To participate, pick a prompt (any or all) and use it for an entry in your own blog. Then leave a comment here with the option number, link, and your name as you want it to be displayed on the participant’s page.

This project will remain open until August 31st. The next project will open on Sunday, September 5th.

Option 1: Picture It

Tire Swing | Photo Source: Morguefile.com (Click to embiggen)

Use the image above as inspiration to write something about childhood. Your piece can be fiction, creative non-fiction, poetry, or any other form that suits you. (Please remember to copy the image to your own server and credit the photographer.)

Option 2: Poetry

“At breakfast, Anthony found a Corvette Sting Ray car kit in his breakfast cereal box and Nick found a Junior Undercover Agent code ring in his breakfast cereal box but in my breakfast cereal box, all I found was breakfast cereal.”
– Judith Viorst, Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Use the quotation above to inspire a poem about anticipation or disappointment.

Option 3: Pick Three

I have a little shadow that goes in and out with me,
And what can be the use of him is more than I can see.
He is very, very like me from the heels up to the head;
And I see him jump before me, when I jump into my bed.

The funniest thing about him is the way he likes to grow–
Not at all like proper children, which is always very slow;
For he sometimes shoots up taller like an india-rubber ball,
And he sometimes goes so little that there’s none of him at all.

He hasn’t got a notion of how children ought to play,
And can only make a fool of me in every sort of way.
He stays so close behind me, he’s a coward you can see;
I’d think shame to stick to nursie as that shadow sticks to me!

One morning, very early, before the sun was up,
I rose and found the shining dew on every buttercup;
But my lazy little shadow, like an arrant sleepy-head,
Had stayed at home behind me and was fast asleep in bed.

– Robert Louis Stevenson, “My Shadow”

Use at least three of the the bold words in the above quotation to write a short piece in whatever form (poetry, prose, fiction) you wish.

Option 4: Tell Me a Story

“I wouldn’t be a bit afraid, and it would be lovely to spend the night in a wild cherry-tree all white with bloom in the moonshine, don’t you think? You could imagine you were dwelling in marble halls, couldn’t you?”

– Lucy Maude Montgomery, Anne of Green Gables

Use the quotation above as inspiration for a short piece of fiction or creative non-fiction about the power of imagination.

Option 5: Seven Things

Jo on the next lid, scratched and worn,
And within a motley store
Of headless, dolls, of schoolbooks torn,
Birds and beasts that speak no more,
Spoils brought home from the fairy ground
Only trod by youthful feet,
Dreams of a future never found,
Memories of a past still sweet,
Half-writ poems, stories wild,
April letters, warm and cold,
Diaries of a wilful child,
Hints of a woman early old,
A woman in a lonely home,
Hearing, like a sad refrain
Be worthy, love, and love will come,
In the falling summer rain.

– Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

In improvisation, one of our exercises is a game called “Seven Things,” in which we go around in a circle giving each other the challenge, “Give me seven things that [whatever].” We are not going to go around in a circle here, but if you’re drawn to lists, this prompt is for you.

Give me seven items from your hope chest or toy box. If you didn’t have such a thing, make a list of seven keepsakes from your childhood.

Option 6: Short and Tweet

I’d give all wealth that years have piled,
The slow result of Life’s decay,
To be once more a little child
For one bright summer day.

– Lewis Carroll, “Solitude”

Do you have a Twitter account? If so, use the quotation above as inspiration, and tweet your own childhood memory (in 140 characters or less) to @cw_barista.

Bonus Option: Time It: For an extra challenge, set a timer for eight minutes when you sit down to respond to one of these prompts, and stop writing when the timer goes off!

The July Participants were:

1. MissMeliss chose Option 5: Seven Things: Seven Personal Heroes
2. Janet chose Option 5: Seven Things: Heroes
3. Sumi chose Option 5: Seven Things: Seven Personal Heroes
4. Mike G chose Option 3: Pick Three: Cafe Writing: Pick 3

To participate: Leave a comment with your name as you wish to have it posted, a valid email address (not visible to anyone else), and the direct link to your post. You’re welcome to respond to one prompt or all of them, but as I link them separately on the participants post for each project, please find a way to designate which prompt(s) you chose, so that I can tell. Also, it’s nice if you include a link back to CafeWriting.com somewhere in your post.

This project will remain open until July 31st. The next project will open on Sunday, August 8th.

Option 1: Picture It

Photo Credit: Michael Greene | Click to enlarge

Use the image above as inspiration to write something about ordinary heroes. Your piece can be fiction, creative non-fiction, poetry, or any other form that suits you. (Please remember to copy the image to your own server and credit the photographer.)

Option 2: Poetry

“The real hero is always a hero by mistake; he dreams of being an honest coward like everybody else.”
– Umberto Eco, Travels in Hyperreality

Use the quotation above to inspire a poem about becoming a hero by mistake.

Option 3: Pick Three

“There are new words now that excuse everybody. Give me the good old days of heroes and villains. the people you can bravo or hiss. There was a truth to them that all the slick credulity of today cannot touch.”
– Bette Davis, The Lonely Life

Use at least three of the the bold words in the above quotation to write a short piece in whatever form (poetry, prose, fiction) you wish.

