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 write a few micro-poems or micro-fictions. These will be either poems under 20 lines or stories under 200 words.
For inspiration go read some micro or hint fiction in this Buzzfeed article, at Microfiction Monday, Alba, Molecule, 50 Word Stories and Nanoism. Or also this Barnstorm blog post "How Microfiction Could Transform Social Media".
Read the full prompt twice before you start writing, because you're looking to keep it minimal, so have ideas. If your first draft is longer don't fret. Hone it down. And the piece will be what it is. I've started out with a goal of 100 words but hit on something and had to cull the end result from 1350 to 1200 for a contest because I loved the result. So each story will be its own beast, but we're ideally aiming for 20 lines or 100-200 words with these.
Micro Exercise 1: Light Lunch. Tell the story of a small dropped piece of 'human' food as smaller and smaller creatures and bugs and bacteria scavenge on it.
Micro Exercise 2: Homemade Dinner. Write a short piece in which the narrator was attempting to make a fancy dinner for their date/significant other but they keep realizing they're missing vital ingredients/items.
Micro Exercise 3: At the Diner. Write a micro piece set at a 24/7 diner during the 'wee hours' around 3am. Insert at least one very colorful character with an irregular request, and end the piece in a similar place as where it started (polishing glasses, ending polishing the pie display, etc). If you'd like, work with the idea that most things stay the same despite outlying events.
Micro Exercise 4: Fine Dining Gone Wrong. Write a micro piece from the perspective of a fine dining restaurant employee who witnesses some sort of massive fight in the restaurant. Could be a fistfight among guests at nearby tables, between staff, a mix of staff and guests, perhaps hooligans rush the restaurant—many options. Just set up the restaurant's upscale surroundings before the melee occurs. And give the piece some sort of observation, of course.
Micro Exercise 5: Minimalism 1. Write a piece that is very, very short. Think under 25 words. Include the smell of rubber (burnt or regular, basketball, shoe sole, car tire, rubber band, you name it) and include someone being regretful. Make the scene clear, but keep it to just the bare bones.
Micro Exercise 6: Minimalism 2. Write a micro piece under 50 words (whether prose or poetry) in which the narrator is falling. We should be clear who they are, why and what they're falling off of, and also feel like they deserve this fall, however large or small. Whether the narrator thinks they deserve it isn't the point here, the reader should be like, yep—play with fire and get burned. Before you start, brainstorm at least 5 dumb or foolhardy ways someone might fall off of something (not necessarily a building, but an ill-placed ladder, stepping between beams in an attic, saying something extremely rude or mean to someone within shoving distance etc).
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If you'd like some background music to write to, try the Chet Baker Trio album "Estate".
