creativeStarting now, the Poetry Fishbowl is open! Today's theme is "chocolate and other foods." I will be checking this page periodically throughout the day. When people make suggestions, I'll pick some and weave them together into a poem ... and then another ... and so on. I'm hoping to get a lot of ideas and a lot of poems.
Watch for the linkbacks perk to go live. Click to read "Beggars' Night" (Monster House) or notify
minor_architect of linkbacks to reveal more verses.What Is a Poetry Fishbowl?
Writing is usually considered a solitary pursuit. One exception to this is a fascinating exercise called a "fishbowl." This has various forms, but all of them basically involve some kind of writing in public, usually with interaction between author and audience. A famous example is Harlan Ellison's series of "stories under glass" in which he sits in a bookstore window and writes a new story based on an idea that someone gives him. Writing classes sometimes include a version where students watch each other write, often with students calling out suggestions which are chalked up on the blackboard for those writing to use as inspiration.
In this online version of a Poetry Fishbowl, I begin by setting a theme; today's theme is "chocolate and other foods." I invite people to suggest characters, settings, and other things relating to that theme. Then I use those prompts as inspiration for writing poems.
Cyberfunded Creativity
I'm practicing cyberfunded creativity. If you enjoy what I'm doing and want to see more of it, please feed the Bard. The following options are currently available:
1) Sponsor the Fishbowl -- Here is a PayPal button for donations. There is no specific requirement, but $1 is the minimum recommended size for PayPal transactions since they take a cut from every one. You can also donate via check or money order sent by postal mail. If you make a donation and tell me about it, I promise to use one of your prompts. Anonymous donations are perfectly welcome, just won't get that perk. General donations will be tallied, and at the end of the fishbowl I’ll post a list of eligible poems based on the total funding; then the audience can vote on which they want to see posted.
2) Swim, Fishie, Swim! -- A new feature in conjunction with fishbowl sponsorship is this progress meter showing the amount donated. At $150 you get a free series poem; at $200 you get an extra fishbowl featuring a poetic series.
$211 raised, first goal MET, second goal MET
December 6 2011, 20:29:09 UTC 9 years ago
1) Early European consumers of drinking chocolate quickly discovered its effect as a stimulant; one named Thomas Gage (a Dominican priest trained in Spain, not the British general who served during the American Revolutionary War) even wrote that he drank it whenever he wished to work late at night. Makes you wonder what else those early Europeans, who'd not had time to build up a tolerance to the stuff, got up to when they consumed it during the wee hours...
2) In some countries, the meaning of the word chocolate has evolved into "anything sweet that is easy to eat from the hand." For example, children in Afghanistan will proclaim that toffees are chocolates before happily finishing them off. :)
Poem
December 6 2011, 23:23:49 UTC 9 years ago