Option 4: Tell Me a Story

“Heroing is one of the shortest-lived professions there is.”
– Will Rogers, newspaper article, Feb. 15, 1925

Use the quotation above as inspiration for a short piece of fiction or creative non-fiction about short-lived heroes.

Option 5: Seven Things

“I’m kind of hooked to the game of art and literature; my heroes are artists and writers.”
– Jim Morrison

In improvisation, one of our exercises is a game called “Seven Things,” in which we go around in a circle giving each other the challenge, “Give me seven things that [whatever].” We are not going to go around in a circle here, but if you’re drawn to lists, this prompt is for you.

Give me seven of your personal heroes. These can be public figures, or personal acquaintances. Have fun with it. As always, explanations are welcome, but not obligatory.

Option 6: Short and Tweet

“Old myths, old gods, old heroes have never died. They are only sleeping at the bottom of our mind, waiting for our call. We have need for them. They represent the wisdom of our race.”
– Stanley Kunitz

Do you have a Twitter account? If so, use the quotation above as inspiration, and tweet your own heroic wisdom to @cw_barista.

Bonus Option: Time It: For an extra challenge, set a timer for seven minutes when you sit down to respond to one of these prompts, and stop writing when the timer goes off!

It’s been almost a year since I last offered writing prompts here. Since then, I’ve had a lot of changes in my life, and for several months the only writing I was doing was the kind I get paid to do. There are other reasons why this site has laid dormant, but it’s a new summer, and the soft sounds of gurgling coffeemakers and clinking silverware are calling me back. I hope you’ll embrace these prompts once more, as you always have.

Remember that suggestions for themes and images (with credits) for the picture prompts, are always welcome.

Thanks in advance…

— The Barista

This theme will remain open until October 16th or 17th. Please remember to include the option number, your name as you want it posted, and your direct link in comments.

Option One: Seven Things

A good library will never be too neat, or too dusty, because somebody will always be in it, taking books off the shelves and staying up late reading them.
~Lemony Snicket

In improvisation, one of our exercises is a game called “Seven Things,” in which we go around in a circle giving each other the challenge, “Give me seven things that [whatever].” We are not going to go around in a circle here, but if you’re drawn to lists, this prompt is for you.

Give me a list of seven things that make a library good. These can be real or imagined, physical or intangible. Have fun with it. As always, explanations are welcome, but not obligatory.

Option Two: Pick Three

The library connects us with the insight and knowledge, painfully extracted from Nature, of the greatest minds that ever were, with the best teachers, drawn from the entire planet and from all our history, to instruct us without tiring, and to inspire us to make our own contribution to the collective knowledge of the human species. I think the health of our civilization, the depth of our awareness about the underpinnings of our culture and our concern for the future can all be tested by how well we support our libraries.
~Carl Sagan

Pick at least three of the following words, and build a piece of writing around them. The form is up to you: poem, scene, flash-fic, essay, or general blog entry. (As always, you can pluralize, change tense, or alter the part of speech, if necessary.)

civilization, culture, extracted, history, insight, knowledge, support, tiring

Option Three: Can You Picture That?
Use the the following photo to inspire a piece of writing in any form (poetry, prose, whatever).
(Please remember to copy the image to your own server, and include the photo credit when it is known.)

Option Four: Poetry

The library is not a shrine for the worship of books. It is not a temple where literary incense must be burned or where one’s devotion to the bound book is expressed in ritual. A library, to modify the famous metaphor of Socrates, should be the delivery room for the birth of ideas – a place where history comes to life.
~Norman Cousins

Using the quotation above as your inspiration, write a poem (any form is fine) about devotion expressed in ritual.

Option Five: Fiction

What a place to be in is an old library! It seems as though all the souls of all the writers that have bequeathed their labours to these Bodleians were reposing here as in some dormitory, or middle state. I do not want to handle, to profane the leaves, their winding-sheets. I could as soon dislodge a shade. I seem to inhale learning, walking amid their foliage; and the odor of their old moth-scented coverings is fragrant as the first bloom of the sciential apples which grew amid the happy orchard.
~Charles Lamb

Using the above quotation as your inspiration, write a flash-fic, scene, or short story involving an old library.

Option Six: Timed Writing

Libraries are reservoirs of strength, grace and wit, reminders of order, calm and continuity, lakes of mental energy, neither warm nor cold, light nor dark…. In any library in the world, I am at home, unselfconscious, still and absorbed.
~Germaine Greer

Take nine minutes (use all nine, but don’t go over), and write on the subject of libraries.
This is a timed exercise and it’s expected that it won’t be perfect. Any format – fiction, essay, verse – is welcome.

Don’t forget to comment here with your name, the title of your piece, the selected option number, and the direct link to it.

Happy Writing, and Happy Book-browins

Here are YOUR submissions:

Option One: Timed Writing

1. When I was a kid…, by Jessie
2. When I Was a Kid, by Becca
3. When I Was a Kid, by Snack BPC

Option Two: Seven Things

Option Three: Pick Three

1. Musings on a Golden Eagle, by Gemma
2. The End of a Flight, by Niebla
3. Urban Warfare, by Tiel Aisha Ansari

Option Four: Can You Picture That?

