November PAD- Day 7

It's the weekend. Whoo. But that doesn't mean we get a break from writing.... ha, I wish. So today we complete the first week of the challenge. Good stuff. Today's writing prompt is to pick a flower and use its name as the title of your poem. You could totally cheat though and add extra words to your title like I did.

To Bring Adam Closer, Lilith Becomes an Atropa Belladonna

Lilith knew he could not resist her flowers. She walked to the edge of the garden and sang to him. She planted her feet and arched upwards. Her black eyes covered her bodies. The gel solidified. Her eyes were dripping berries. Her spine lengthened and twisted. It turned purple as her blood dripped and fermented. Her stalk was a deep green. Adam left his new wife in the garden. Lilith could see the woman walking around the garden's perimeter, stopping now and again to sniff the various fruits and flowers. Lilith sent ivy vines forward. They crept along the garden floor. The woman walked and tripped over them. Adam hovered over the plant. Lilith smiled up at him. He touched her flowers and berries. He picked several of the fruits and placed them on his tongue. When he bit down, juice sprayed past his lips, wetting her petals. He swallowed and his forehead wrinkled. He gagged and grabbed his throat. Lilith reached for him. He fell into the flowers and breathed the hallucinogenic pollen in. Raising his head, he kissed her pistil. I love you, he said. His eyes darkened. I love you.

She kissed him back. Remember who possesses the other, she said and sent him back to the garden. The grass browned when his sweat dripped onto the lawn. The ground sizzled. A tree of deep purple fruits sprouted. Lilith could see her face in the trunk's wooden whorls.

NaNoWriMo Day 6

Hey all. I'm beat. This novel is kicking my ass. I'm at 21,329 words. I have about 28,600 words left. My goal for the day was to make it to 22,000 words and I was about 700 words short. Oh well. It could have been worse. I'm already several days ahead of schedule. Eddie and I are staying home this weekend and just relaxing for once which is nice. Plus, he's planning on playing his new video game so that means I have plenty of time to write. On top of that, I have all these ideas for different chapbooks. I had some strange dreams last night and Eddie and I have been watching "Ghost Adventures" which is our new favorite paranormal show, if only because they spent so long talking about the infamous histories of various places. So that's good stuff. Yeah, so that's where I am right now. Once I reach 25,000 words (which will hopefully happen tomorrow), it will be all downhill. Then I will be the happiest writer in the world. But right now, I'm exhausted. So I'm going to say good night to you all. Good night.

November PAD- Day 6

Today's prompt is to write about something being covered or blanketed. Get to it, people.

Lilith Conceals Herself in Stone

The woman found that seemingly solid stone was actually pliable. She used her knuckles on bedrock and her toes on the mountains. She beat the rocks until she could roll them out into thin sheets. Lilith could see the new husband and wife in the distance. They pulled ivy vines around their nude bodies as protection against the cold. They didn't know that the vines would do nothing to keep the wild animals away. Lilith piled the stone sheets up. She added pebbles in between the layers. She sewed the edges together. When she was done, she pulled this stone blanket around her body. It adhered to her curves. It kept the cold out and the warmth in. When the animals tried to bite down, their teeth broke and they trotted away, wounded. Not even the angels could penetrate her covers. They tried to scratch along her back. They went back to the garden with misshapen hands. Those were the lucky ones. The unlucky ones lost their heads. Once a week, Lilith pulled the scalps out from between her teeth. She licked her lips. They still tasted of stone-cooked meat.

NaNoWriMo Day 5

Well, I am making great headway in my novel. I'm up to 17,124 words, plus it's only five days into the competition. I'm pretty sure that I'm going to be able to finish this novel in two weeks. I don't mean, two weeks from now but a total two weeks time. Go me.

Even better, some of the girls from my MFA program have also joined NaNoWriMo and so we are going to be cheering one another on to get to the end of the challenge. It's a nice, writer-ly friendship. Good stuff.

So that's that. I went out to find Israeli couscous and my mission was a success. I immediately set to work making a couscous vegetable soup. Delightful. I'm watching "Destination Truth" right now. Right now, my main goal is to come up with different ideas for my novel. I am pretty sure I'm going to figure out how to fit fire breathing ceremonies into one of the chapters/stories.

Good stuff. To get me through any spontaneous writing, I will be working on my mantra "Josh Gates is a badass. Josh Gates is a badass." Because he totally is. And I have a crush on him. Plus, if he can go through all these random countries and nearly get mauled by wild animals, I can finish a novel. Mine is slightly safer. Although I do run a higher risk of carpel tunnel.

