Unshackling the Bonds

I don't start a novel until I have lived with the story for awhile to the point of actually writing an outline and after a number of books I've learned that the more time I spend on the outline the easier the book is to write. And if I cheat on the outline I get in trouble with the book.
— John Grisham

I always have a basic plot outline, but I like to leave some things to be decided while I write.
—J.K. Rowling

Some writers are plotters… I, on the other hand, have the curse and rabid delight of being a pantser. I sit down at my computer every day praying for a lightning strike. Common symptoms include pacing, an abnormally clean house, frantic cups of joe, and middle-of-the-night writing breakdowns.
— Pierce Brown

Workshop number eight was Unshackling the Bonds, presented by Dennis Bock. Enough time has passed that it’s a little hard to remember what all we discussed, and I’ll apologize ahead of time if this post is a little scattered, but my notes were a little uncomprehensive. Hence, once again thinking ahead to the next Writersfest and the possibility of recording these workshops.

He began by weighing in on the “plotters vs. pantsers” debate.

The real magic of writing happens when you write with the idea to discover instead of planning each and every step. Get rid of the idea that you need to plan, or create a plot outline. Plot is for writers who want to know their story. Narrative is for writers who want to discover their story.

You don’t have to know what you’re going to write about. It’s perfectly fine to start with a character or an image and then just go from there. It doesn’t have to be perfect, and it may take a couple of attempts, but that’s okay too. Give yourself permission to fail.

Show don’t tell is the worst advice for a new writer. It’s a cliché. Show and tell, but don’t explain. When the writer wants to be sure the reader “gets” what they mean, they’ll explain way too much, spoon feeding them what they want them to know. They’re not dramatizing the scene as it unfolds, allowing the reader to discover the story on their own, connecting to it in their own way. They’re bashing them over the head with facts.

Showing focuses on the character, articulating their emotions. Make your characters real without using cliches. Leave it to the character to discover and unveil what’s going on.

Go into the character and discover their key emotion and then explore it. Don’t just skim the surface, dig down deep. “I hope. I wish. I want.” Feel what the character is feeling.

Dialogue is showing. What does your character want? How is he going to achieve this? Want is a dynamic rolling of emotion. To show this, use a dynamic shift (significant internal change) in your character. This can be done by conversion of regular everyday emotions to extreme emotion.

Literary conversion is when a narrator lands on a moment so private that even though the rest of the world carries on, it must be commented on. It takes an otherwise invisible moment and raises it with extreme emotion.

Telling can deepen our characters. It can explain what they’re doing, what they’re feeling, and can articulate emotion that might not be obvious. You can tell by having the character interpret and be aware of their emotional landscape. But keep to a single point of view – you’re only allowed to head hop (jump from one point of view to another) if you’re aware of it and have a good reason to do so.

Your narrative does the heavy lifting. It’s like stage directions. It introduces the reader to the main character, the point of view, the setting, and the situation the character finds themselves in. You can tell by supplying information, a little more removed from the immediate experience, and you can show by employing the senses and the emotions.

Finally, we were given a prompt, to write a piece encompassing the following emotions:

Dread, fear, confusion, and optimism.

But we ran out of time to write anything.

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

WORDAGE REPORT

THE WEEK IN REVIEW
Another mixed bag last week, but though I didn’t get any more writing done than I’ve been doing lately, it was still a pretty good week. And you don’t get to hear me say that very often, so you’d better take note! LOL

First of all, I got all of my blog posts, with the exception of my serial installment, written and scheduled on the weekend. That has never happened to me before, and it was a good feeling, let me tell you.

This was offset by Monday, when I had a couple of appointments, including an opening at the dentist for my root canal. And you know you’re in for trouble when the dentist gives you a prescription to have filled on your way home.

To be honest, once the freezing wore off the pain wasn’t all that bad. The drug he prescribed, however, a combination antibiotic and pain killer, was a little hard on the system. So yeah, that kind of took the wind out of my sails.

I spent more time than I probably should have on stitchery stuff, which is probably why when I was on Amazon I succumbed to another stitchery book and a couple of kits. Meeting with the guild every week (one week a regular meeting, the opposing week at the library) keeps the interest high.

I also ordered myself a couple of new books, but believe it or not I didn’t have much time to read. Thursday I spent a good chunk of the day baking – cookies for a kids event on Saturday – and Friday was a P.A. day, which meant we had the pleasure of the granddaughter’s company.

So it was just as well I got all those posts done early, because they might not have got done otherwise.

NEW WORDS:
2401+800+348+792=4,341
UP 648 – words from last week

I don’t know where all those extra words came from, but don’t expect the same this week.

Not a lot of gaming to distract me last week, but a lot of other stuff. And I did spend a little more time in my office, not that it did me any good.

Despite all my good intentions to get my serial post done early, I found myself waiting until Thursday to write it. I started out in my office, thinking I’d do better without any distractions, but I didn’t really get anywhere.

Then I re-located to the living room and my recliner, and next thing I know I’m getting ‘er done. This despite the handicap of a sleeping cat draped across my arms, forcing me to type one-handed. Maybe Dinsdale is my muse (or maybe that should be mews).

Goals For Next Week:
Get all my blog posts done and maybe a few extra words besides.

EDITING:
0 hours
Believe it or not, I was so busy working on other things that I forgot I was supposed to use some of my time for editing. Duh!

Goal For Next Week:
Get back to work on An Elemental Spirit.

POETRY:
I admit I kind of cheated on my poetry form last week. I used the form we were assigned as the monthly “poemwork” for the poetry group. Once I got the hang of the Poiku, it was a fun little verse. I did five of them for the blog post, then added three more for the poetry meeting that night (because that’s what it took to fill the page LOL).

I still seem to be stuck in the mindset of doing the poetry posts and no more. I don’t know why that is – I get a line here and a line there flit through my mind at odd times, but never when I’m in a position to write them down. And of course when I do make it to a pen and paper they’re long gone.

Goal For Next Week:
Find another new poetry form to share. Expand on the poems I started during the Duende workshop.

CRAFTING:
I spent a fair chunk of Monday going through bins of stitchery in my craft room, organizing them a little better so I could take stock of what I have. Apparently I have a really good supply of everything. Except material that’s easy to embroider on. *sigh*

There was a piece of a cream coloured canvas that I thought would do for my zentangle sampler so I cut off a fair chunk of it and spent considerable time debating on what size to make my squares – I settled on 4 ½ inches. Then I decided that I’d stitch the outline of each one in black, which is where I realized that canvas wasn’t all that much fun to stitch on.

I had one square outlined when I went to the stitchery meeting and my fellow stitchers agreed it wasn’t the best material for a sampler, but it was perfect if I wanted to use it for one side of a tote bag to carry my stitchery stuff in.

The next day I did end up going to a Michael’s craft store, but it was for supplies for a craft the granddaughter and I were going to do on Friday, I didn’t even think to look for anything else. However, I did order myself a book on crewel embroidery, a set of stitchery kits, and some plastic beading canvas from Amazon. :-)

Goal For Next Week:
Decide which is the project I’m going to keep doing and stick to it.

WHAT I’M READING:
I’m still reading The Book of Magic, by Alice Hoffman. To be honest, I didn’t get all that much reading time in last week. But I did order a set of Eve Langlais books and I’m sure once I start reading them I’ll zip right through them.

Goal For Next Week:
Keep reading.

THE WEEK AHEAD:

I was a couple of days late, but I got a list made last week. And as soon as I had it started in my brand new list making notepad, I found my old one. Isn’t that the way it goes? *sigh* But rather than make a master list and then divide it into sublists, I just made one list to rule them all, crossing things off as I completed them and adding new things as they occur to me. Works for me.

