Poetry Fishbowl Open!
Jul. 21st, 2015 12:22 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
The Poetry Fishbowl is now closed. Thank you for your time and enthusiasm. You can watch for more thumbnails to appear later.
Starting now, the Poetry Fishbowl is open! Today's theme is "anything goes." I will be checking this page periodically throughout the day. When people make suggestions, I'll pick some and weave them together into a poem ... and then another ... and so on. I'm hoping to get a lot of ideas and a lot of poems.
Stuck for ideas? You can find prompts by ...
* picking some from the Bingo Generator prompt lists.
* browsing my Serial Poetry page or QUILTBAG list for favorites.
* looking up fun things on TV Tropes.
* plugging a favorite topic into your search engine and choosing a picture that looks interesting.
What Is a Poetry Fishbowl?
Writing is usually considered a solitary pursuit. One exception to this is a fascinating exercise called a "fishbowl." This has various forms, but all of them basically involve some kind of writing in public, usually with interaction between author and audience. A famous example is Harlan Ellison's series of "stories under glass" in which he sits in a bookstore window and writes a new story based on an idea that someone gives him. Writing classes sometimes include a version where students watch each other write, often with students calling out suggestions which are chalked up on the blackboard for those writing to use as inspiration.
In this online version of a Poetry Fishbowl, I begin by setting a theme; today's theme is "anything goes." I invite people to suggest characters, settings, and other things relating to that theme. Then I use those prompts as inspiration for writing poems.
Cyberfunded Creativity
I'm practicing cyberfunded creativity. If you enjoy what I'm doing and want to see more of it, please feed the Bard. The following options are currently available:
1) Sponsor the Fishbowl -- Here is a PayPal button for donations. There is no specific requirement, but $1 is the minimum recommended size for PayPal transactions since they take a cut from every one. You can also donate via check or money order sent by postal mail. If you make a donation and tell me about it, I promise to use one of your prompts. Anonymous donations are perfectly welcome, just won't get that perk. General donations will be tallied, and at the end of the fishbowl I’ll post a list of eligible poems based on the total funding; then the audience can vote on which they want to see posted.
2) Swim, Fishie, Swim! -- A feature in conjunction with fishbowl sponsorship is this progress meter showing the amount donated.

3) Buy It Now! -- Gakked from various e-auction sites, this feature allows you to sponsor a specific poem. If you don't want to wait for some editor to buy and publish my poem so you can read it, well, now you don't have to. Sponsoring a poem means that I will immediately post it on my blog for everyone to see, with the name of the sponsor (or another dedicate) if you wish; plus you get a nonexclusive publication right, so you can post it on your own blog or elsewhere as long as you keep the credits intact. You'll need to tell me the title of the poem you want to sponsor. I'm basing the prices on length, and they're comparable to what I typically make selling poetry to magazines (semi-pro rates according to Duotrope's Digest).
0-10 lines: $5
11-25 lines: $10
26-40 lines: $15
41-60 lines: $20
Poems over 60 lines, or with very intricate structure, fall into custom pricing.
4) Commission a scrapbook page. I can render a chosen poem in hardcopy format, on colorful paper, using archival materials for background and any embellishments. This will be suitable for framing or for adding to a scrapbook. Commission details are here. See latest photos of sample scrapbooked poems: "Sample Scrapbooked Poems 1-24-11"
5) Spread the word. Echo or link to this post on your LiveJournal, other blog, Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Digg, StumbleUpon, or any other social network. Useful Twitter hashtags include #poetryfishbowl and #promptcall. Encourage people to come here and participate in the fishbowl. If you have room for it, including your own prompt will give your readers an idea of what the prompts should look like; ideally, update later to include the thumbnail of the poem I write, and a link to the poem if it gets published. If there is at least one new prompter or donor, I will post an extra freebie poem.
Additional Notes
1) I customarily post replies to prompt posts telling people which of their prompts I'm using, with a brief description of the resulting poem(s). If you want to know what's available, watch for those "thumbnails."
2) You don't have to pay me to see a poem based on a prompt that you gave me. I try to send copies of poems to people, mostly using the LJ message function. (Anonymous prompters will miss this perk unless you give me your eddress.) These are for-your-eyes-only, though, not for sharing.
