There is a writing exercise you might try over HERE. It takes a George Ella Lyon poem, Where Im from, and turns it into a sort of advanced ad-libs, where by you fill in some info and describe the places/people/events that formed you. My attempt is featured below. If you try your hand at it, post the result in the comments. Id like to see where youre from.
-WHERE IM FROM-
by Joshua Alan Doetsch
I am from the goblin roads, by the bog, where early A.M. mists tickle hands hanging out passenger windows, a thousand degrees colder than the surrounding summer nightfrom Dunkin Donuts coffee and the grinnin skull-bead bracelets my mother makes for me.
I am from the house with the shrieking-turquoise garage door, the tropical biosphere interior, impossible anomaly of the Midwestwaxen, Vincent Price sideshow bedroomglamour photography by dad. From the wooded, backyard deck, the iron fire pit, listening to audio fiction, punctuated by coyote calls that sound like the second, fifth, and ninth steps of going insane.
I am from the whispering leaves, the groans-by-night corn.
I am from Jack O Lanterns picked fresh from the patch, at Great Grandma and Grandpas farm and playing card games by candlelight through tornado warnings, from my father, Mark the Magician; and my mother, Renee the Potter; and my brother, Nick the Pirate; and my sister, Danielle the Scream Queenand every cross-hatched eccentricityBradford to BradfordDoetsch by Doetsch.
I am from photographing gators in the Glades of Ever and walking ghost tours in Key West, which is really Cayo Hueso, which is really Island of Bones, which is really full of t-shirt shops and frozen drinks.
From the prayers to St. Anthony to find all things lost and the chewed stubs of the whole carrots left out for Santas reindeer the night before.
I am from the Catholic cross, the confessional, the Body and Blood. And then from the rum prayers, the happy macabre, the sugar skulls that hummed voodoo hymns to me on every Caribbean pilgrimage.
Im from October Country, Chicagos shadow, and Ray Bradbury dreams remixedpumpkin pie and double-decker pizza that was divine until the restaurant owner was knifed by her son.
From the great grandparents, Lord and Lady of the Patch, who contrived a big sleep of exhaust, in a car in a parking lotwhen their minds and bodies began to gotogether forever, and the other great grandma, Mima, who was a writer, who told me to write, who died while I was away, waking to our van surrounded by bison in Yellowstone.
I am from inside my head, where I hang it all so prettily upon my hueso walls.
-WHERE IM FROM-
by Joshua Alan Doetsch
I am from the goblin roads, by the bog, where early A.M. mists tickle hands hanging out passenger windows, a thousand degrees colder than the surrounding summer nightfrom Dunkin Donuts coffee and the grinnin skull-bead bracelets my mother makes for me.
I am from the house with the shrieking-turquoise garage door, the tropical biosphere interior, impossible anomaly of the Midwestwaxen, Vincent Price sideshow bedroomglamour photography by dad. From the wooded, backyard deck, the iron fire pit, listening to audio fiction, punctuated by coyote calls that sound like the second, fifth, and ninth steps of going insane.
I am from the whispering leaves, the groans-by-night corn.
I am from Jack O Lanterns picked fresh from the patch, at Great Grandma and Grandpas farm and playing card games by candlelight through tornado warnings, from my father, Mark the Magician; and my mother, Renee the Potter; and my brother, Nick the Pirate; and my sister, Danielle the Scream Queenand every cross-hatched eccentricityBradford to BradfordDoetsch by Doetsch.
I am from photographing gators in the Glades of Ever and walking ghost tours in Key West, which is really Cayo Hueso, which is really Island of Bones, which is really full of t-shirt shops and frozen drinks.
From the prayers to St. Anthony to find all things lost and the chewed stubs of the whole carrots left out for Santas reindeer the night before.
I am from the Catholic cross, the confessional, the Body and Blood. And then from the rum prayers, the happy macabre, the sugar skulls that hummed voodoo hymns to me on every Caribbean pilgrimage.
Im from October Country, Chicagos shadow, and Ray Bradbury dreams remixedpumpkin pie and double-decker pizza that was divine until the restaurant owner was knifed by her son.
From the great grandparents, Lord and Lady of the Patch, who contrived a big sleep of exhaust, in a car in a parking lotwhen their minds and bodies began to gotogether forever, and the other great grandma, Mima, who was a writer, who told me to write, who died while I was away, waking to our van surrounded by bison in Yellowstone.
I am from inside my head, where I hang it all so prettily upon my hueso walls.
henryetta: