Wednesday, May 30, 2018

Establishing the Writing Habit

One of the most challenging things for me as a writer is maintaining a writing habit.  NAPOWRIMO is a great time to kick-start, but it is so easy to fall away once May 1 hits.  For me, this results in  procrastination, carelessness about journaling, and after only a few weeks, self doubt about my abilities. We all have those serendipitous moments of genius in the shower or while brushing our teeth, but that's a pretty meagre diet for the creative process.

During NAPOWRIMO, I mentioned discovering a number of twitter handles that provided daily prompts.  I suppose I thought this was only for the month of April, but it wasn't!  Just the few minutes of looking up the prompts and writing them down can be enough to start words flowing.

Today, I saw the prompt 'where memories dwell,' and that triggered memories of driving across Nevada with storms looming.  That brought on the poem below, in the form of 5 cinquains:


Newe Sogobia

Sagebrush
is everywhere
roots clinging to basalt
though scant cover of rocky soil
sustains.

Raptors
fly wide circles
scan the terrain for prey.
Upon finding the lone rodent
they stoop.

Wildfires
scorch high desert.
Rough limbs that have endured
countless cycles of blackening
still green.

Storms are
foreseen for miles
dappled on the landscape
cool clouds with ozone on their breath
approach.

After,
sun is revealed
spiders and lean lizards
emerge beside sweet rabbit brush
and bask.

I'm committing to myself to post every Wednesday.  I also found this graphic on Twitter to help motivate me.  As the tweeter suggested, it's posted above by desk. 

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