And other than my stitch-in at the library on Tuesday morning, I don’t think I have any appointments until Saturday, when I get a temporary filling replaced with a permanent one. But the weather is supposed to be really crappy for the whole week, so I’m making no promises where my productivity is concerned.

The hour a day thing for editing hasn’t been working out so great, so now I’m wondering if I should try working on it a couple of different afternoons a week. I’m not sure if that’ll work any better, but it’s something to try. But I do think I should put TraxTime on the good laptop as an incentive to, you know, use it.

Ideally I’d to get my writing projects done during the day so I can craft in front of the TV in the evenings. Yesterday would have been the perfect day for The Witcher and some stitching because it was rainy and miserable, but I was working on this post instead and it was taking me far longer than it should have, mainly because I was working in the living room. It took me until late afternoon to smarten up and move to my office.

As well as my sampler-come-tote-bag, I’d like to use the flowers in the kits I bought as a guide to embellish a dress I bought the granddaughter for Easter. I may not get it done before she outgrows it, but maybe I can get it done for back to school. So lots of stitching to do in the evenings.

I’d still like to see myself spending a little more time in my office, but I have to admit that the desk and area around it are getting a little cluttered. It’s really just a matter of putting papers and junk where they belong, or finding a home for things in some cases, so it might be worth taking a couple of hours, or a whole afternoon, to just do it.

The track is getting closer, I just need a weed-whacker to clear the way.

The Pond - Part 36

This spell would be the greatest endeavour of her life. Even the spell she’d cast to vanquish Varnya paled in comparison. But it must be perfect. Though there was little chance the spell would kill her, there was a very good chance that by casting she would deplete herself of power. But she did not care.

The sun was beginning to lower in the sky. Izolda crafted her spell with care, dark shadows gathering in the corners as she did so. What she was doing was one of the forbidden magics her mother had warned her against. Even Varnya, for all her arrogance, would not have attempted such a thing.

She wrote the words and drew the symbols on a piece of skin that she’d brought with her from the old country that was dry as parchment. It had come from a thief Varnya had caught spying on them. They’d had no other choice but to kill him – they could not afford to let him share their secrets.

Varnya had instructed Izolda to bury the body in the forest, where no one would find it. Preserving a piece of the skin had been Izolda’s own idea. They had written spells on animal skins to increase their potency, how much more effective would it be to write one on human skin? She had never had the chance to find out, until now.

Her quill was that of an owl, for its magical ability to fly in silence as for the wisdom it imbued. For ink, she used her own blood, it being more potent than any she could create. She gathered wood from the nine sacred trees – birch, rowan, ash, alder, willow, hawthorn, oak, holly from the old country, and hazel.

She filled her pockets with acorns for strength, cedar and cinnamon for courage, and hyssop for protection. As an added measure, she made her sacred circle in the cleared space behind the house, one already surrounded by violets, hyssop, honeysuckle, and mandrake that she had planted years ago for protection.

The stars began to appear, surrounding a moon that was naught but a dark outline. It was time. Izolda chose not to set a ward. It was chancy, if the rusalka – she refused to call the creature by its given name – sensed a ward, she might decide to investigate and try and stop her. As well, she did not wish to contain the spell, she needed it to spread far and wide.

Izolda lit her fire within a small ring of white stones that glimmered in the dark. Chanting a plea for strength and protection, she made an offering of rosemary and thyme, sprinkling the dry leaves on the flames, then let a small bag of wheat drop into the fire as well. Finally, she added wine, mixed with her own blood. The fire flared up blue, then settled down to a yellow flame with streaks of green. Her offerings had been accepted.

Without hesitation, her mind was set on what she was about to do, she began reciting the spell she had created. A wind came out of nowhere as she recited the spell a second time. Unseen fingers plucked at her clothing, trying to steal the skin the spell was written on. She was filled with cold, as though plunged into a river.

Izolda stood firm. As she recited the spell for the third time, the wind became as shards of ice, stabbing at her hard enough to draw blood. Voices surrounded her, from whispers and promises of things untold, to shrieks of what her punishment would be if she failed. She trembled, but stood firm.

The black wind became a spinning vortex around her. It had pulled back, leaving her at the eye of the storm, so that when the skin she was holding caught fire, she was able to let it go and it drifted gently to the fire.

An ear-splitting shriek, heard not with the ear but with the mind, filled the sacred circle as the skin burned. Abruptly, everything was still again. Izolda slumped to the ground.

Poiku Verse

I’m cheating just a bit this week. As you know, I belong to a poetry group. We meet once a month in the basement of a church to share our poetry. Each month we’re assigned what we affectionately call “poemwork,” a prompt to work on, purely optional, for the next meeting.

It’s not often we’re assigned a form, but we were for this month, it being National Poetry Month and all. And I figured, since I was doing a poem or two for the form anyway, why not share it here as well?

The form is another variation on the Haiku called the Poiku. Instead of referencing nature and the seasons, it condenses a song into three lines. Think of it as the pop version of the Haiku.

It’s still a verse of 17 syllables, 5-7-5. But the content is based on song lyrics. Most songs have three parts – the verse, the chorus, and the bridge. It’s helpful if you can condense each one of these parts into a single line. Don’t forget to include the name of the song as well as the artist.

You’re analyzing the content of the song, distilling the most important points, and then summarizing it into your verse. Perhaps there is a thematic change between the beginning and the end of the song that you can use for effect.


Earthquake and Rapture
escalating, rushing on
world ends, but we’re fine.
It’s the End of the World As We Know It – REM


Wake on the cliff’s edge
night beckons, just one more step
to death or to life
Epiphany – Trans-Siberian Orchestra


Dreamers imagine
a more peaceful, gentle world,
Perhaps, someday soon.
Imagine – John Lennon


Paint your starry night
sanity caught in amber
no one understands.
Vincent – Don McLean


Watch the world outside
repeat tragic history.
Dream your life away.
Dreamer – Ozzy Osbourne

Extraordinary Elements in Fiction

It's perfectly normal that extraordinary things happen to me. I'm an exceptional person. Oh, don't think I'm boasting. I mean to say that, unfortunately, I'm exceptional and that, unfortunately, I can't live by the rules. I must make my own.
― Cocteau

Ordinary people believe only in the possible. Extraordinary people visualize not what is possible or probable, but rather what is impossible. And by visualizing the impossible, they begin to see it as possible.
― Cherie Carter-Scott

It never failed to amaze me how the most ordinary day could be catapulted into the extraordinary in the blink of an eye.
― Jodi Picoult

Workshop #7, facilitated by Dimitri Nasrallah, was about introducing extraordinary elements into our fiction. And you know you’re in for a good workshop when it starts with Godzilla. :-)

Godzilla is actually a metaphor for nuclear weapons. It was a response to the incident with the Lucky Dragon 5. The Lucky Dragon was a tuna boat with a crew of 23 who became contaminated on March 1, 1954, by nuclear fallout from the U.S. Castle Bravo thermonuclear testing on Bikini Atoll. The boat was 14 miles outside of what the U.S. considered the “danger zone” and though the ship was not affected by the blast itself, it became covered in radioactive ash.

Godzilla exists as a metaphor of the pain and destruction caused by the atomic bombs that were dropped on Nagaski and Hiroshima during World War II. In the Japanese 1954 film, Godzilla, it was explained that the monster was a prehistoric reptile of some sort who was mutated by radiation from a nuclear test conducted by the United States military in the Pacific Ocean. The large amount of radiation absorbed by the reptile caused it to grow to gigantic proportions.
- Screen Rant

Fiction writers of all genres employ the surreal, symbolic, or unfamiliar in their stories. There are several reasons for this, but unfortunately we weren’t given a lot of time to take notes so the only reason I wrote down is that it raised tension. I swear I’m going to take some kind of recording device to the next Writersfest I attend so I can transcribe the notes later!