1. Through the Binoculars, by A~Lotus

Option Five: Poetry

1. Unhallowed Ground, by Melanie BHD
2. Space, by Richard Wells
3. PV=nRT, by Tiel Aisha Ansari

Option Six: Fiction

Happy Writing, and Happy Stargazing

Option One: Timed Writing

When I was a kid, we had 9 planets
and they were all in a neat line to the right of the Sun
(which was just a big slice of yellow)
and we liked it that way!

And Mars had canals
(and maybe ancient cities and certainly some simple vegetation),

Venus was a swamp full of dinosaurs
and exotic plants,

Mercury roasted on one side
and froze on the other all the time,
except for this Twilight Zone area on its terminator
where some kind of life
could exist.
But otherwise
it probably looked just like Earth’s Moon.
You know, with all those craters that came from volcanic eruptions.
~ Larry Klaes

Take eleven minutes (use all eleven, but don’t go over), and write on the subject of when you were a kid.
This is a timed exercise and it’s expected that it won’t be perfect. Any format – fiction, essay, verse – is welcome.

Option Two: Seven Things

“…my father replies that we are made to live here.
We need air to breathe,
water to drink,
we suffocate without air and water:
so why go (into space)?”

“For the same reason
that makes us bring children into the world.

Because we’re afraid of death and darkness,
and because we want to see our image reflected
and perpetuated to immortality.

We don’t want to die,
but death is there,
and because it’s there we give birth to children
who’ll give birth to other children and so on to infinity.

And this way we are handed down to eternity.
~ Ray Bradbury, as recounted by Oriana Fallaci, in If the Sun Dies

In improvisation, one of our exercises is a game called “Seven Things,” in which we go around in a circle giving each other the challenge, “Give me seven things that [whatever].” We are not going to go around in a circle here, but if you’re drawn to lists, this prompt is for you.

Give me seven things that represent your legacy to the future. These can be real or imagined, physical or intangible. Have fun with it. As always, explanations are welcome, but obligatory.

Option Three: Pick Three

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of Earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds, — and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of — wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,
I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air. . . .
Up, up the long, delirious burning blue
I’ve topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or ever eagle flew —
And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.

~John Gillespie Magee, Jr.

Pick at least three of the following words, and build a piece of writing around them. The form is up to you: poem, scene, flash-fic, essay, or general blog entry. If you want to be really daring, write in the style of Milne. (As always, you can pluralize, change tense, or alter the part of speech, if necessary.)
air, burning, craft, eagle,sanctity, space, surly, trespass

Option Five: Poetry

these are the laws of physics
immutable as those of Medes & Persians:

you, frailness of flesh & skin
wrapped in only blueprints & hope
to plunge through furnace of plasma
burning, blasted, luminous beyond mach-molten:
torn molecules, pink & purple,
cremating you as sati to the sky.

if all goes well, you shall fly
as a butterfly bolted to a bullet.
if not, your only grave shall be
Schlieren lines across a shocked sky.

to strangers,
your death shall be as beautiful as fireworks.
but to those who knew you:
grief.

they vanished
became sky:
a rain of metal tears
upon the land.

breaking,
that contrail became cenotaph:
a wreath we laid
on our voyage to worlds.
~ Keith Gottschalk

Using the quotation above as your inspiration, write a poem (any form is fine) about breaking the laws of physics

Option Six: Fiction

We sail onboard space station “Alpha”
Orbiting high above Earth, still in night
Traveling our destined journey
beyond realm of sea voyage or flight
A first New Year is upon us
Eight strikes on the bell now as one
The globe spins below on its motion
Counting the last thousand years done.
15 midnights to this night in orbit
A clockwork not of earthly pace
Our day with different meaning now
In this, a new age and place
We move with a speed and time
Past that which human hands can tell
Computers programmed-like boxes
Where only thoughts’ shadows dwell

~ William Shepherd, from the log of the ISS Alpha 1, January 1, 2001.

Using the above quotation as your inspiration, write a flash-fic, scene, or short story involving celebrating the turn of the year…in Space.

Don’t forget to comment here with your name, the title of your piece, the selected option number, and the direct link to it.

Happy Writing, and Happy Stargazing

1. Cuppa Joy, by Carl
2. Let Us Have Cake, by Bobbi

1. Anticipation’s Desire, by J.C. Montgomery
2. Café Writing: Anticipate, by Floreta
3. I Swing Closer, by The Lightbearer
4. Anticipation, by Bobbi

1. Bear, by James Steerforth
2. Star Child and Azure Moon, by Lissa
3. My Mama Done Told Me, by Miss Meliss

1. Journey, by Anu

1. Images, by Jeeves
2. Caterpillar Cub, by Tiel Aisha Ansari
3. Bear Haiku, by A~Lotus
4. Café Writing June Project, by Mrs. Shields

1. The Game of the Friend, by Tiel Aisha Ansari

Thank you all for your lovely words. New prompts will be posted shortly.

Look for prompts this weekend.

No, really. I promise.