You can read about the challenge here.
1. A man wearing an apron and a crash helmet runs from the bakery with a brown paper sack of baguettes and jumps on his scooter.
2. Some distance away but what must be a large crab scuttling across the lowest stone step on the quay at Le Bleu Royale restaurant and plopping into a sparkling sea.
3. The sound of my husband having breakfast in the kitchen downstairs, a spoon clattering against a china bowl, the bowl knocking against the wooden table. A chair scraped back.
12 comments:
TUESDAY (this is such a lovely exercise :))Sorry posted this on day 1 too !
1. Summer necklace against a honeyed neck. Huge dark wooden beads painted with pink flowers. She says, "I am here, it’s morning, anything is possible".
2. Observing the mind’s slow adjustment from wonder to uneasy acceptance over a failed friendship.
3. My 20-month-old daughter’s book of colours. A green frog in a bad mood, followed by a blue sky empty of clouds.
No problem, Helen. I think they're worth reading twice : )
1/ first thing; bats droppings on our office key boards on the mezzanine floor, no sign of the buggers
2/ small grey terrier chasing a large black cat across the road out of the farm yard
3/ the sound of an unseen nearby bird mingles with that of a distant jet plane
Tuesday
1.
In the dim half-light of the
hour before sunrise, crossing
the 200 yards from my silver
SUV to the stucco building I
work within, I was confronted
by a large racoon, who rushed
out from behind a tall conifer
and blocked my path. It stood
up on its back legs and the
yard lights sparkled in its
black eyes. I hissed at it,
knowing from experience that
although it had the comic
looks of a Disney Beagle Boy,
never the less it still was
a wild begger accosting me
in the deep dark, with eyes
masked and teeth bared. I
clutched hard at my brown
sack lunch and pounded the
ground with my stout cane.
It returned to all fours,
returned my hiss and slung
back into the shadows,
running in that distinctive
racoon lope, short front legs
giving it a rakish profile.
2.
A glance out my office window
revealed a nesting pair of
bald eagles with one of their
young high up on a fat fir
branch near the edge of
American Lake, waiting to
catch sight of a rainbow
trout probably hiding under
the rough puncheon boards of
the government dock just south
of them. A stiff breeze off
the water ruffled the chocolate
feathers on their folded
wings and the snow white ones
of their crowns, while Mt.
Rainier peeked up over the
edge of Silcox Island, eager
to witness their parenting.
3.
I sat alone in the picnic
shed watching the May mist
first become shower, then
return to rising steam,
pelting the four BBQ's
standing in a sloppy row
out front, all blue-black
with smeared charcoal and
ash; chewing on my tuna
sandwich, laced with garlic
dill pickle slices and
swirls of white onion, staring
wistfully out over the wide
mile of lake, at the white
caps the wind whipped up,
at the lone fisherman
anchored in the middle,
two poles thrust out over
the low transom, he covered
in gortex and hope, and at
several three-story mansions
piled up like wealthy lichen
on the opposite shore.
1. There's a small round spyhole in my appartment door. I stand looking at it in the dark - a keyhole to a brighter world. I can hear voices - a woman talking to a child; the child singing in a foreign language. If I were to place my eye over this small sun, all of the light in the universe would enter.
2. At night here your mind has to imagine the outline of the buildings against the dark of the sky. You imagine a darker shade, a shadow hard against a lighter shadow, grey pooling on the ground. It is either that or there are floating windows of light. One passenger leans out and stares down at the dark.
3. On the window sill this morning, three dead flies close together. They lay on their backs, their little legs seemed like a false eyelash until my groping hand found my specticals and they resolved into their tableau of death. On the other side of the glass the sky widened into white.
@ Martin - re 3): I love images that contrast near and far distance - sound, smell, or sight. They can be really effective in poems.
@ Glen - no 3. is just beautiful, Glenn. And your 'Racoon Attack' made me laugh : ) I had a similar, less alarming, experience here with a mouse, yes a mouse! It stood up on its back legs on the stairs and squealed at me. I put a yoghurt pot over it... not going to work with a racoon that : )
@ Frank - the first two read like complete prose poems, though I also like reading the three as a series...the links and shifts between them.
1. bird’s cry, a waft of fragrance - lilies? lilacs?
2. bonsai confined to a pot, a thrush in a cage.
3. thunders roll over the repair shop jackhammers at work.
Hi Lu - I hadn't thought of making single line haiku. Great idea. I really like 3.
Hot glue scalds my hand. Later I peel it from my fingers like sunburned skin.
The spilt grains of quinoa bounce and scatter like raindrops. The dogs scavenge hopefully, but decide its not worth the bother and slump back in their baskets.
A single adult skateboarder plays at the skate park whilst all the kids are at school.
Hi Nicky - ouch!!! Great to see you here : )
1) The layering of office noises: packing tape being torn, plastic being ruffled, phones beeping, voices speaking, keyboards clicking…
2) A single strand of red hair on a cream countertop.
3) The thorny branches of the bush—purple-red—clasp a small white feather.
Hello Erin - It's interesting 'how' things attract our attention, isn't it? Not something we have to analyse to enjoy life but, as writers, really noticing what our observations are made from can help us achieve particular effects and realise our intentions. Here you have sound, visual contrast and textural contrast. The latter's not one that I've really been aware of in my own observations... but I'll be looking for it now : )
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