The last next five workshops are for all sorts of writers, not just fiction writers. For those of you who (think you!) write only fiction, I want you to try some of these other ways of writing to challenge yourself and inform your fiction writing. For the poets, these five workshops will give you a chance to practice forms you may not know as intimately. For non-fiction writers, these workshops are intended to push you outside the box so you go forward in your non-fiction with new eyes.

The idea behind these exercises is that by trying new things as a writer, you help yourself look at what you’ve already been doing in new ways. By doing this, you breathe life into something that isn’t working, you fire up your creativity, and you have fun with words.

Having fun with your writing is the best way to reconnect with it. And maybe along the way you’ll discover you’re a far more diverse writer than you knew.

The first thing I want you to try is called a FOUND POEM. Here’s a definition from poets.org:

Found poems take existing texts and refashion them, reorder them, and present them as poems. The literary equivalent of a collage, found poetry is often made from newspaper articles, street signs, graffiti, speeches, letters, or even other poems.

A pure found poem consists exclusively of outside texts: the words of the poem remain as they were found, with few additions or omissions. Decisions of form, such as where to break a line, are left to the poet.

That means, basically, that you take a text, or multiple texts, and reword the original into a poem by adding line breaks. Here are some more instructions if it needs to be clearer: http://www.creative-writing-now.com/found-poetry.html

Traditionally, you use any text that is not your own. But some of you Wattpadders might like to mix it up and use one of your already written scenes to turn into a poem.

The best thing about found poetry is that it reminds you words are everywhere, ideas are in the most unlikely places and inspiration can come from something as simple as a line break.

Here’s a short found poem I tried using my bulletin board at home:

To replace this screw, drop

in for an inspection

at the youth resource centre

gift certificate upon receipt

there is nothing so lonely

just fix it entirely

let’s go.

Even if this feels like something that you’ll never do again, try it this week and see what ends up on the page. Share your work on the Weekly Workshop Series Discussion Thread!

This week’s writing prompt:

This week I want you to write a found poem using either a text that you find (as in a traditional found poem) or using one of your pieces of fiction/non-fiction/poems reshaped.

If you’re stuck and want a text to use, please use this text from my local art gallery’s newest exhibit. Use as much or as little as you like:

Petroleum, in its extraction, distribution, utility, economics, and social, political, and environmental impacts, defines our contemporary world. Yet, in the developed countries that consume it most, it remains a strangely invisible substance, evident primarily at the clean and bright gas stations dotting our city streets and highways. In his fascinating account of international petroleum industry operations, Crude World, journalist Peter Maass argues that in North America oil is invisible most of the time, but “like gravity, it influences everything we do.”

Beneath a Petroliferous Moon is a survey of artistic responses to the petroleum industry by 11 artists living and working around the world. The exhibition brings visibility to an array of aspects of this most important commodity, which in Canada is typically “extracted, refined, shipped, and poured into your gas tank with few people seeing it.” (Maass) While some artists focus on petroleum’s environmental impacts, others choose to respond to its social significance, its modern history, or the awe-inspiring visuals of the industry’s infrastructure and detritus. The title of the exhibition is taken from a 1940 poem by Pablo Neruda, “Standard Oil Co.,” which describes effects of the oil industry in Central America.

Last workshop we added line breaks to original texts while making our own found poems. This workshop we’re going in the opposite direction, removing line breaks and turning a ‘poem’ into something that resembles prose. The technical term is PROSE POETRY.

Here’s a link that explains prose poetry in full, and here’s a definition (from this site) for you that’s easy and quick to incorporate into your writing repertoire.

A prose poem essentially appears as prose, but reads as poetry.

There’s an example of a prose poem on this website: http://www.prose-poems.com/edson.html by an author called Russell Edson. Here’s the opening to give you an idea of his wonderful voice and ease with language:

We went upstairs in a canoe. I kept catching my paddle in the banisters.
     

We met several salmon passing us, flipping step by step; no doubt to find the remembered bedroom. And they were like the slippered feet of someone falling down the stairs, played backward as in a movie.

As you can see, a prose poem has the potential to bring out the strengths and weaknesses of poets and fiction writers alike. You may notice as you attempt this that you struggle with the language of poetry, or you may find removing line breaks feels strange. I’d suggest there is something for every type of writer to learn from this form. Perhaps you’ll discover that focusing on language helps you find your story, or perhaps you’ll find that making something look like prose opens up new possibilities in your work.

I never anticipated that I’d ever be able to use the prose poems I’ve written but one of my characters (from my second novel) ended up interested in prose poetry so I got to use a couple of my own prose poem creations in my fiction. You’ll be surprised how fun, challenging, addictive and useful prose poems can be.

This week’s writing prompt:

This week we’re writing prose poems. Using up to 300 words write a prose poem using this line: life is but a dream.

The line is from a nursery rhyme and a poem is by John Keats. I’ve added the poem below to inspire you:

On Death

1.

Can death be sleep, when life is but a dream,

And scenes of bliss pass as a phantom by?

The transient pleasures as a vision seem,

And yet we think the greatest pain’s to die.

2.

How strange it is that man on earth should roam,

And lead a life of woe, but not forsake

His rugged path; nor dare he view alone

His future doom which is but to awake.

John Keats

As a final note, here’s a place to submit your prose poem if you feel like braving the world: http://www.prose-poems.com/submit.html There’s no financial compensation, but it sure can feel good to see your work out there.

This week’s workshop is all about Halloween. It’ll help us remember that writing is fun. Sometimes as writers we focus too much on end goals, such as publication, or finally finishing the project we’re writing. But writing should be, above all, fun. Enjoying getting words on the page is the first step in a very long, challenging process. So, we’re going to have a little fun with writing this week by looking at writing a Half-Minute Horror story!

This is a project I took part in a couple of years ago, as did a bunch of very cool and brilliant authors including Lemony Snicket, Margaret Atwood, Neil Gaiman and Joyce Carol Oates. The weblink is here if you’re interested in sharing your final result or reading some other half-minute horrors.

The idea is that you write a story that is spooky, scary, (totally in the Halloween mode, hey), that can be read in half a minute. You’d be amazed at how tricky it can be to get down a whole story, hopefully with a spine-tingling twist, so it takes up less than a page or two. Taken from their website, here’s a Half-Minute Horror by the wonderful Margaret Atwood. As you can see, it’s brilliant, swift, and chilling. A whole story using hardly any words at all. I’ve included it here so you can see what can be done with this idea:

This week’s writing prompt:

Now it’s your turn: I’d love to see what you come up with if you dare this week. Write your own Half-Minute Horror.