The 2021 Writing Series is a series of daily writing exercises for both prose writers and poets to keep their creative mind stretched and ready to go—fresh for your other writing endeavors. The writing prompts take the impetus—that initial crystal of creation—out of your hands (for the most part) and changes your writing creation into creative problem solving. Instead of being preoccupied with the question "What do I write" you are instead pondering "How do I make this work?" And in the process you are producing new writing.
This is not a standard writing session. This is pure production—to keep your brain thinking about using language to solve simple or complex problems. The worst thing you can do is sit there inactive. It's like taking a 5 minute breather in the middle of a spin class—the point is to push, to produce something, however imperfect. If you don't overthink it, you will be able to complete all of the exercises in under 30 minutes.
For today's writing exercise you will first read a short piece of writing, and then respond using one of the following prompts.
Today's inspiring piece of writing is the powerful poem "HELLO, MY PARENTS DON’T SPEAK ENGLISH WELL, HOW CAN I HELP YOU?" by the poet Su Cho. This poem was published in the seventeenth issue of the journal Four Way Review.
Seriously. Go read it. It's short. I'll wait.
I mean it, jumping right to the prompts will be borderline pointless as they won't have context. It's a 2 minute read, you got this.
This is lovely and sad poem about growing up with parents that don't speak English (while the poem does not explicitly state that the mother is an immigrant, one can assume their mother didn't grow up in the US and only know 'that practiced phrase'. The narrator looks back on the way they acted as a child as many of us are wont to do, feeling the weight of regret and nostalgia mixing together in memory. Of hoping as an adult, to have learned from experience—to be better with that perspective. And, you know, it's a formal poem too, in a way—I think abecedarians are formal. The language is accessible and the narrative moves fluidly. Okay, now that you've ACTUALLY READ the poem, let's write something.
If you'd like some unobtrusive background music try the lofi mix "3AM Study Session".
