MONDAYS ARE FREE EXERCISES 141—145

[The Stage is on Fire] is a page-turner in which, much like life, there are no easy answers and yet each step of the journey yields insight and hope. This work of heart must not be missed!

Melanie Faith

Creative Writing Teacher, Essayist & Poet.

Katie Steedly’s first-person piece [The Unspeakable Gift] is a riveting retelling of her participation in a National Institutes of Health study that aided her quest to come to grips with her life of living with a rare genetic disorder. Her writing is superb.

The Society of Professional Journalists

In recognition of receiving the Dateline Award for the Washingtonian Magazine essay, The Unspeakable Gift.

I thank you … It is the authenticity of your “class notes”; and it is the delicacy and skill with which you present the nuances of classroom life and the actuality of your students’ and fellow teachers’ lives.

Maxine Greene

Philosopher and Education Scholar

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MONDAYS ARE FREE EXERCISES 141—145

Plants. Roses. Sweet Things. Vegetables.

EXERCISE 141: TAP IN

plant wonders

Write a poem in which some kind of plant wonders about you.

The Lotus

My heart breaks when I see her. She carries too much. It is all heavy. Her mind is noisy and unkempt. Resistant to structure and form and unable to find flow. Her feet are tired because she doesn’t begin or train because she is tired. A cycle of tiredness. Her beauty is buried beneath hunger. The kind of hunger that is never satiated. The kind of hunger that burns beneath the surface of her days. The kind of hunger that rails against what is. It is hard not to rail against what is when so much of what is must not be.

I float at the beginning, middle, and end. I swim in the mud, water, and sand. I drink the sunshine, rain, and wind. I symbolize spiritual awakening. Sometimes that feels like a lot. I see one thousand Katies. I invite them to breathe. I invite them to lay it all down. I invite them to surrender. Ultimately, I invite them to bloom. They will know it when they are ready to bloom.

EXERCISE 142: SPEAK UP A GREENHOUSE

list every plant

List every plant you can in ten minutes.

pine, poinsettia, iris, rhododendron, magnolia, rose, bluebonnet, chrysanthemum, oak tree, peony, morning glory, sunflowers, crocus, impatiens, flocks, marigold, coleus, cedar, banyan tree, lotus, frangipani, sweet pea, wisteria, weeping willow, redwood, petunia, grass, babies breath, daisy, lily, forsythia, pansy.

EXERCISE 143: NAME SWEET THINGS

Tonguestopper cantaloupe!

Whenever I flip through seed or nursery catalogs, I think whoever gets to name all the fruits and veggies has to be the luckiest person. At least among the luckiest people. Sweetmeat squash! Arkansas Black apples! Tonguestopper cantaloupe! (I might’ve made that one up.) Anyway, you have been appointed the namer of sweet things for one day and one day only, so get to work naming sweet things.

Shut the front door donuts. Hell fire devil’s food cake. More than beans vanilla ice cream. Chopping down cherries cheesecake. Curl your toenails toffee. Wait for it waffles. Off the chain candy canes. Puppies and rainbows lemonade. Beautiful butterful blissful brownies. Just like July watermelon. Total juice tomatoes. Carry me home carrots. They don’t even need jelly biscuits. Scratch red velvet cupcakes. Hard candy mountaintops.

EXERCISE 144: GET CLOSE

from each distance

Describe a flower from twenty-five feet away. Now describe it from ten feet away. Now describe it from three feet away. Now describe it from six inches away. If this is helpful, observe at least 5 things about the flower from each distance.

From twenty-five feet away, a bed of double delight roses looks like the candy cane-filled windows at the candy shop in my hometown at Christmas time. The red and white swirls dance sweetly. Beauty in the story of childhood memories. A softness and in the hardness. A sweetness in the history.

From ten feet away, a bed of double delight roses looks like the red and white flannel pajamas I was given at Christmas when I was a child. Swirly petals caress our eyes in the way soft cotton holds our skin. I think of roses deep in winter. There is a specific look of red and white flannel pajamas underneath the lights of a Christmas tree, like sunshine on a summer day. This is the gift of winter and summer.

From three feet away, a bed of double delight roses looks like ballet dancers twirling red and white ribbons as they move across the floor. I am in the first row feeling the wind of their dance. Close enough to smell their grace filled air. I think back to my dance recitals when I twirled with red and white ribbons. To the beauty of blooming.

From six inches away, a bed of double delight roses look like the batter of red velvet cupcakes before I add cocoa. When the milk and red food coloring and flour and baking soda bend and fold and move separately toward deliciousness, that is the Double Delight moment. Unlike a Double Delight rose, there is no particular smell to the batter. The smell begins when the batter bakes.

EXERCISE 145: RHYME WITHIN THE LINE

disagree with yourself

“I will always love green beans” is six words long. The last two words consist of an adjective-noun pair that rhymes.

Write a fourteen-line poem in which each line is six words long and ends in a rhyming adjective-noun pair. The poem has to be in first person and you have to disagree with yourself once.

I will always love broke artichokes. I will always love fussy asparagus. I will always love moot beetroots. I will always love stalkily broccoli. I will always love Babbagey cabbage. I will always love desperate carrots. I will always love dure cauliflower. I will always love gallant eggplant. I will always love gothic garlic. I will always love meek leeks. I will always love pagan melons. I will always love my inner okra. I will always love noncarb rhubard. I will never love sanguine pumpkins.

Thank you for reading MONDAYS ARE FREE. These are my explorations of poetry and language and joy. Subscribe to he Wide-Awakeness Project to share this journey.