybe I'll do that first, then come back and put in the effort to make it a Pony story. A double reverse, I guess you'd call it! :)

Mike

OK:

This one, I've got an idea for early enough I might actually be able to finish it in time!

Mike

Yeesh!

I've finally gotten an idea for this one, but I won't have time to write it now...

Mike

Thanks, >>Pascoite:

The form is called a rondeau--probably the best-known one in English is John McCrae's "In Flanders Fields". I was definitely aiming for the "you'd better or else" with this one, but swapping out some words will help convey that better.

Mike

And now:

The revised version of this poem - which, again, now lives at https://www.silverblade.net/2024/09/one-last-pie-in-the-face/ - has been nominated to the preliminary ballot for this year's Rhysling Award, given out by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Poetry Association. It's in the "long poem" category, so it's near the bottom of the list on their webpage, and it still has to make it through the panel of jurors to get onto the final ballot. So we shall see!

Mike

>>Pascoite
>>Bad Horse

Thanks, folks!

As often happens with these 24-hour poems, everything I had planned at the beginning has changed by the time I get to the middle fo the second verse, and by then it's too late to make the revisions that need to be made. This one needs a different refrain line, for instance, though right now I have no idea what that might be. I reckon it'll come to me eventually. :)

Mike

The one suggestion:

I'd make to give the narrative a bit more "oomph" would be to play with Flurry's voice. Right now, 6-year-old Flurry and 31-year-old Flurry use pretty much the same words, the same sentence structures, seem to have the same world view informing their writing. I'd recommend making the narrative more reflective ot Flurry's growth. And you could have fun with it, too, making her get more melodramatic during her teen years--start calling Cadance "Mother" instead of "Mom," little ticks like that. What's here is very nice, but I think it'd be even better if the language reflects Flurry's character growth.

Mike

Is it unethical:

That I submitted this prompt because I had a Pony story I wanted to write with this theme? I mean, the whole point around here is that the story's supposed to follow the prompt rather than vice versa, isn't it?

Oh, alas for my various transgressions! :)

Mike

>>Pascoite

Thanks!

Goofy was pretty much the point this time, so I'm glad it came through. Now to apply a little more polish and start submitting it to various and sundry venues!

Mike

>>devas

It's happened:

Three or four times in the past. I recall the first time was during a Pony minific event, and Horizon did a fine story with the three letters "TBD" as the prompt. It ended up too long to enter in the contest, though, but you can read it here if you're interested. As for this contest, well, us writers'll hafta see what the artists come up with before we can do anything anyway... :)

Mike