Writing Prompts

Word Prompt: Harvest | Story Prompt: from the Essay “The Writer On, And At, Her Work” by Ursula K. Leguin, from Janet Sternburg’s 1995 anthology The Writer On Her Work, Volume 2, New Essays In New Territory

Write It Out: Instruction Video

‘Her work, I really think her work

isn’t fighting, isn’t winning,

isn’t being the Earth, isn’t being the Moon.

Her work, I really think her work

is finding what her real work is

and doing it,

her work, her own work,

her being human,

her being in the world.

So, if I am

a writer, my work

is words. Unwritten letters.

Words are my way of being

human, woman, me.

Word is the whorl that spins me,

the shuttle thrown through the warp of years

to weave a life, the hand

that shapes to use, to grace.

Word is my tooth,

my wing.

Word is my wisdom.

I am a bundle of letters

in a secret drawer

in an old desk.

What is in the letters?

What do they say?

***

Dedicated, with thanks, to all the friendly people (authors, writers, readers, illustrators, composers, painters, planners, organizers and volunteers) that I spent time with yesterday in Minden, Ontario at their first annual Bookapalooza.

Thoughts? Feel free to share them here.

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