JanBeek

Every first and third Friday our Madison County Writers’ Group meets in Ennis, Montana. We may have just two participants, or we could have eight or ten. Last February during our third Friday meeting, there were just two of us. I recently came across my notes from that meeting.

We begin our meeting each time with a prompt we draw from a bag. Anyone can add prompts to the bag at any time. On this particular Friday, Steve drew the prompt, “Writer’s Block.” We had ten or fifteen minutes to write on that prompt and then share with one another what we had written.

I decided to write a Haiku. It ended up as a 5 stanza poem… each stanza a syllabic count of 5-7-5 syllables. What would you have written with the prompt “Writer’s Block”?

Let me share mine with you.

Writer’s Block can trap
You and me in wordless haze
Floating in nothing

Nothingness can hold
You and me in dilemma
Pen in hand stands still

Stillness can reveal
Treasures in the quietness
You just can’t force it

Forcefulness is great
If you adamantly feel
Thoughts begin to swirl

Swirling thoughts spin out
With contemplation and ease
The Block disappears

We had so much fun sharing our ideas on Writer’s Block that we decided to draw another prompt. This one was “Words.” We gave ourselves another ten minutes.

This time since I was on a roll with the Haiku rhythm, I wrote a 3 stanza poem. Sharing it later with my husband, Bob, he asked, “What determines if your Haiku is going to be one stanza or 3 or 5?”

“You write what you have to say,” I told him. “When you have said it, you stop. The thoughts dictate the length.”

Here’s what I wrote to the prompt, WORDS:

When words just fail me,
I sit back and dream awhile.
Dreams don’t have to speak.

When dreams are wordless,
My imagination spins –
Motivating scenes.

Let pictures emerge.
Print them on your mind and soul.
Eventually: WORDS!

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These kinds of dreams come to us as writers, but they come to painters and potters and musicians as well. It’s a capacity of the human brain that needs to be cultivated.

A productive life is one that can get beyond writers block, can use words to express inner feelings, and can listen with heart to the unspoken words of those around them.

I hope you are a proponent of the kind of arts education that promotes such critical thinking. Let your curious mind fly free.

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Be a wise consumer of words and thoughts and dreams! Do you have a Writers’ Group? If so, tell me about it. If not, think about forming one. It’s such fun to share your creative thoughts with others face to face, not just on WordPress.