Writers' Pantry #39: Plums and feathers

New acquaintances: 'Oh, you're a writer. What do you write?'

Rosemary: 'Poetry, mainly.'

Them: 'What kind of poetry?' 

Me: 'Um, all kinds.' (Which I'm aware is uninformative, albeit true.)

End of that conversational topic, usually – except for those who enquire if they should have heard of me, to which the answer is no.

But sometimes they ask, 'Where do you get your inspiration?'

Of course the answer to that is equally broad and unhelpful: 'Everywhere.' Though I do add that I respond to online prompts, among other things.

I love the way the community member we know as Magical Mystical Teacher put it recently:

From the ripened plum,
from the raven’s tailfeather,

let there be stories! 

Oh yes!  

And how brilliantly those two examples suggest the whole of the natural world.

Dear wordsmiths, please share with us your poetry or prose, old or new, fictional or fact, from any and every source of inspiration, and leave us your link below.

If you're giving us prose, please keep it to 369 words max (excluding title). The prompt will stay open for a week, which we hope is time enough for us all to come up up with something, to enjoy reading what everyone else shares, and to leave them some encouraging comments.

Please add your piece (just one per person) to Mister Linky, and leave us a comment here too if you'd care to.

Advance notice: on Wednesday Magaly will be asking us for poetry or prose inspired by anything October. Think of traditions, colors, rituals, folklore, memories of events lived in that month… and then write.

Material shared here is presented for study and review. Poems, photos, and other writings and images remain the property of the copyright owners, usually the authors. (Older material may be out of copyright). Both of these photos are from Unsplash, with thanks to Daiga Ellaby for the feather and Markus Spiske for the plum.

Weekly Scribblings #38: A Helping String

Hello, Word Artists and Admirers! Learning the art of Japanese tea ceremony often means learning a bunch more related arts, for instance, the art of wearing kimono. You might not think kimono wearing is all that complicated a thing… but you’d be wrong. It involves a lot of knot tying as well as little details that are easy to miss if you don’t quite know what you are doing.

The novice kimono wearer’s best friend is a koshihimo, which is a length of long skinny fabric. It’s name means waist belt, but you use it whenever or wherever you need a part of your kimono or obi secured either for when you’re trying to keep one part still while you deal with another bit of fabric, or to keep things held down the whole time you are wearing your kimono. Koshihimo can be pretty, but they aren’t intended to be seen. Think of them more as ‘kimono support’, either hidden away or untied and removed completely once the main knots are in place.

So for today, I’d like you to think about things that act like a koshihimo—things meant only as a temporary or hidden support. Show off your newly created word offerings for this prompt by dropping your link below. Poetry and prose are welcome, as is fiction or non-fiction. Just be sure to keep it to 369 words or fewer if you opt for prose and only one entry per person please.