3) Sponsors of the Poetry Fishbowl in general, or of specific poems, will gain access to an extra post in appreciation of their generosity. While you're on the Donors list, you can view all of the custom-locked posts in that category. Click the "donors" tag to read the archive of those. I've also posted a list of other donor perks there. I customarily leave donor names on the list for two months, so you'll get to see the perk-post from this month and next.
4) After the Poetry Fishbowl concludes, I will post a list of unsold poems and their prices, to make it easier for folks to see what they might want to sponsor.
Feed the Fish!
Now's your chance to participate in the creative process by posting ideas for me to write about. Today's theme is "anything goes." I'll be soliciting ideas for ... anything at all! Favorite characters, ideas for new ones, plot twists, stop-trope repairs, strange settings, whatever tickles your fancy. Now's the time to bring out all your cool ideas that haven't quite fit a previous prompt call. If you manage to recommend a form that I don't recognize, I will probably pounce on it and ask you for its rules. I do have the first edition of Lewis Turco's The Book of Forms which covers most common and many obscure forms.
I'll post at least one of the fishbowl poems here so you-all can enjoy it. (Remember, you get an extra freebie poem if someone new posts a prompt or makes a donation.) The rest of the poems will go into my archive for magazine submission.
Stuck for ideas? You can find prompts by ...
* picking some from the Bingo Generator prompt lists.
* browsing my Serial Poetry page or QUILTBAG list for favorites.
* looking up fun things on TV Tropes.
* plugging a favorite topic into your search engine and choosing a picture that looks interesting.
What Is a Poetry Fishbowl?
Writing is usually considered a solitary pursuit. One exception to this is a fascinating exercise called a "fishbowl." This has various forms, but all of them basically involve some kind of writing in public, usually with interaction between author and audience. A famous example is Harlan Ellison's series of "stories under glass" in which he sits in a bookstore window and writes a new story based on an idea that someone gives him. Writing classes sometimes include a version where students watch each other write, often with students calling out suggestions which are chalked up on the blackboard for those writing to use as inspiration.
In this online version of a Poetry Fishbowl, I begin by setting a theme; today's theme is "anything goes." I invite people to suggest characters, settings, and other things relating to that theme. Then I use those prompts as inspiration for writing poems.
Cyberfunded Creativity
I'm practicing cyberfunded creativity. If you enjoy what I'm doing and want to see more of it, please feed the Bard. The following options are currently available:
1) Sponsor the Fishbowl -- Here is a PayPal button for donations. There is no specific requirement, but $1 is the minimum recommended size for PayPal transactions since they take a cut from every one. You can also donate via check or money order sent by postal mail. If you make a donation and tell me about it, I promise to use one of your prompts. Anonymous donations are perfectly welcome, just won't get that perk. General donations will be tallied, and at the end of the fishbowl I’ll post a list of eligible poems based on the total funding; then the audience can vote on which they want to see posted.
2) Swim, Fishie, Swim! -- A feature in conjunction with fishbowl sponsorship is this progress meter showing the amount donated.

3) Buy It Now! -- Gakked from various e-auction sites, this feature allows you to sponsor a specific poem. If you don't want to wait for some editor to buy and publish my poem so you can read it, well, now you don't have to. Sponsoring a poem means that I will immediately post it on my blog for everyone to see, with the name of the sponsor (or another dedicate) if you wish; plus you get a nonexclusive publication right, so you can post it on your own blog or elsewhere as long as you keep the credits intact. You'll need to tell me the title of the poem you want to sponsor. I'm basing the prices on length, and they're comparable to what I typically make selling poetry to magazines (semi-pro rates according to Duotrope's Digest).
0-10 lines: $5
11-25 lines: $10
26-40 lines: $15
41-60 lines: $20
Poems over 60 lines, or with very intricate structure, fall into custom pricing.
4) Commission a scrapbook page. I can render a chosen poem in hardcopy format, on colorful paper, using archival materials for background and any embellishments. This will be suitable for framing or for adding to a scrapbook. Commission details are here. See latest photos of sample scrapbooked poems: "Sample Scrapbooked Poems 1-24-11"
5) Spread the word. Echo or link to this post on your LiveJournal, other blog, Twitter, Facebook, MySpace, Digg, StumbleUpon, or any other social network. Useful Twitter hashtags include #poetryfishbowl and #promptcall. Encourage people to come here and participate in the fishbowl. If you have room for it, including your own prompt will give your readers an idea of what the prompts should look like; ideally, update later to include the thumbnail of the poem I write, and a link to the poem if it gets published. If there is at least one new prompter or donor, I will post an extra freebie poem.