Some of the considerations to keep in mind when using extraordinary elements are:
Motivation: what stimulates your characters to believe in the device?
Justification: How does the device fit into the fabric of reality?
Description: How is it presented and individualized – the fingerprint
Interaction: How does it move through the story, and how do your characters engage with it?
Balance: How much of this device can your world handle? How far can you push your readers’ suspension of disbelief?

We were then given a big chunk of time and the following prompt:

Write a scene that incorporates this one surreal element: A talking hand. To balance your narrative, use only people and places from everyday circumstances to fill out the rest of the story.

Here’s what I came up with:

“Talk to the hand ‘cause the face don’t care,” Grandma said with a snicker.

The hand was not impressed. “Do you know how many times I’ve heard that?” it asked.

“Do you have a name?” little Katie asked.

“Just Hand will do.”

“Katie,” her mother asked, slowly and carefully. “Where did you find that thing?”

The hand vibrated, fingers spread wide. “I am not a thing! I’m a hand!”

“In the Addams Family, they had a hand and they called it Thing,” Grandma said helpfully. “You any relation?”

The hand curled itself into a fist and refused to say anything further.

Earlier that day, Katie had been playing in the woods and followed the sounds of a commotion. Someone was crying for help as a big, shaggy dog was tossing something up in the air and then pouncing on it.

Katie knew that dog, it was Bruno, a well-known thief of toys. She also knew how to distract him.

“Here, Bruno,” she said, picking up a hefty piece of wood. “Look what I’ve got for you!”

She showed him the stick and tossed it as far as she could. Bruno abandoned whatever he’d been playing with and bounded after the stick. Katie crept closer and found the hand. “Thank you,” the hand said. “I was starting to feel sick from being tossed in the air.”

“You’re a hand,” Katie said in surprise.

“Bright child,” the hand said dryly.

Katie ignored its sarcasm and moved a little closer. “Are you okay?”

“I’m sure I’ll be fine, as long as that dog doesn’t come back.”

Looking down thoughtfully, Katie said, “You need a bath. Maybe you should come home with me.”

The hand drummed its fingers in the dirt as it thought about it. “All right,” it said finally. “Lead the way.”

Katie watched dubiously as it began to drag itself towards her. “Maybe it might be better if I carried you,” she suggested. “You know, in case Bruno comes back.”

The hand gave a long suffering sigh. “Very well.”

It had reached her feet by this time, and quickly crawled up Katie’s leg. Katie giggled as it reached her side and kept going until it was clutching her shoulder. Then she started for home.

“Katie,” her mother asked again. “Where did you find it?”

“I didn’t, Bruno did,” Katie said. “I rescued him.”

“Rescued him,” her mother said under her breath. “A disembodied hand.”

“Yes,” the hand said, uncurling itself. “And I’m most grateful. But I do not wish to cause discord, so I’ll just be on my way.”

“No!” Katie pleaded. “Mom, look at him. We need to help him. You said, we should always help God’s creatures. He’s one of God’s creatures, isn’t he?”

“Well, yes. But—”

“You said,” Grandma snickered.

“Please, can he stay? Please?”

The mother looked from her daughter’s hopeful face to the somewhat bedraggled hand, and back again. “All right,” she said with a sigh. “But you’re responsible for him.”

“Yay!” Katie held her hand over the talking hand and it jumped to high five her. The she rested her hand beside it so it could clamber up to her shoulder. They disappeared down the hall towards the bathroom.

“Well,” Grandma observed, “It could have been worse.”

“How so?” the mother asked.

“Those woods are full of strange things. She could have brought home something really unbelievable.”

It was a fun exercise and there was enough time left over for us to read a few of our stories out loud. There were hands that grew mouths, hands that were still attached to people but worked independently, telepathic hands, imaginary hands, disembodied hands, and mechanical hands. But to my surprise, I was the only one who wrote about a hand that had no connection to a body.

Weird, or what? LOL

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

WORDAGE REPORT

THE WEEK IN REVIEW
Well, the good news is that I spent more time in my office last week. The bad news is that I still didn’t get much extra writing done. My focus still isn’t what it should be, but it’s getting better too.

And no, despite all my good intentions, I still didn’t get my master to-do list or my sub to-do lists made. I have so much I’d like to be doing, and I really think those lists would help, so I need sit down tonight and just do them.

I had a bit of an epiphany about why it’s so hard for me to focus, it has to do with the sheer amount of stuff I can do, but knowing why and fixing the problem seem to be two very different things.

NEW WORDS:
Blog Posts
2004+712+302+675=3,693
UP – 578 words from last week

Kittens to the rescue! When in doubt for something to write about on Mondays, write about kittens. :-)

As for other words . . . I caught up my journals and jotted down a couple of ideas, but I also found a couple of new games to distract me. But I’m happy to report that I reached the saturation point with the games and I’ve deleted the links to them.

I’m finding it easier to work in my office so I spent more time in there than I have been, despite it being a busier week than I expected.

And I pulled out one of my first, as yet unfinished, novels to see where I went wrong, and I realized I don’t like my main character. I’m going to have to figure out how to change that because I’ve already written the sequel (and I like that main character) and I’ve got the bare bones of an idea for a third one (really like that main character too).

Goals For Next Week:
Get all my blog posts done and maybe a few extra words besides.

EDITING:
2 ½ hours
This time was was editing on Element Fire, and I’m thinking I’m going to have to spend some time on the back story and the historic records to keep me from getting confused about what’s going on.

Goal For Next Week:
Keep working on An Elemental Spirit.

TECH & TRAINING:
Still nothing here.

Goal For Next Week:
If I don’t come up with up with something this week then I’m deleting this item off the list, like I did marketing.

POETRY:
Last week’s form, the Snám Suad, was a little tricky so it was all the more surprising I managed to create three examples of it.

Thursday afternoon I attended a seminar on the poetic device of Duende. I’m not sure that my grasp on it was one hundred percent, but I came away from it with the rough draft of a poem and the makings of another one. So it was time well spent.

But going to the seminar used up all my peopling skills for the day, which meant I had nothing left for the poetry reading that evening. But to be honest, I’m not sure I’d have gone to the reading anyway because they tend to be crowded and I just can’t handle crowds anymore.

Goal For Next Week:
Find another new poetry form to share and work on the poems I started.

CRAFTING:
I went to the stitch in at the library on Tuesday, and while I was there a few of us decided to check out what the art club was doing. This proved to be a mistake because it left me with the urge to pull out my art stuff and do some drawing or painting. I resisted the urge, but it did get the wheels turning.

I’m still dithering a bit on what my next project should be. I was thinking about doing a placemat and napkin set with poinsettias on it (from a kit) for the Christmas display we’re going to do late summer, but then I received this book I ordered a couple of weeks ago.

It has 120 different stitches in it, plus amazing examples on what you can use them for, and I started thinking about doing a sampler. And then I got the idea to do it like a zentangle – section off squares and then fill them with three to five different kinds of stitches in random patterns. I think it would look kind of neat.

Goal For Next Week:
Better organize my needlework crafts; decide on next project.

WHAT I’M READING:
I finished The Last Heir to Blackwood Library by Hester Fox and I started reading The Book of Magic, by Alice Hoffman.

Goal For Next Week:
Keep reading.

THE WEEK AHEAD:

I’ve got a couple of appointments this week, but they’re on the same day so I’m getting the interruptions over with all at once. Oh, except I have a poetry group meeting Wednesday night. But then I don’t usually accomplish much in the evenings anyway.

I am definitely going to give the list making another shot. I even have a special narrow, lined, notepad to make my list on. One of my problems with lists in the past is that I over-think them. So I’m going to forget the sub-lists and just do one list of everything. I can cross things off as I do them, and add more when I think of them.

