This week’s challenge is a little different – there isn’t one! Instead, from next week, I’m going to be setting some new mini competitions with prizes. I hope you’ll give them a go. Watch this space for news…
Now, on to last week’s challenge and the fantastic writing I received in response.
OPTION ONE was to write a fifteen-word story with the words THUNDER, TRUMP and TIARA in it somewhere.
Sanfranciscoatheart sent in a wonderfully topical story:
Hillary trumped Trump to steal the thunder and wear a presidential tiara!!
Rajiv Chopra always amuses:
Trump put a tiara on Hillary. The Republican thunder suddeny rolled loudly across the Nation!
OPTION TWO was to write a poem or limerick on the theme of SORROW.
Keith Channing takes my breath away with his brilliant limerick writing abilities:
According to Henry Dave Thoreau,
We can make a better tomorrow.
If life is promotive
Of offerings votive,
Then living will overcome sorrow.
Now, sorrow’s a normal reaction
To a lack of affirmative action.
Related, of course,
To our old friend remorse,
That’s a consequence of an infraction.
I thought it was something quite funny,
When my Dad said, “Advice for you, Sonny.
Don’t lend and don’t borrow
They’ll both lead to sorrow.
Be smart, and look after your money.”
Convinced it was all balderdash,
I spent years being careless with cash.
I’d no thought for the morrow,
Expected no sorrow;
Then came the financial crash.
The interest rates fell to the floor
And I found I could borrow no more.
To my greatest chagrin,
Twas all lose and no win,
And not like it was heretofore.
Now, here is a word to the wise,
And I fear this may be a surprise.
The thing that’s perverse
About each prior verse
Is that it’s a whole bunch of lies.
Rajiv has written a poem on sorrow, based on a question asked him in the library:
She asked me if I was a television presenter
I really did not want to lie at all to her.
And so, I said, “Milady, this I am definitely not,
But, do you still find me slightly hot?
She turned away, and wrinkled her nose,
And blew me away, as if with a hose.
She looked at me like I’m an insect
And then proceeded to hold her breath.
So now you understand my deep sorrow,
I really cannot face the lady tomorrow.
The girl has gone and my sorrow runs deep,
Why, oh why – do I want to sleep and weep?
For OPTION THREE, your word of the week was the MUSIC.
Rajiv shows us what music means to him:
Music is a strange thing, and it is hard to say what it means for me. I have a reasonably wide range, or collection, of music and often choose my music depending on my mood. But, I have been planning to write about ‘Driving Music’ for a very long time, so maybe this is a good time to do it.
Sometimes, in the morning, or particularly when I am stuck in the traffic, I will listen to calming music. Something like ‘The Maha Mrityunjaya Mantra’, or ‘Wahe Guru’, or ‘Aum Man Padme Hum’.
There are times when I will listen to some Indian maestros, like Pandit Hari Prasad Chaurasia on the flute, or Pandit Shivkumar Sharma on the santoor. They don’t find their way into Western lists of the world’s greatest this, or that. However, their music is divine.
At others, I will listen to the Tuvan throat singing of Huun-Huur-Tu, or the music of Mamer, the singer from West China. I love the singing of Tenger, or Mongolian pop music.
If I listen to ‘Bollywood’ music, it is normally the music of the 1960’s and 1970’s. What is produced these days (with a few exceptions like ‘Bhaag Milkha Bhaag’) is really awful.
The other thing I like a lot, is shaman drumming, or some traditional Japanse drum groups like Tao, or the Kato drummers.
When I am in a more rocky mood, I will listen to good old rock music. Pink Floyd, the early music of Jethro Tull, the early music of Deep Purple, Dire Straits, Led Zeppelin, the Allman Brothers, The Grateful Dead, Grand Funk, ELP. The list can go on and on.
What I have discovered recently, is goth metal, and groups like Leaves Eyes come to mind.
And, what I also really like is pagan music. I have discovered some more European groups like Omnia or Faun, who are brilliant in this form of music.
I must say that some of these north European groups are really interesting.
Music is a mood thing. It needs to match the mood you are in. It can uplift you, or depress you. I generally listen to a lot of music when I am at the computer, especially when I am editing my photographs, or writing.
The waveforms of music have an intimate relationship with us, as human beings.
Death Metal, on the one hand, rouses the beast in us. It hammers at our consciousness, and can take you into an entirely different dimension. It is violent. It speaks a different language.
Much pop music of today is empty. It is, as Bowie is once said to have remarked (and, I don’t know if it is true) plastic pop that reflects today’s plastic soul.
On the one hand, like shaman drumming – they bring us back to our roots. When you listen to Shiv Kumar Sharma’s music of the mountains / Hari Prasad’s music of the rivers / Huun-Huur-Tu, you are transported back into the bowels of the earth, and you can feel the spirit of the natural world flow through you.
This then, is pure music.
Our choice of music reflects our stage in life, our growth as individuals, our society, our culture, and the state of our soul.
We each choose our own path, and music accompanies us on the highway of life.
***
“No! Stop what you’re doing. Now!” he yelled.
It was the first time her father had ever yelled.
MOM was always the one harping on about math grades and coming home past curfew.
Her constant nagging made Dad afraid to come home.
When he did, he was always so nice. He took her out for pizza. He undid the locks on her cell phone.
Which was why she told the courts Mom would get drunk and hit her.
HE loved her, unlike Mom.
But he’d been somehow changing, ever since she’d moved in.
Here’s the next entertaining piece in the Mary Jane series from Rajiv Chopra:
‘No! Stop what you’re doing. Now!’ he shouted. Spidey woke up with a start. It was not a dream. He had seen her do it. He looked around. He was alone. It was not a horrible dream.
That evening he was at his favourite pub, that hated letter in hand. The letter in the black envelope. That’s when he saw those hated Hobbits, each holding a black envelope.
‘What’s going on?’ he asked, finding himself to be unusually warm and chummy. Misery does indeed seek misery, and finds comfort in the least expected places.
They showed them their black envelopes, gloomy lines coursing down their almost childlike, ageless faces. ‘A beer,’ said Frodo. ‘Let’s have a beer, and drown our sorrows together.’
Beer flowed along with their lament. Tears coursed down their cheeks. They vowed eternal, drunken friendship, and swore to find her.
As the evening wore on, the pub doors were flung open, and in walked a most outlandish person. Dressed in green, with a white pasty face, dressed in a red smile that seemed to have been carved on to his visage.
He snarled bitterly. ‘My Harley Quinn has run off with some dame called Mary Jane Parker.’
And here’s Simon Farnell‘s super take on the prompt. Please click on the link to read his story:
https://sfarnell.wordpress.com/2016/09/17/esthers-monday-motivation-challenge-stop-what-youre-doing-now/