Additional Notes
1) I customarily post replies to prompt posts telling people which of their prompts I'm using, with a brief description of the resulting poem(s). If you want to know what's available, watch for those "thumbnails."
2) You don't have to pay me to see a poem based on a prompt that you gave me. I try to send copies of poems to people, mostly using the LJ message function. (Anonymous prompters will miss this perk unless you give me your eddress.) These are for-your-eyes-only, though, not for sharing.
3) Sponsors of the Poetry Fishbowl in general, or of specific poems, will gain access to an extra post in appreciation of their generosity. While you're on the Donors list, you can view all of the custom-locked posts in that category. Click the "donors" tag to read the archive of those. I've also posted a list of other donor perks there. I customarily leave donor names on the list for two months, so you'll get to see the perk-post from this month and next.
4) After the Poetry Fishbowl concludes, I will post a list of unsold poems and their prices, to make it easier for folks to see what they might want to sponsor.
Feed the Fish!
Now's your chance to participate in the creative process by posting ideas for me to write about. Today's theme is "anything goes." I'll be soliciting ideas for ... anything at all! Favorite characters, ideas for new ones, plot twists, stop-trope repairs, strange settings, whatever tickles your fancy. Now's the time to bring out all your cool ideas that haven't quite fit a previous prompt call. If you manage to recommend a form that I don't recognize, I will probably pounce on it and ask you for its rules. I do have the first edition of Lewis Turco's The Book of Forms which covers most common and many obscure forms.
I'll post at least one of the fishbowl poems here so you-all can enjoy it. (Remember, you get an extra freebie poem if someone new posts a prompt or makes a donation.) The rest of the poems will go into my archive for magazine submission.
(no subject)
Date: 2015-07-21 09:49 pm (UTC)1. "In olden days a hint of stocking / Was looked on as something shocking. / Now Heaven knows, / Anything goes." (Cole Porter)
2. Silkpunk
1 + 2 = ...
3. Silk stockings :-)
(3i. To be hung by the chimney with care???)
Boosted:
http://thnidu.dreamwidth.org/1423308.html
http://thnidu.livejournal.com/1535764.html
Poem
Date: 2015-07-22 03:43 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2015-07-21 11:45 pm (UTC)Prompt the first, in Terramagne: How is the young man who manifested the power to see all the oppressions getting along?
Prompt the second, also in Terramagne: Inspired by a nasty encounter a friend had with a flippin' gigantic nest of paper wasps built above her driveway. Super stinging insects, and however the heck one deals with them. Ick!
Prompt the third, again with Terramagne: We know cocoa powers exist. Do coffee, tea or guarana powers exist also? I'm betting they do, and I wonder if manifestations cluster with local crops or affinities i.e. someone in Sri Lanka or England might manifest tea powers, where someone in Ethiopia or Kenya gets coffee ones. Hmm.
(no subject)
Date: 2015-07-22 03:27 am (UTC)Poem
Date: 2015-07-23 05:00 am (UTC)Poem
Date: 2015-07-23 05:00 am (UTC)102 lines, Buy It Now = $51
(no subject)
Date: 2015-07-22 12:19 am (UTC)Poem
Date: 2015-07-22 04:30 am (UTC)45 lines, Buy It Now = $20
Prompts
Date: 2015-07-22 12:24 am (UTC)1) In Polychrome Heroics, preferably in Stalwart Stan & Antimatter, use the trope Bruce Wayne Held Hostage. Your choice on which of them is the hostage, why, and how. And how they get free (powers, rescued, the person doing it is delightfully amateur and really not cut out for the super-villain thing).
2) Heart is a Awesome Power. Polychrome Heroics.
3) Comes Great Responsibility - Superman being Superman.
4) Badass Normal - Do not mess with Phil Coulson or his team.
Re: Prompts
Date: 2015-07-22 02:31 am (UTC)Hmmm.... this leads to another question. Does Stan's family know or suspect that either Stan or Lawrence is a soup?