November PAD- Day 5

We're on Day 5 of the November Poem-a-Day Challenge. Write a growth person today. Think of gardens, think of people. If you're like me, think of Adam and Eve. Just run with it.

Adam Makes a New Woman

There was no god involved. Instead, the man had wild animals slice him open. Several had meat stuck on the tips of their claws and these pieces got lost inside Adam's torso. When he wrenched his own rib out, it smelled like barbecue. He shaved his pubic hair and placed it on the top of the rib. He used sticks to make the limbs. When he was done, a creature he had never seen before stared back at him. It tried to speak but had no mouth. Adam seized the closest angel and snapped its neck. He took the angel's face off and adhered it to the rib. The angel's eyes fluttered and rolled. The creature opened and closed its mouth. It tried to sing but was only able to make a gurgling sound. Adam filled in the missing pieces with mud. The rib creature watched as it was given breasts and hips, buttocks and shoulders. When Adam stepped away to wipe sweat from his forehead, he was able to call his creation a woman. Still, when she tried to speak, no sounds came out. Lilith emerged from the wilderness and scratched at the woman's ankles. This is your Eve, she asked Adam. This is the model for all women? Adam threw stones at her forehead. Demons slipped free of her womb.

November PAD- Day 4

Hi, hi. Today's writing prompt is to title your piece "Maybe (blank)" in which you fill in the (blank) with whatever you care to. Run with it. Have fun. I used my piece to simultaneously fulfill the theme of this challenge's chapbook as well as to exaggerate a political standpoint. Because I'm just that good.

Maybe the First Couple Conceives a Child Lilith Does Not Want

Maybe Lilith sat in her cave and ate boulders to appease her hunger. She heard Adam in the forest, hunting her with a spear. He used the angels to track her. She sent the winged beings back with an iron clamp on their left knee. He caught the angels and wrung their necks before getting closer. She pressed her fingers to her womb and felt the child creeping around her torso. She did not want to be tied to Adam this way. Lying on her back, she spread her legs and sang until the child crept out. It slithered along the floor and expired a few feet away from her. Adam entered the cave and picked the child up. It had a heartbeat, he screamed, shaking it in the air. Lilith stood and snatched the child from his hand. She swallowed it in a single bite. Leaning close to him, she whispered, It was my choice and disappeared.

NaNoWriMo Day3 and some political stuff (sorry but yesterday was elections)

Total word count: 7,656

Not bad bananas.


In political news, yesterday was election day. I voted Democrat (please note that I am unabashedly liberal and have no problem whatsoever stating that). Democrats lost miserably. Thus, I am sad. Because here's the way I see it: with only conservatives taking government seats, women's rights are going to be trampled. Also, stem cell research will continue to be vilified and the government will continue to restrict same-sex marriage, which isn't fair. It frightens me that so many people my age and younger are so anti-liberal. I'll assume that they only know what their parents know. As for me, I was born to a family of die hard Republicans and quickly realized that denying people their rights as well as forming beliefs based on the teaching's found in a book are just wrong.

I know that plenty of people advise against voting or not voting against a candidate strictly on the basis of their views regarding a single issue, but I just can't support that. I find women's rights to be so important. I find it amusing that the government thinks that women wake up one morning and decide "oh, I'm going to have an abortion today" like they're choosing a donut. Sorry. It doesn't happen that way. I'm sure that there are a few people who have had abortions who were entirely apathetic to the process but there are even more who thought long and hard about whether abortion was the right choice. To then limit that choice and even initiate a 24-hour waiting period is cruel.

Do you want to know what the waiting period is really for? It's to scare the women. It's to make the entire procedure harder for her. It's so that she has time to sit there and dwell and allow strangers to guilt her into doing something she doesn't want. It is manipulation, simply put.

So on that issue alone, I voted. And obviously, like I said, for stem cell research and same sex marriage. Because I believe that if science can make the advances to improve quality of life, then the government should support that. And anyone who wants to get married should be allowed to, because love is love no matter what sex is the focus. But abortion is always the issue I stand up on first. It is that important to me. I don't want anyone to take my rights away and I will keep voting to preserve those rights for as long as I can.


Okay... I got a little into that. But it's true. And it gives me an idea for my poem today. We'll see.


Stay tuned for the November PAD day 4 poem.