I think I need an attitude change for Elemental Spirit. I need to stop thinking of it as a chore and find a way to look forward to having it done. It might be a little time-consuming, but I also think I should start by figuring out the prophecy for the Illezie and then maybe more detailed historical records. That way I can use excerpts from them for my chapter headings. And as far as TraxTime goes, there’s no reason I can’t install it on this laptop too.

I have a regular stitchery guild meeting on Tuesday, and hopefully I’ll have decided on my next stitchery project. Believe it or not, there’s another afghan I want to make, but I’m also thinking I may start the zentangle sampler. Of course there’s also the half dozen “in progress” projects I could finish up, but they’re not exactly ones that are easy to take with me to a stitch-in.

My office is starting to look better and better for me to get some serious work done, it’s just a matter of dragging myself down the hall to use it. Even though there are more distractions, as in books and papers and the view, I sit at my desk and I tend not to check social media or play games as much. Good reasons to try and use my office more.

The track is out there, I just need to get back on it.

The Pond - Part 35

Izolda shook Nikolai’s arm. “Where is Dmitri?” she demanded again, voice shrill with fear.

Nikolai turned towards her, a bleak expression on his face. “The grinding wheel, it cracked. It must have had something to do with the speed in which it was turning. I have never heard of such a thing happening before.”

“But Dmitri, what happened to Dmitri?”

“He was the first to see the smoke. He, he shouted fire and tried to put it out himself. He slipped and he ended up under the grinding stone, trapped. The floor underneath him must have been rotted, it gave way. Somehow he ended up caught in the gears. We tried to pull him out . . .”

“No!” Izolda shrieked.

She tried to make her way into the burning mill, but hands held her back. She fought them, needing to get to her son, until her strength was gone. Nikolai wrapped his arms around her from behind and held onto to her.

“It was my fault,” he said brokenly. “I knew the mill could not keep going at such a rate. All I could see was the profit we could make, not the danger.”

A perfumed breeze wafted across them. Izolda stilled.

“No, my husband. It was not your fault,” she said with conviction.

The crowd on the river bank was silent. The workers had formed two lines from the river, one passing buckets full of water forward, the other sending the empty buckets back. The roaring flames began to die out and soon the flames were gone. The smouldering remains still sent black smoke into the air.

“Now there is no choice but to send for Mikhail,” Nikolai continued. “He needs to come home.”

Izolda went ridged in his arms, then forced herself to relax. “Of course, you are right,” she agreed, to placate him. But already she was formulating a plan to keep her remaining son safe.

The fire was out when they finally made their way back home. Nikolai would allow no one inside the mill to inspect the damage, not even to retrieve what remained of his son, until the mill was completely cooled down.

Too restless to stay inside, he went off down to the village. Izolda shut herself up in her workroom. She pushed her grief aside, focusing on ways to save her remaining son. Protection spells were useless, she knew that now. But there had to be something . . .

She sat in her rocking chair and leafed through the ancient text she inherited from Varnya, the one she had spent countless hours trying to decipher. In it were the darkest magics, ones that revealed themselves bit by bit, and only when she was at her most desperate. Never had she been more desperate than she was now.

And there it was. The spell that could save Mikhail. She read it over, then read it again, cementing it in her mind. There was no time to waste. The spell must be cast tonight, under the new moon.

The rusalka would be at her weakest now, having used so much of her power to assault the mill. And there was no doubt in Izolda’s mind that it was the rusalka who was responsible for the fire that caused Dmitri’s death. The scent of her perfume was unmistakeable.

It would take time for the creature to replenish her energies, time Izolda would take advantage of. She began gathering the ingredients she would need. And when Nikolai returned and called for her, she waved her hand to send him to sleep without a moment’s thought. When he awoke, it would be all over.

As she worked out the details of the spell, there was a part of her that also mourned for Mikhail. If the spell worked as it should, it would mean losing him, but he would live, and that was all that mattered.

Snám Suad Form

Well, I couldn’t avoid the Irish verse forms forever, as much as I’d like to. At first glance the Snám Suad (pronounced sNaao Sooud) seems like a simple little poem. It’s only eight lines (an octostich), but don’t let its brevity fool you.

The literal translation of the name is “swimming of the sages” but the meaning is “poetic floating.” It only has 24 syllables to it, 3 per line. Lines 4 and 8 should each be a single, 3-syllable word. The rhyme scheme is: a-a-b-c-d-d-d-c

As well, it should include a dunadh, beginning and ending the poem with the same word, phrase, or line as a kind of refrain. It’s written with cywddydd (harmony of sound) and focuses more on the sounds and images than any particular meaning. If possible, line 7 should use alliteration.

Schematic:

xxa
xxa
xxb
xxc
xxd
xxd
xxd
xxc

I gotta say, this form was a little tricky to write, especially getting the first line and the single word of the last line to correspond. In my last example, the word doesn’t exactly match, but I figure it still fits. And I wasn’t able to work the alliteration in. But most of the examples I saw didn’t have it either.


Summer

the sunlight
is too bright
to my eyes
highlighting
summer green
fresh and clean
perfect scene
sunlighting.


Ice Cream

Soft and sweet
perfect treat
ice cream cone
offering
perfect taste
lactose based
eat with haste
softening


Song

sing your song
sing it strong
sing with pride
fragmentize
with the note
not remote
from your throat
harmonize

The Word and the Line

Poetry empowers the simplest of lives to confront the most extreme sorrows with courage, and motivates the mightiest of offices to humbly heed lessons in compassion.
― Aberjhani

I’m a great believer in poetry out of the classroom, in public places, on subways, trains, on cocktail napkins. I’d rather have my poems on the subway than around the seminar table at an MFA program.
— Billy Collins

The world is full of poetry. The air is living with its spirit; and the waves dance to the music of its melodies, and sparkle in its brightness.
— James Gates Percival

As you might have guessed from the above quotes, workshop number six, run by Paul Vermeersch, was one of the two workshops that dealt with poetry. He began by talking about words themselves.

Words matter, ideas don’t. It’s the execution of the idea that makes a word good or bad. Words don’t just say things, they do things. Choosing the right word matters. When words are doing something different than what they’re supposed to, that’s ironic.

The right word can create tone or mood, give connotation or texture to your work, and rhythm and speed to your poem. Polysemy is a word or phrase chosen to mean many things.

He then went on to cite Canadian poet Dennis Lee, whose careful choice of words is apparent in his work. He’s not trying to say something, he’s trying to do something. He often starts with a sound and there’s a strong rhyme and rhythm to his poetry that continues its musical quality.

It’s really a matter of following, not my nose, but my ear, hearing what the poem wants to be. I may be as surprised by the end of it as the reader is.
— Dennis Lee

Then we were asked, what is the poetic line?

The line is the basic building block of making a poem. It’ consists of all the words that occupy the same horizonal space. Lines of poetry exist because of the way we read. Meaning does not create a line, but a line can create meaning.

A caesura is a break within a line. Initial caesura is found near the beginning; medial is found near the middle; terminal caesura is found near, but not at, the end of the line.

End stop lines with punctuation or a natural conclusion.

Self-enclosed lines follow proper grammar.

Enjambment – sense and syntax of line continues beyond the line.

Line breaks prevent you from reading the way you would prose.
They
Slow
Things
Down

Line breaks can sew confusion or provide clarity:

The old man the boat

The old man
the boat

The old
man the boat

Ask yourself:
What do I want the poem to say?
What do I want the poem to do?
How do I want the poem to sound?
Can I place the line breaks so the poem accomplishes all of these aims?

While this workshop started out strong, for me it kind of fell apart after this. One of the participants claimed to write exclusively sonnets, but he often used hyphens at the end of the line. He couldn’t understand why people didn’t like this and wondered if he should be doing it that way. The instructor’s response was: “You’re the boss of the poem, the poem’s not the boss of you. Do what you want.”