Re: Prompts
Date: 2015-07-22 03:26 am (UTC)I'm not entirely positive if the Woods know - there was comments to one of the poems (What We Call Chaos) that makes me think maybe. But we can trust that either Ysabet knows or can get a straight answer out of Stan. ;)
Re: Prompts
Date: 2015-07-22 03:34 am (UTC)Re: Prompts
Date: 2015-07-22 06:37 am (UTC)Re: Prompts
Date: 2015-07-22 10:09 am (UTC)Re: Prompts
Date: 2015-07-22 04:06 am (UTC)Re: Prompts
Date: 2015-07-22 05:03 am (UTC)Reading "What I Love About Games" - I leaning more toward they know about Stan. I doubt they know about Lawrence. Out right know that is - Stan's parents seem pretty on the ball so they might have thoughts and are waiting for him to tell them himself.
(edit: typo and missing word)
Re: Prompts
Date: 2015-07-25 05:33 am (UTC)478 lines, Buy It Now = $239
Re: Prompts
Date: 2015-07-26 03:40 am (UTC)Sounds like fun.
Re: Prompts
Date: 2015-07-26 03:42 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2015-07-22 12:39 am (UTC)Poem
Date: 2015-07-24 03:57 am (UTC)142 lines, Buy It Now = $71
(no subject)
Date: 2015-07-22 02:10 am (UTC)Re: anything goes: What counts as a vehicle?
("Anything can fly if you add enough thrust.")
The joy of discovering a whole new way to communicate.
Edit: and boosted at DW and LJ.
Poem
Date: 2015-07-22 11:15 am (UTC)426 lines, Buy It Now = $213
Available for posting after "Coloring In" has been sponsored and published.
Anything goes?
Date: 2015-07-22 02:28 am (UTC)Re: Anything goes?
Date: 2015-07-22 02:49 am (UTC)Re: Anything goes?
Date: 2015-07-23 08:39 pm (UTC)138 lines, Buy It Now = $69
Re: Anything goes?
Date: 2015-07-23 10:39 pm (UTC)Re: Anything goes?
Date: 2015-07-23 10:44 pm (UTC)You'll get to, because prompters get a backchannel copy.
"You don't usually open anything so short for multiple sponsors, do you?"
Sure, it's epic length. Below epic, I discourage but don't forbid partial funding. (It's fine if people arrange cosponsors though, which has happened a few times.) The only catch is we currently have three open epics, two of them in Polychrome Heroics. I'd rather clear out some of that before opening a new epic.
Re: Anything goes?
Date: 2015-07-25 03:57 am (UTC)70 lines, Buy It Now = $35
(no subject)
Date: 2015-07-22 03:23 am (UTC)How is Larriken doing? I was thinking about him earlier today.
Has any progress been made on finding and neutralizing the clipper who hurt Cassandra? (Yes indeed, "neutralizing" is a loaded word.)
I'd like to see a conversation between Mr. Marshall and Ms. Fischer about making the school a safer place for students with soup abilities. What/who are they up against, and what kind of strategy will they adopt?
Okay...
Date: 2015-07-22 03:55 am (UTC)* The ones who actually know what they are doing, do a competent job of it, and are working to help people that nobody else can or will. (Remember, superdisempowers can be fatal, and some superpowers are just more trouble than they're worth.)
* The ones who believe that they are helping, but aren't as skilled as they think and don't really understand how little is known about superpowers period, which means that sometimes they do a lot of collateral damage without realizing it. They would probably be horrified to discover how much they have hurt people.
* The ones who know damn well what kind of damage they're doing, and either don't care, or take malicious pleasure in it. Some are just in it for the money. Some are sporks who hate themselves and other soups and wish it would all just go the hell away, but they can't dig out their own ability.
Now which of those latter two -- or something else -- do you think would make a more interesting example as part of Cassandra's story?
Re: Okay...
Date: 2015-07-22 06:48 am (UTC)You don't have to use that portrait if there's another option you like better. But it seems to me to be the best fit from what Cassandra has said about her home life.
* Of course they will accept adult patients who come of their own will, and there will be some of those. But their bread-and-butter is from children, consenting or not, who are handed over by their parents.
Poem
Date: 2015-07-30 01:34 am (UTC)454 lines, Buy It Now = $227
Done for the night!
Date: 2015-07-22 11:28 am (UTC)