Tuesday, June 3, 2014

Snip Week--a poem and an update on FRIENDLY FIRE

It's the first week of the month and I promised you some snips, poetry, or something of the sort. I thought I'd share a "found poem". The rules are to read anything and collect phrases and then try to construct a poem from them. This is an exercise from Sara Crawford's THIRTY DAY WRITING CHALLENGE.

I used a review of the recent movie remake of Godzilla. Really. ;-) The not-so-good review turned into a commentary on a bad marriage. Yep, you read that right. Here goes. The found phrases are in Italics.


She’d gotten the short end of the stick.
Again.
Of course.
He looked like someone who
Everyone thinks is a standup guy
One communicating with a slow burn—
With the tone and character
To counter balance
Life’s pains.

Only the worried wife
Knew the disastrous truth
He was the world’s most famous monster
A man dedicated to thunderous applause
And spectacular blows.

Her life would be vastly improved
If she only existed for his short attention span
Instead
Of awakening his dormant,
Meticulous, cool notes
Of prolonged disdain.
 (copyright May 15, 2014)

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FRIENDLY FIRE Update:
I've reworked two scenes using this month's B&W Forum exercise on details. Making them count and tying them to the POV character's emotions is a big craft item for me. I've loved every minute of it. It's like the idea of setting details has finally clicked for me. 

I've also been working on digging deeper into my secondary characters--Rosemary and her son Dean. This is as eye-opening as the digging I did on Samantha earlier this year. It's all necessary to make FRIENDLY FIRE the best it can be--a layered story that will hook readers into my world of Cherry Hill.

9 comments:

  1. I had planned on doing the may X but just never got around to it. Bummer, it was one I could have used. Glad it helped you!

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    1. It's a good one. You can do it for yourself...I'll give feedback if you'd like. ;-)

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  2. Love that found poem - and I especially loved knowing the source - that made it funny. :)
    Thanks for the blitz stop!!!

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  3. Great poem--I love that you took a movie review and turned it into this! :)

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    1. Lara, the exercise did it. I just grabbed the review and highlighted interesting phrases and the poem leaped out. I can't claim any expertise. ;-)

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  4. Love the poem! The flow works really well, and it's neat how many found phrases you got in there. Godzilla, ha ha!

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  5. I mean, funny that you used a Godzilla review to write a failed marriage poem!

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    Replies
    1. I knew what you meant. It was funny to me, too. Thanks, Deniz!

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