Sorry, but to my mind, if you’re going to write a sonnet, you need to follow the rules, otherwise you’re writing a sonnet-like poem.

We talked a bit about the Glosa , Erasure poems (also known as Blackout Poetry) and the Cento verse form.

For the remainder of the workshop, the instructor referred to a 20-page hand out that he’d emailed to us the day before. I don’t know about anyone else, but I didn’t think to bring a printer with me to the retreat, so I was kind of lost. And seeing as we were encouraged to use a notebook and pen in the workshops, few of us had a tablet or laptop to consult.

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

WORDAGE REPORT

THE WEEK IN REVIEW
Despite the weather being absolutely beautiful, I did manage to spend some time in my office last week. Not too much though, because even with the window open it got kind of warm in there. Yesterday there was a warm breeze coming in the window. This is only April, I’m a little worried about what the summer is going to be like this year.

I’m still finding it hard to focus, so not much extra in the writing department. I did not do a master list, but I did do a daily to-do list – once.

The words are there, they’re just all jumbled up in my head and I still have to work to straighten them out. Now one of my problems is, what do I want to work on? It’s like when I would go to the video store to rent a movie – there was too much selection and I could never make up my mind which movie to pick.

NEW WORDS:
1847+0+460+808=3,115
DOWN 372 – words from last week

Well, that’s not surprising, considering I missed Monday’s post completely. I just didn’t have anything to write about. My other posts were longer, but not long enough to make up for Monday.

I did a fair amount of hand writing, but that doesn’t really count in my wordage totals. I guess playing word games doesn’t really count either, does it?

But to show my pure intentions, I did go into my office one day, intending to work, and . . . the power went out. And yes, I know the laptops both have batteries, but there still wasn’t any internet connection to do research.

Goals For Next Week:
Get all my blog posts done and maybe a few extra words besides.

EDITING:
2 hours
Which is better than nothing, I suppose. But it wasn’t on Elemental Spirit, I was playing around with some super short fiction – just changing a word here, a comma there.

Goal For Next Week:
Keep working on An Elemental Spirit.

TECH & TRAINING:
Ummm, no. I got nothing here.

Goal For Next Week:
Learn something new. Figure out Dropbox.

POETRY WEDNESDAY:
I have a folder of poetry forms on my desktop and when I went through it I couldn’t find one I liked enough to attempt, so I researched a bunch more forms and last week’s poem was one of them. Even though it was another weird one, I liked it better than the one from the week before.

Several years ago, someone on a poetry forum I was on asked for submission of poems to a specialized anthology. There was a central theme, and our poems were supposed to help tell the story. I thought it was kind of cool, so I submitted a poem and to my surprise it was accepted. And further more, I was going to get paid for it. I think a whole $5.00. LOL

Anyway, for a couple of years, nothing happened, then I got an email from the organizer who said the book was still a go. Then nothing again for another few years until last week, when I got an email explaining that the original publisher had backed out and he was working for someone else now, but even though he’d lost touch with a few of the poets involved so he couldn’t use their poems, the anthology was still a go, he’d just work around the missing poems. Cool, eh?

Goal For Next Week:
Find another new poetry form to share.

CRAFTING:
We had a couple of guest speakers at our regular stitchery guild meeting, and seeing as it’s not considered rude to be working on something while someone’s talking, I worked on my embroidered pillow case and managed to finish it. One down, one to go.

And wouldn’t you know. One of the ladies was down-sizing their stitchery stash and I ended up bringing home a couple of crewel kits. There’s a small one with hummingbirds so I can re-learn how to do crewel work, and a bigger one with a mother and baby tiger laying on the grass. Like I didn’t already have enough projects.

I’m putting off the jewelry I was going to make until I’m able to take possession of the baker’s rack, so . . . not any time soon. *sigh*

Goal For Next Week:
Better organize my sewing bag, either start the second pillow case or find something new to work on.

WHAT I’M READING:
I finished The Knockoff Eclipse by Melissa Bull, and The Writing Retreat, by Julia Bartz. And Goodreads sent me a friends update, letting me know that the daughter marked Run, Rose, Run by Dolly Parton and James Patterson as one she’d like to read, so I texted her so she didn’t buy a copy – I had one. So I ended up reading it, too, so I could pass it along. Now I’m reading The Last Heir to Blackwood Library by Hester Fox.

Goal For Next Week:
Keep reading.

THE WEEK AHEAD:

Still kind of disappointed in myself over the lack of writing, but I’m not going to beat myself up about it because that would just lead to a downward spiral. Yes, my recliner is more comfy than my office chair, but I need to get over it. When I’m in my office I do well, it’s just getting there that’s the problem.

I really need to get back to list making, if for no other reason than to make me feel like I’m accomplishing something during the week.

I’m keeping my goal of editing for an hour a day. If I put Elemental Spirit onto a USB stick, I can edit it on my other lap top, the one that has TraxTime on it so I can keep track of how long I’m working.

I’m also going to keep the goal of making a master list on Sunday night, starting tonight, and then divvying the tasks up through the week. Time well spent, methinks.

I’ve got a bit more on my plate this week. I have a stitch-in at the library on Tuesday, I have a blood test on Wednesday, and a poetry seminar on Thursday afternoon. Then Thursday evening I have a conflict of interest. There's a poetry reading I'd like to go to, but it's also the series finale of Star Trek Picard. While I'd really like to go to the reading, is it worth missing Picard for?

Yes, I know I could have my TiVo record it, or even watch it on On Demand at a later date, but any Trekkie will tell you it's not the same.

But, there’s still little excuse not to spend some more time in my office. I was in there all afternoon yesterday, and only went back to the living room when the battery died on my laptop. Yes, I know I could have just brought the cord in there, but I promised myself I’d work until the battery died. So there. LOL And actually, another advantage of working in my office is that when I’m running on battery I tend to stay off the internet unless it’s important, so no gaming. It really sucks up the battery juice.

Let’s hope I can get my head out of my butt this week and actually get some work done for a change.

Wish me luck.

The Pond - Part 34

Izolda tried to anticipate where and when the next attack from the rusalka would occur, but once again things were quiet for a time. She found herself jumping at shadows. She, who feared nothing now feared . . . everything. It was not a feeling she wished to cultivate.

What happened to that girl who had been so fired with ambition? That Izolda would never have found herself in such a position. She would have continued to hone her skills and never allowed an enemy to catch her unawares. But she had attained everything she’d desired and grown complacent with it. The girl she had been would have sneered at the woman she was now.

Much of her time was spent in her work room, spending equal time strengthening the protections on Dmitri and Nikolai and trying to break the hold the rusalka had on Nikolai. If she could weaken it sufficiently, she might be able to persuade him it was time to leave. Though spirits like the rusalka could not be trusted, this one had not lied when she said her power was greater than Izolda’s. She was not able to break the spell.

Using the bones, she tried to at least see where the next attack might come from, but the bones told her nothing. In the dark of the new moon she sacrificed a chicken and read the future in its entrails, but it only pointed to impending doom, not what form the doom would take.

Life went on. Nikolai took Dmitri with him to the mill each day to teach him the workings of it. Izolda made sure they had a hearty breakfast, then locked herself in her workroom to experiment with new spells. Sometimes she walked along the forest paths in search of special plants.

Though she was growing frustrated, she was not growing discouraged. At the same time, she couldn’t help worry what the rusalka was going to do next. Every time there was lull in the troubles it seemed the creature followed up by causing an even greater grief.

Izolda insisted that they have dinner together each night, even though Dmitri and Nikolai tended to talk about work throughout the meal. But it was good that business was picking up again.

“With the extra money from this new order, we can make some improvements to the mill,” Dmitri said eagerly.

“You have a new order?” Izolda asked, trying to show an interest. “This is wonderful news.”

