The sublimity of language
Words are beautiful things, don’t you think? And language is an incredible tool, capable of describing the ineffable and translating one person’s experience into something more universal by putting the right words in the right place at the right time.
I went to a poetry panel this past weekend and was reminded of how many different ways there are to talk about the shared human experience: love, grief, fear, desire, rage. They say there are only a handful of stories in the world, but at the same time, every story is unique. It’s just a matter of choosing the words that are particular to your own experience. It’s always worth taking a few minutes to examine someone else’s experience and consider how it relates to your own.
Borrowed beauty
This month, we thought we would give you a chance to connect with another human’s experience as expressed through their poetry. Borrow any one line from the following poem by Australian Indigenous poet Dakota Feirer and use it as the first sentence of your micro, adding exactly 40 words. (In other words, this line will not apply to your total word count.)
She knows sacrifice so well,
They exchange secrets.
Her carriage arrives on the bell,
A rusty operator sings.
Covering her nose from the mechanical smell,
Her fingers are dressed in weathered rings.
She looks up at me, and I am enlightened,
Green eyes flourish in the Autumn sun,
And although she has alighted,
We are in transit, forever walking.
Closely it will follow,
A glance or whisper, forever stalking.
We know promises are hollow,
So, let our shadows do the talking.
“Napitji, Napitji,”
“And let us be free.”
A few guidelines:
- You must use the line exactly as it is written—no substituting or leaving out words, changing tense, punctuation, etc. with the following exceptions:
- You may add quotation marks if you use it as a line of dialogue.
- You may add onto the line to make a longer sentence, but any additions will be added to your word count.
- Be kind to the YeahWrite editors: bold or underline the line from the poem so that we can distinguish between the provided text and your own words. Example: “We know promises are hollow so now I need to write the other 40 words I promised here we go word word word another word word word more words word word word word word still another word word word word so many words word word.” (see? I even added exactly 40 words. But yours should tell a story.)
- Remember that you are writing a story—your piece must be more than a vignette or character sketch. Something ought to happen in your story.
- Even though it’s National Poetry Month in the US, we are looking for prose, not a poem.
Image credit: stockiphoto/sebastianbourges
This is the badge you need:
Below is the YeahWrite badge you need for this month’s microprose challenge. Under the badge is a few lines of code. See that? Copy it and then paste it into the “text” or HTML view of your post editor. If you don’t copy it exactly, the image will not appear correctly in your post, and you will receive an error message when you submit the post to Inlinkz. If you have any questions regarding adding this code to your post or website, please contact us at editors@yeahwrite.me.
Need a hand?
Microprose sounds easy. After all, how hard can it really be to write a story with fewer than 100 words incorporating a prompt or two? But it turns out it’s our hardest challenge to really get right. Whether you’re a seasoned micropro or a brand new microwriter, it’s worth taking a minute to glance through the tips and tricks our editors have put together, like this quick refresher on what makes a micro great, or this one on how to incorporate mandatory prompts into adjudicated challenges. Make sure you make it to the vote this week: check your wordcount (we count those footnotes!) and prompts!The microprose challenge ends in:
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How to submit and fully participate in the Microprose Challenge
Basic YeahWrite guidelines: must be in response to the prompt found in this post; your entry can be dated no earlier than Wednesday, April 3; nonfiction, fiction, whatever, told in exactly 40 words NOT INCLUDING the opening line taken from the above poem. You may enter only one microstory per weekly challenge.
How to submit and fully participate in the challenge:
- Please grab the code beneath the microprose badge in the body of this week’s post and paste it into the HTML view of your entry;
- Follow the Inlinkz instructions after clicking “add your link” to upload your entry to this week’s challenge grid;
- Your entry should appear immediately on the grid if you don’t receive an error message;
- Please make the rounds to read all the entries in this week’s challenge; and
- Consider turning off moderated comments and CAPTCHA on your own blog.
Submissions for this week’s challenges will close on Wednesday at 10pm ET. Voting will then open immediately thereafter and close on Thursday at 10pm ET. The winners, as always, will be celebrated on Friday.
Thank you for sharing with us your hard work! Good luck in the challenge…
Loading InLinkz ...About the author:
Christine Hanolsy is a (primarily) science fiction and fantasy writer who simply cannot resist a love story. She joined the YeahWrite team in 2014 as the microstory editor and stepped into the role of Editor-In-Chief in 2020. Christine was a 2015 BlogHer Voices of the Year award recipient and Community Keynote speaker for her YeahWrite essay, “Rights and Privileges.” Her short fiction has been published in a number of anthologies and periodicals and her creative nonfiction at Dead Housekeeping and in the Timberline Review. Outside of YeahWrite, Christine’s past roles have included Russian language scholar, composer, interpreter, and general cat herder. Find her online at christinehanolsy.com.
