#poetry with story

[fatal-fun]

A caravan of misty eyed fools,

Selling as trinkets what were meant to be tools.

The marketplace lies full of treasure,

Something known by every vender.

Silk so thin the light bleeds through,

Wrapped in baskets on the pack mule.

Only a wise and experienced eye,

Would know exactly what to buy.

Overpriced scams wrapped in a bargain,

You’d never know without the right jargon.

This old man has seen it all,

And sure as ever he made the right call.

For over at the very next stall,

Lies what he seeks, the crystal ball.

“It has no use but its rather pretty”

Says the salesman without a clue.

“Oh is that so? Its quite the pity”

Yet that old man, well he surely knew,

Exactly what that ball can do.

So with a twinkle in his eye,

He tells the seller he’d like to buy.

Well the salesman was not sure why,

he had a feeling the time was nigh.

Through the marketplace rings children’s laughter,

A most beautiful sound to capture.

Folk go merrily on their way,

Without knowing whats at play.

For that very crystal ball,

Had seen the future, the kingdom’s fall.

[mournfulroses]

Margaret Atwood, from True Stories: Poems; "Postcard," originally published in 1981

[skellydun]

absolutely love reading such a well-written story and falling a bit in love with the author based solely on the way they write. like baby the way you italicize words makes my heartbeat quicken.

[flintpunks-mind]

A co-worker of mine was standing outside with me during a break from customers to share a cigarette with me, and told me about how he had lost his brother that he was close with some years ago. He told me about how they used to be in a band together with some friends, and how ever since he'd died, he hadn't played any music because he'd been too scared and anxious. I told him about how I'd lost my brother to suicide some years ago.

I went home and pulled out an old tiny wooden box my brother had given me before he'd died. I'd been using it to store guitar picks I'd collected over the years, including one guitar pick that used to be his. I haven't played the guitar since he'd died, my hands are too small to play some of the chords, so I play bass and piano instead.

I went to work the next day and gifted my brothers old guitar pick to my co-worker. I told him that it'd been sitting in a box for ten years unused, and would probably sit there for longer if I kept it there. Told him that I thought he deserved to have it, because I bet he could put it to better use than I ever would. Told him I didn't feel like it was coincidence that me and him would cross paths with each other in our lives, and that it seemed suiting that we had these similar experiences but split in two halves. That somehow, I felt like he was meant to have the guitar pick. I told him that I knew he'd not played guitar since his brother died, but that if he ever decided to play again one of these days, maybe he'd be able to honor both of our brothers by using that guitar pick.

He almost cried. He thanked me. Then he went home that night and for the first time in years he played the guitar.

I don't know what the meaning of life is or what my purpose is, but I do believe that love and human connection is one of the most important things in life. It's finding ways to tell strangers you love them and share experiences with others. I think it's all just about love.

[agirlwiththoughtsandnegativity]

”oh so how did you get into writing?-“ no, writing got into me. Actually it infiltrated my brain, starting with the slow takeover of my room with books to the extremely fast claiming of my notes app and now there’s no way to stop it and no way for me to stop.

[flowerytale]

Anaïs Nin, from the short story “Elena”, Delta of Venus (published posthumously in 1977)

[and-corn]

[sunshinesere]

Emily Henry / Funny Story

[fairydrowning]

"Well, let it pass; April is over, April is over. There are all kinds of love in the world, but never the same love twice."

– F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Short Stories

[punksp1rt]

Ali Smith, The Whole Story and Other Stories

[myfakeplasticlove13]

You know I didn’t want to, have to haunt you, but what a ghostly scene

[solsticat]

around a year ago I had an incredibly realistic dream where I was hiking and stumbled off a cliff. I managed to grab into a ledge, but I was hyper aware that eventually I would lose hold of it and fall to my death. I just sat there holding the ledge for a while thinking about everything I was never able to do, the conversations I never had, and how badly I wanted to live. Eventually I came to terms with my untimely death and accepted that there was nothing I could change, and it wasn't really okay, but it would have to be okay, and I'd had a good life. If nothing else, I was glad for the life I had been able to have. I wanted my last thoughts to be peaceful. I was about ready to let go when my family came along and rescued me. Some other stuff happened after that. Then I woke up and let me tell you I had a Bad Day. How are you even supposed to act normal after that.

[mournfulroses]

Margaret Atwood, from True Stories: Poems; "Use," originally published in 1981

[literaryvein-reblogs]

Writing Notes: The Shape of Story

by Christina Wodtke 

Start with Conflicted Characters

The character needs a goal, a motivation and a conflict.

The goal can be alien to your audience,

but the motivation must be shared by them, and

the conflict creates struggles that increase engagement.

Paint a Picture

Details transport you into the story.

The world disappears and you have a story play in your head.

Even though there are no literal pictures.

But be careful—Too many details and the story gets bogged down.

Make the Protagonist Suffer

“Be a Sadist. No matter how sweet and innocent your leading characters, make awful things happen to them - in order that the reader may see what they are made of.” (Kurt Vonnegut, How to Write a Great Story)

And when it can’t get any worse, make it worse before it gets better

The two key moments that create the peak of excitement in a story is the darkness before the dawn, and the dawn. 

The climax is the moment when the protagonist is either rescued or rescues themself.

In older tales, we saw a lot of Deux ex Machina (the hand of god) rescuing the hero. A hero could be rescued by luck, a partner, another hero…but modern audiences strongly prefer stories where the protagonist helps themself.

Resolution is Boring, Keep it Short

Interest grows with every additional conflict, but once the hero figures out the solution, our fascination collapses.

Don’t natter on while the audience’s mind is drifting.

Also Consider:

You need a good inciting incident to move your protagonist to action.

A setting is more than a place, it’s a situation and a moment in time. A vivid place has details.

Modern audiences prefer “return home changed” to “return home the same.”

EXAMPLES: ARCHETYPAL PLOTS ALONG THE ARC

Boy Meets Girl

Internal conflict is always satisfactory (e.g., she believes love interferes with his career, he believes love interferes with his beer.)

The crises usually revolves around betrayal — lying, cheating — and the climax shows it was a misunderstanding or we get atonement.

The struggle is always about them being separated.

The resolution is about binding them more tightly together than ever.

The Quest

You seek things, and find yourself.

Return home changed and don’t pass go.

Common elements include companions, a mentor, great losses and extreme character arcs.

The Underdog

Even though they do not have a shot in hell, the underdog wants something. They want it so bad.

Common elements include an enemy who blocks their path, and a coach who helps them forward.

In this case, they do not return home changed but rather move into a new life that fits their changed self.

Coming of Age

Naive person has the world teaches them a hard lesson, and they become a better person for it.

Struggle revolve around life sucking and then sucking more.

The hero grows and becomes better because of it, and via new understandings becomes competent.

In some tragedies, the world breaks them.

They can return home changed, but more often they move to a new life they have earned.

More Examples. Justice & Pursuit:

Weaving Multiple Plots:

Weaving multiple plots together to make subplots can further increase tension.

Multiple plots woven together makes the whole story not only unique but very compelling.

Writing Notes & References

[darlingdeathx]

I am yours, even in this waiting. I am yours.