“Yes, and it is thanks to Mikhail.”

“Mikhail?” she repeated, with a quick glance at Nikolai.

“We were right to send him to the city for an education,” Nikolai said. “He was in a position to recommend us for a large, government contract.”

“Then he has done even better than we thought he would,” Izolda said. “And he will continue to do well.”

“I think it is time that he returns to his rightful place,” Nikolai told her.

She felt a shiver of apprehension go up her spine. “But surely he has more to learn.” She touched his arm.

Nikolai frowned. “It is something to think about.”

Though he let the subject drop, the feeling of dread continued to expand in Izola’s mind. Something was in the offing. Perhaps it was the idea of Mikhail returning, but she thought it was something else. Something bigger.

With this new order, Dimitri and Nikolai spent more and more time at the mill. Izolda tried to dissuade them from working so hard, but they would not listen to her.

“Did you not say, just two nights ago, that the mill is in need of repair?”

“That is what the profit from this order will be used for,” Nikolai said. “As long as the wheel keeps turning, we will fine. We have never had such a big order, the mill is being used at its full capacity.”

Privately, Izolda wondered how long the mill could keep going at such a rate. Though she knew little of the inner workings of the sawmill, she heard the mutterings of the workers. It was not a reassuring sound.

Her fears were realized two days later when her work was interrupted by a loud clanging. She hurried from the house towards the sound, towards the river where she could see black smoke coming from the mill. Just as she reached it, there was a cracking sound, and a gout of flame erupted from the building.

A crowd was already gathered, those who had been in the building distinguished by their soot-covered clothing. Izolda searched the crowd until she saw Nikolai’s tall form.

“Thank heavens you are safe,” she said. Something wasn’t right though. She grasped his arm. “Where is Dmitri?”

Tripadi Verse Form

The Tripadi comes to us from the Bangladesh region of India, originating somewhere in the 10th century. It is written in any number of tercets (three line stanzas). Lines one and two have eight syllables and rhyme with each other, and line three has ten syllables. There is also a less common version where lines one and two have six syllables each (but still rhyme) and the third line has eight syllables.

The verse is considered to be one thought broken up into three lines and can sometimes be found expressed as a single line. However, it is more typically written in tercets, giving the last line of each tercet a little more space and emphasis. There is no theme for the Tripadi, but the structure lends itself to both short and lengthy poems

Schematic:

xxxxxxxa
xxxxxxxa
xxxxxxxxxb

xxxxxxxc
xxxxxxxc
xxxxxxxxxd

... and so on.

I did two examples, one in the traditional 8/8/10 format, and one in the 6/6/8 format, and just for fun did the first one in the single line format as well. I kept wanting to make the last line of each verse rhyme, either with the other two in that verse or the end lines of the following verses. But that would have given us a whole different poem. :-D


Aging

We contemplate the road ahead,
some filled with joy, and some with dread,
but eventually we choose our way.

Our winding path may be easy,
maybe it is slow and breezy,
but pressing on we will find our fortune.

And whether rich or whether poor
the life we lead will account for
how others look upon us when we’re gone.

And when we come unto the end,
when comes the time we must ascend,
we can look back to see where we have gone.


Aging

We contemplate the road ahead, some filled with joy, and some with dread, but eventually we choose our way.
Our winding path may be easy, maybe it is slow and breezy, but pressing on we will find our fortune.
And whether rich or whether poor the life we lead will account for how others look upon us when we’re gone.
And when we come unto the end, when comes the time we must ascend, we can look back to see where we have gone.


The Birds

I see the birds in trees
cheering the summer breeze
and feel their joy that summer’s here.

They flutter, fly away
as they did yesterday
but I know they’ll be back again.

Measure Twice, Cut Once

Turning a manuscript into a book is easy; getting the manuscript ready to become a book is hard.
― A.P. Fuchs

An unedited manuscript is a first draft of story; but is not a finished product. Too many writers study the craft of writing but do not acquire the skills of an editor.
― Michael J. Kannengieser

When you print out your manuscript and read it, marking up with a pen, it sometimes feels like a criminal returning to the scene of a crime.
― Don Roff

I think I might have mentioned that some of the workshops I took part of were more sharing friendly than others. The next workshop I took after the Inner Critic was actually one on dialogue. However, the instructor zipped so quickly through her presentation that I have exactly four paragraphs of notes, incomplete notes at that.

She had us doing a lot of exercises, most of which involved recalling conversations. I don’t know about you, but I tend to avoid people and their conversations so I had a hard time recalling one to use, or one involving two children having a conversation, or one where I overheard an important conversation. And she was a screenwriter, so a lot of her advice didn’t really apply to fiction writing.

So today we’re skipping ahead to Workshop #4, Measure Twice, Cut Once, presented by Tanis MacDonald. This was all about getting your manuscript ready for publication.

How do you know if your manuscript is ready for a publisher?

You’ve finished writing your novel and you think you’re ready for a publisher. Not so fast. First, put it away for six to eight weeks. Then you’ll need to edit it. It very likely isn’t the story you thought it was and this cooling off period will show you that.

Often we’re writing more than one thing at the same time and these are the pages that need to be cut. So write to the end of what you know, put it away for six weeks, and then trim it down, or add to it if that’s the case. You need to develop an appetite for revision and for loving the process. Develop strategies for spending time with your manuscript.

Sometimes what you’re revising, or trimming, are your impulses, things that seemed like a good idea at the time. You need to know what you’re writing about. Sometimes, this isn’t clear until near the end. You make discoveries as you write.

Develop a manuscript community. Have a peer read it – someone you can do a story/chapter exchange with is ideal. It’s an exchange of time. Have a beta reader from your demographic read it. Consider hiring a developmental editor, but you don’t want to do this when you’re still feeling tender about your work. Send it to a beta reader instead. Learn to take criticism graciously.

If you are publishing through traditional channels, you will probably be assigned an editor. So why should you hire a developmental editor? It will help make sure your manuscript is polished, and shows you’re serious. You can even mention it in your submission letter.

There are only four big presses, but there are many small presses and independent publishers. It’s easier to get published with a small press. Look for one that publishes your kind of book. Small presses are more willing to take a chance on unknown writers. You won’t feel like a number with them, you’ll feel like a person.

Independent small presses are less demanding. They’re a small organization, but they have a big reach. They’re gaining momentum and popularity. You don’t need an agent to submit your manuscript. You’ll get pulled into a publishing family.

Vanity presses are not evil people, but they do take advantage of new authors. They do a minimal amount of editing and no promotion. They’re basically fancy printers, not publishers and they’re very limiting. You’ll probably only sell locally to family and friends.

When making a pitch to a traditional press, make sure you check out the other authors they publish. They’re going to want to know whether they can sell a book like yours. You’ll also want to compile a literary CV – publications, readings, work in the community.

In your cover letter, tell them what the book does and does not do, the reality of your book, what it is – a light-hearted romp, mystery, historical, science fiction . . . Be confident. Tell them who you are, what you’ve published before. Include a synopsis, why you wrote it, why you chose them. Read three books they’ve published that you liked. Get to know their backlist. Be honest, especially if this is your first manuscript.

Have patience, the wait time is usually six months or better. Publishing is slow. If you’re accepted, remember you’re all working towards the same goal – getting your book out there. The publisher runs the show. An editor will be assigned to you, as will a cover designer. You probably won’t be getting a say in the cover design unless you’re working with a small press.

The copy-editor will check for consistency and double-check style choices. They’ll also fact check and catch every little error. You may also be assigned sensitivity readers when you’re writing about things not your own – a black community, aboriginal, LGBT. . . You need someone sensitive to that life style to read what you’ve written to make sure you’re not being offensive.

You want to maximize the first six months. New books get the lion’s share of promotion and reviewers are usually very generous with their reviews. The publisher will also probably arrange for other authors to do review blurbs. And then comes the best part, your book will be released into the wild.

