Eiffel Over

Tag: MorningPages

  • Musical prompts and the fundamental modes

    My free writing can sometimes become a delve into my to-do list and my anxiety jukebox. I have a theory that different members of my internal family wake up at different times, but it’s the to-do list comptroller and that anxiety jukebox DJ who often wake up first. 

    But music can wake up the other characters first. This reminds me I have different play lists to conjure up different creative moods. But this morning all it took was to turn on Fip, and all of a sudden I was walking down the street. This turned into a lovely sequence that could become the basis of a song or poem. 

    Which leads me to the second idea. To delve more into the fundamental modes of being: walking, sleeping, talking, breathing. So simple, yet I take them for granted. 

    Yesterday I was deeply immersed in the world of quality assurance. This was very heady and disembodying. My reaction is to turn to lean methods of working. There are few things leaner than these fundamental modes. And a rich source for creative material.

  • Rapid poem development

    This week’s project is to write a series of six poems for a mystery client. To leave a trace but not give anything away, here are some notes on process.

    Primary creation step – morning pages. Most of my ideas have come from writing morning pages (Julia Cameron’s technique from the Artist’s Way, described here by Oliver Burkeman). From starting with me writing the question over and over again – what shall I write in these poems?

    Next key move. Just start writing some words down. They don’t have to be very good. I found some simple word play. I like working lists and categories. Pick a category, like tree species, and all of a sudden you have a list of words to pick from. And as soon as you pick a word, you can probably find something for it to rhyme with.

    Are poems supposed to rhyme? I’m not going to worry about that for now.

    Yes, in fact, that feels like another step. Don’t worry about it for now. Because soon you will have the first poem written. And then, it’s easier when you’ve started.

    Rewrite the lyrics of a song. That’s good because you have the poem structure set up for you.

    Finding written things that are banal, and try re-imagining them. Instructions, signs, WhatsApp conversations.

    That’ll do for now.