Not Sneaking Up On Me This Time

So tomorrow is the last day before April comes. Typically every year April sneaks up on me. Before I know it, it’s gone. Then I’m left with trying to catch up. I am happy to say that this year is different. I am waiting for April first. Not because it’s April Fool’s day. But because April is Poetry Month. So, everyday for April my goal is to write one poem a day. By the end of the month, I’ll have 30 poems.

Usually I put them into a collection with the intent to have them published one day. I currently have three collections from doing this. One of them I still need to transcribe. This year I want to do things differently. Instead of putting them into a collection, my goal will be to blog them here. Then at the end of the month, pool them into a collection for the blog. I already have one blog collection under the tab for Poetry Collections Blog Edition titled Bag of Knick Knacks

I will also continue to write poetry not inspired by a prompt as well as regular posts, so there may be two posts from time to time. The poetry prompts I’ll be using will come from the Writer’s Digest Poetic Asides website.

Again the goal is to write one poem a day. Hopefully everything will go smoothly and I’ll be able to post at least once a day. I hate trying to play catch up.

Be blessed. Peace.

 

My Delights of Inspiration

I recently went to Barnes and Noble to purchase just one magazine. I ended up buying two and the third novel to a trilogy I’d started reading earlier this year. It was really unexpected but it happens. Besides, the magazines were Writer’s Digest and Poets and Writers (my first ever of either one). It wasn’t until I started reading them I wondered, why hadn’t I bought these long before now? They were packed with some really nice articles. I am very choosey about what I think I should believe from what I read. Got to be careful in this day and age where everybody thinks they have something important to say when all it is, is nothing at all. Anyway, as I was checking out the clerk was interested in my purchases, seeing that I have bought these particular magazines, and asked if I was a writer. I said ‘yes’ and then they proceeded to ask me if I had anything published. This second question I had trouble answering because I still haven’t defined it for me. I know the world thinks that unless it’s come through a publisher or self-published e-book, then it’s not considered published. But by definition, a blog, vlog or any other form of writing content and distributing it to the masses is considered published. So I told the clerk ‘not professionally but I do have a blog’ and I told them where they could find it. The last question the clerk asked was what did I like to write. While I gave them an answer I could live with (being that I mainly write thriller, sci-fi, and fantasy type stuff), this answer goes beyond that. It is always for the sake of time that I try to keep this particular answer short. However, beyond the three that I mentioned, my delights are rooted in a variety of things, so my inspiration is just about everything. This is in part because I am fascinated by a lot of things. As a kid, I loved researching and learning about different things. I still do and so I am interested in different genres. It is also due in part because I just don’t stick to writing novels. In fact, my writing roots begin with the short story. My earliest memories of writing are of me in the basement as a kid writing short stories from one page long to about fifteen or so pages. Then I moved on to novel writing, as a test because I knew it was longer. It certainly takes greater endurance. Poetry came lastly, which came to be something I love equally as the first two (especially since I initially didn’t care for poetry). But at a young age, it came to me almost as easily as the short story and novel. Almost. Poetry took more practice I think because instead of endurance, now the focus was on the word choice, which I find to be a grueling task and yet fun.

So my inspiration stems from any and everything around me as well as the fact that I don’t like to be confined to any one genre or writing discipline. Writing in each of these three veins helps me to understand them well enough to use their strengths in whatever I am writing, whether it is for word choice, endurance, or details or whatever. They each require their own specific set of skill. That same set of skill I find, however, can be used to achieve writing in another form.

However, if for some reason the above doesn’t satisfy what I specifically like writing, here is an idea (keep in mind this is not all inclusive): FOR POETRY- Faith (I am a Christian for the inquiring mind), love, nature (even the destruction of it), time, life, death, seasons, thoughts/ponderings, muse/poet relationship, lack of inspiration, reaching one’s dreams, relationships (familial, friends, intimate), abuse (domestic, child, and other), and sometimes socially conscience pieces.

FOR NOVEL: thriller, sci-fi for the most part although my work is probably more sci-fi thriller (in my opinion). I like fantasy and I have a working idea for a fantasy but I haven’t really had experience with this particular genre. The only thing I think would qualify is my posted short story A Turn In Perception and an epic ballad I did in high school. I like having themes in any novel work I do. I try to incorporate some kind of theme on purpose and then of course you have themes that just pop up organically. I am interested in writing other genres inspiration and mixing genres as well.

FOR Short Story: This runs the gamut. From inspirational to fantasy. I like short stories because they are a good writing workout in my opinion. It will certainly test the ability of word choice, that’s for sure.

But these are my delights of inspiration for the most part. More pop up as I become fascinated with more things.

I Missed Poetry Month!

So April is poetry month. I love poetry and I love writing poetry. Unfortunately, I’ve been so busy that I haven’t had much time to write poetry. Not just for poetry month but just for me. This of course means that I have missed poetry month 😦 which is a bummer.  There is, however, hope. During poetry month I use prompts from Writer’s Digest Poetic Asides blog. They have some great prompts, one prompt for each day. My plan is to write down each prompt and use those as a springboard to get my poetry flow back on track. That way I can write my pieces at my own pace. I also hope to get some pieces to post on this blog.

First Ever!

Last month I entered my first ever major writing competition. I must say I had a lot of doubts about whether my pieces were good enough to compete and if they were original enough. I’m always asking myself: is this original enough? I ask that question every time I’m thinking on an idea or even after I’ve already finished the work. Anyway, I entered both competitions  through Writer’s Digest. I’m currently waiting to hear if I won. I must say it’s exciting. I’ve never, in all my writing career, entered anything like this. In high school, I submitted three poems over two years to be published in my school’s magazine. All three were published. That was exciting. I have copies of the magazine and the invite to the magazine launch. I guess that was my first experience in the literary world as a writer/author. It wasn’t Harper Collins but it was the first time I got published so I was excited, haha.

In the meantime, I have quite a few projects to keep me busy. I just finished a novel that I’m currently querying agents for. I will be starting it’s sequel pretty soon. There is a short story I have to edit once more (I’m a editing/revision fiend). There are also a couple of other novels that I’m developing. In my Current Projects tab is the whole list as it stands currently. The titles are abbreviated for now. I’m also putting together a poetry as I also write poetry. That’s it for now. Peace everybody!