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

WORDAGE REPORT

THE WEEK IN REVIEW
You would think, with the hubby being gone for five days, I would have got all kinds of writing done. But alas, such was not the case.

The problem with having too much time on your hands is that it’s way too easy to put things off. I could sit in my office and write, but my recliner is so much more comfy, and I’ve got all day to write. I’ll just play a few more rounds of solitaire and write later. Oops! I was just about to get up and do something constructive, but one of the kittens decided to curl up on my lap and I really hate to move them. I’ve got all the time in the world, I can afford to sit here for a few hours.

Discipline folks, it’s all about discipline. Something which apparently I’m sadly lacking.

That being said, I did get all my posts up on time, most of them written early. I just didn’t get a whole lot of extra writing done.

NEW WORDS:
1674+807+366+640=3,487
UP – 686 words from last week

I was really hoping I’d have a bunch of new words to share, but alas, it was not to be. Disappointing, but it is what it is.

One thing I did do was some experimentation with translators. In one of the workshops last fall, it was suggested that we take a short piece we’d written and run it through several translators in succession, using a different language each time.

The one I tried was limited to the amount of text I could use, so I right off the bat I lost text. For the next one, I decided to use a poem, and that worked out really well. So then I dug around until I found those weekly prompt stories I was doing a couple of years ago. They were super short, so I tried a couple of them and found the results really interesting.

Goals For Next Week:
Get some words written besides my blog posts.

EDITING:
6 hours
Fooled you! I got some editing done. :-) It was spread out over a few days, but even a little bit every day adds up.

Goal For Next Week:
Keep working on An Elemental Spirit.

TECH & TRAINING:
Ummm, no. I got nothing here.

Goal For Next Week:
Learn something new. Figure out Dropbox.

POETRY WEDNESDAY:
Last week’s poem was kind of weird, and I wasn’t 100% happy with either of the examples I wrote.

I ran my linking pin sonnet through the translators, and while the poem I ended up with wasn’t true to form, it was still interesting.

Goal For Next Week:
Find another new poetry form to share.

CRAFTING:
I took some cross-stich to the library for my guild’s stitch-in, but it was so long since I’ve worked on it I was kind of lost. I need to un-stitch part of it before I can move forward again. But fortunately, I had some embroidery with me as well, so I worked on it instead. Unfortunately, that’s about the only time I worked on it.

But more good news, I found a work table for my craft room. It’s actually this tall baker’s rack, but not only will it fit in the space I have, it has extra shelf space for my works in progress. The only problem is, it’s probably going to be a couple of months before I can take possession.

Goal For Next Week:
Organize my sewing bag, work on some jewelry I’ve been meaning to make.

WHAT I’M READING:
I finished Devil in the Details, by Shelley Dorey and I’m still pecking away at The Knockoff Eclipse by Melissa Bull. I also started reading The Writing Retreat, by Julia Bartz.

Goal For Next Week:
Keep up the slow and steady reading pace.

THE WEEK AHEAD:

I have to admit to being disappointed in my lack of writing last week. All that time, and so little to show for it. But I also have to say that I work better with deadlines – maybe I should set some. Easy to do, not so easy to follow through with.

One of the goals I should set for myself is to edit for an hour each day. In the grand scheme of things and hour isn’t all that much time, and even an hour a day adds up.

I really need to start making daily to-do lists again. Maybe write the master list on Sunday night, and then each night a short list for the next day.

There’s a regular meeting of the stitchery guild this week, and that same day I have a dentist appointment. So I’ll lots of time to start becoming productive again.

Wish me luck.

The Pond - Part 33

Izolda paced back and forth in her work room. She had tried reasoning with Nikolai, she had even given him a gentle nudge with her magic, but he would not be swayed. He was adamant they were going to stay, no matter what tragedy befell them.

Acres of trees, prime forest waiting to be cut, were found to be rotted on the inside or infested with insects. Farming on the land cleared of the trees became poor. What little would grow was lost to beetles or grubs. People began moving away, hoping for better luck elsewhere.

In desperation, Izolda slipped a potion into Nikolai’s evening tea, but it had no effect on him. That was when she realized the rusalka had some sort of sway over him. An ordinary rusalka did not usually cast spells, but then this was no ordinary rusalka.

Having no other recourse, she once more took the path to the pond. It looked quiet, inviting even. The water was still, sparkling in the sunlight.

“What will it take,” Izolda called out. “What do you want from me to leave us alone?”

At first there was no answer. Everything was quiet. Even the birds stopped their chirping and twittering. Then the water of the pond seemed to shiver, and the rusalka rose until only her feet remained submerged. The form she wore gave Izolda an involuntary shiver.

“A visitor, how nice. I have so few visitors these days.” She pouted as she spoke. “It seems someone has spelled the land around my home to keep people away.”

“To keep you from killing them, you mean,” Izolda said.

“It’s not my fault I’m hard on my toys.”

Izolda’s lips tightened at the comparison of the souls the creature had taken to toys. “What will it take for you to release us from your curse?”

“Release you?” She laughed, a high pitched titter. “When I’m having such fun?”

“How can you make light of all the grief you’ve caused?”

“Me? Me?” the rusalka’s voice rose in outrage. “Who are you to speak to me of causing grief. What of the grief you’ve caused?”

“I—”

“The lies you’ve told, the spells you’ve cast. I know that you were born with power, but that wasn’t enough for you, was it? You could have done great good with such power, but instead you decided to serve only yourself.”

It was harsh, but true enough.

“What of the lives you’ve taken?”

“I cannot change the past,” Izolda said. “I can only move forward.”

The rusalka laughed, a high girlish laugh. “And what do you suppose your beloved would say if he knew the truth of what you are, what you have done. If I went to him, told him all the things you’ve done, do you think he would sacrifice you to save himself?”

“I—”

“If I asked you for Nikolai’s life, to let you and your son live, would you grant it to me?”

“Yes,” Izolda said, without hesitation.

The rusalka pretended to think about it. “No, too easy. He has betrayed me as well, He deserves to suffer, as do you. I will pick you both apart, bit by bit. And when I am done, I will suck the marrow from your bones.”

Izolda said nothing to this.

“Do not think to persuade Nikolai to leave this place. Your magic is strong, but mine is stronger. My magic has him tethered to this place.”

Izolda thought that might be the case.

“Remember, there is no where you can run, no where you can hide. I will find you, and in the end, I will have everything.”

Izolda turned, and left. She had nothing more to say.

Ercil Verse form

Over the last few weeks the verse forms I’ve shared have been pretty easy. Today’s form is a bit tougher.

The Ercil form was created by James Gray to honor Ercil Brown, who was the interim poet laureate of Arkansas from 1970 to 1971. For those of you who care about meter labels, the structure is as follows: the verse is a decastich; lines 1 and 5 are dimeter, lines 2, 6, 9, and 10 are trimeter, lines 3 and 7 are tetrameter, and lines 4 and 8 are pentameter.

In English, this means the verse is 10 lines. Lines 1 and 5 are four syllables, lines 2, 6, 9, and 10 are six syllables, lines 3 and 7 are eight syllables, and lines 4 and 8 are ten syllables. The rhyme scheme is a-b-a-b-c-d-c-d-e-e

Still confused? Maybe a schematic will help.

Schematic:

xxxa
xxxxxb
xxxxxxxa
xxxxxxxxxb
xxxc
xxxxxd
xxxxxxxc
xxxxxxxxxd
xxxxxe
xxxxxe

Okay, maybe not. That only leaves an example for clarity. I’m not quite sure I caught the spirit of the meters, but at least I got my syllable counts and rhymes right. I’m not entirely happy with either of my examples, and I don’t think this is a form I’ll be using on a regular basis.


Lost in the dark
a troubled soul calls out.
Their plea is meant to light a spark
to change the world, when kindness is shut out.
Who’s left to hear?
World so short on pity
imbued instead with rage and fear
intolerance and animosity.
The soul cries out in rage
but cannot leave its cage.


The rain will fall,
the sun will shine after,
the flowers begin to grow tall,
and the summer will follow hereafter.
Enjoy the sun
while it’s high in the sky
before the heat and light is done
and we are forced to bid summer goodbye.
For the seasons will turn,
but they always return.

Step Aside, Inner Critic - Part 2

The critical voices in our own heads are far more vicious than what we might hear from the outside. Our "inside critics" have intimate knowledge of us and can zero in on our weakest spots.
― Susan Ariel Rainbow Kennedy

Give space to your thoughts, clear the noise in your head, chit-chat with your inner critic, decide and move on.
― Cristina Imre

Our reaction to self-criticism is more important than the self-criticism itself. Paying attention to our reactions is very important because the only thing we have control over is how we react.
― Yong Kang Chan

Well . . . this will teach me not to be in such a rush. I thought I’d get a jump on my Sunday post by typing out my notes for the next workshop I was going to share, and I found a bunch of stuff I forgot to include with last week’s workshop. *sigh*

Last week the emphasis was on taking care of yourself both mentally and physically. Exercise regularly, adopt a healthy eating plan, meditate, and keep a regular sleep schedule.

As well as getting a good night’s sleep, become a morning person. Start each day with some freewriting. Get up and write for 15-25 minutes with pen and paper. Do this before doing anything else. Write whatever’s uppermost in your mind without stopping. Write in sentences, not point form. Make friends with your subconscious – you’ll find out things about yourself.

When you get used to this routine, you’ll be introduced to amazing clarity. Write these morning pages, then once a month or so, read what you’ve written. Phrases that you thought were substandard will leap out at you. Write these on a fresh page and use them as a starting place.

Keep your hand moving, lose control, don’t think. Be specific, use the senses and as much detail as you can. Don’t worry about punctuation, spelling, and grammar – go for the jugular. Use a specific notebook for these “morning pages” that is separate from your other writing.

When it comes to your regular writing, it helps to have a schedule – a specific time set aside for writing every day. But setting aside a specific time to write awakens the resistance (that we talked about last week). The Pomodoro Technique is a great way to combat this resistance.

Simply put, the Pomodoro technique is a time management method where you work for 25 minutes, then take a 5 minute break. Twenty-five minutes is the maximum amount of time you can work at something without your brain sending you into flight mode. Write for 25 minutes with a 5 minute break 4 times, then step away from the desk and take a half hour break.

Further Reading:
Writing Down the Bones, by Natalie Goldberg
Becoming A Writer, by Dorothea Brande

We finished this workshop with five minutes of freewriting:
The inner harbour is ice-covered. The space between the wooden docks is filled with white. The seagulls and cormorants I enjoyed watching in the fall are missing. Do cormorants migrate for the winter? I’ll have to ask my bird-watching friend – she’ll know. At home the water fowl stay put because no matter how many signs are put up or fines levied, people persist in feeding the birds. The birds’ dependence on these human handouts is not always a good thing. Case in point, the trumpeter swan that died, frozen in the ice. I wonder what happen to its mate?

* ~ * ~ * ~ * ~ *

WORDAGE REPORT

THE WEEK IN REVIEW
Where does the time go? It seems like I’m just relaxing on Sunday evening, and then all of a sudden it’s the weekend again. Wasn’t Monday just yesterday?

I was feeling much better last week, and Monday I had an epiphany that put me in a much better head space. That’s not to say I’m suddenly all gung ho to get stuff done, but I did a wider variety of things and felt like I wasted a lot less time. Which was the big surprise, considering how crappy the weather was. And an even bigger surprise was that I spent more time in my office.

March may have come in like a lion, but it left like a screaming toddler having a temper tantrum. The temperature has been up and down, the skies have been grey and overcast, and occasionally sunny. Wednesday it wasn’t looking too bad out . . . until we got two inches of snow in under an hour. About the only thing consistent has been the wind.

Barring last Sunday’s posts, not only did I get all of my posts scheduled on time last week, I also got them written early. So no super late nights where I was up past my bed time writing, which was kind of nice for a change.

NEW WORDS:
1426+477+244+654=2,801
DOWN 417 – words from last week

I guess I just didn’t have as much to say last week. The first part of my post on the inner critic workshop for the Sunday post would have been longer if I’d turned the page in my notebook and saw the rest of the notes that I posted this week.

Frankly, I thought about skipping Monday altogether because I really didn’t have much to say. One of the disadvantages of living the quiet life, I guess. And I tried to stretch out the poetry post by writing three example poems, but the form was so simple there just wasn’t anything else to say about it.

As for my serial . . . The pacing of my on-line serial story really sucks. And I jumped the gun a couple of times when it came to the timing of key events, which is really messing me up now. It started out so slowly, but then it started picking up speed and now I feel like I’m rushing towards the end. At this point all I can do is continue on to its logical conclusion, and hope I can fix everything when I get around to editing it.

I swear, I’m not starting a new serial until I have a couple of installments of it already written. There was more I could have said in that installment, and more I probably should have said, but I was in a hurry and getting tired (was only up a little late, but it had been a long day already). So it is what it is and I’ll try to do better this week.

Goals For Next Week:
Get some words written besides my blog posts.

EDITING:
0 hours
The only editing I had the urge to do was on the serial story, which I can’t really do because it’s ongoing.

Goal For Next Week:
Start work on An Elemental Spirit.

TECH & TRAINING:
I figured out how to use my new laminator. It was super easy, but I’m still counting it. LOL

Goal For Next Week:
Learn something new. Figure out Dropbox.

POETRY WEDNESDAY:
This week’s poem was super easy, which made for a super short post, even though I did three examples. It got easier as I went along, and my examples got better.

Goal For Next Week:
Find another new poetry form to share.

CRAFTING:
It’s done, done, done-diddily-done! The afghan is done. Completed. Finished! The crocheted monkey is off my back! AND it’s been delivered to the recipient, who even called and thanked me. Now all I have to do is figure out my next project.

Goal For Next Week:
Go through stitchery stuff and find a new project to finish.

WHAT I’M READING:
I finished reading Spellbound, by Shelley Dorey, and started reading the third in the series, Devil in the Details. I’m still pecking away at The Knockoff Eclipse by Melissa Bull, but it's slow going.

Goal For Next Week:
Keep up the slow and steady reading pace.

THE WEEK AHEAD:

I foresee a push to get the bulk of my writing done during the day, whether in my office or not, so that I can do craft stuff in the evenings when I’m watching TV.

I did try out the translating a story into several different languages in succession (a suggestion from the fall Writersfest), but I lost something in the translation. Literally. Somehow I cut off the beginning of my story. But I’d like to try it again, maybe this time with something shorter, like a poem.

My stitchery guild meets the second and fourth Tuesdays of the month, so we met last week, but several of us decided this wasn’t enough so on the alternating weeks we’re going to have an informal stitch-in at the local library. So, stichery gathering this week.

I keep trying to tell myself that there’s no law that says I have to be at the gym right at 6 a.m., and that I’d only be a little late if I did my morning pages first. Of course that’s assuming I’m awake enough to hold a pen. But I’d like to give it a try.

I think I’ll also try getting my retreat notes typed out, just so I don’t miss any, like I did last week. Unlike previous years, though, I don’t think I’m going to copy them into my writing journal. Seems a little like overkill, to have them both places.

But there’s something I should add to my list – give a little more attention to my writing journal. Mostly what I’ve been writing in there is the odd quote or two. Maybe I’ll start writing a weekly flash prompt or something.

It’s a thought.