Call for Themes

[ysabetwordsmith]

I've reached the end of scheduled themes for the Poetry Fishbowl project. It's time to brainstorm some new themes! These are a few that I've jotted down earlier, ones that I've thought up or people have suggested, to give you an idea what kind of stuff might be suitable:

* Exoplanets & Other Science Articles
* Everything Is Awful and I'm Not Okay
* Disabilities and Abilities
* Hope Is the Thing with Wings

What other themes would you like to see me write about? What would you like to buy? Suggest them in a comment below this post.

Later on I'll collect the suggestions and do some polling. The most popular topics will be added to the schedule for future fishbowls. I'm going to run the first large poll with checkboxes so you can express interest in as many themes as you like. I will then either pick from the most popular ones, or use that information to pull out the favorite themes for a smaller poll to select the ones which will appear in upcoming fishbowls.

You can also help by linking to this post so that more people will see it. Everyone is welcome to suggest themes. Everyone will also be able to vote for them later; prompters and donors will get extra votes. If you link to the call for themes, you can reveal a verse in any open perk poem:
"Mysterious and Impermanent"
"Greater Than the Sum"
"A Lively Feast"
"Always Carry Your Goodness"
"Crossroads on the Hero's Journey"
"Gökotta"
"The Arc of the Mental Universe"
"So Often Alone"
"Mr. Ian Woon and the Excellent Adventure"
"The Bushfire Shawl"
"Putting Everything in Its Place"
"Everything That Blooms"

Comments

[readera]

Baking/cooking as self care

Down in the blues days

Traditional crafts

[(Anonymous)]

I like the exoplanets idea.

Yay!

[ysabetwordsmith]

I suggested that because I miss the time when every major scientific discovery -- and a lot of obscure ones -- caused a flood of SF stories based on them for the next several months. I love writing stuff based on science articles, so I thought I'd see if anyone else was into reading that.

Re: Yay!

[(Anonymous)]

Why not just do a scifi prompt then? Possibly with some sort of bonus if a new-to-you idea is suggested?

Re: Yay!

[ysabetwordsmith]

I have done generic SF as a theme before, and it rarely brings prompts from recent discoveries. But people seem to like this theme idea, so maybe they'll vote it up.

Re: Yay!

[(Anonymous)]

What about choosing a /specific/ scifi topic?

Robtics, cyborgs (hybrots!), gengineering, terraformation/terradeformation, xenolinguistics, Humans thru Alien Eyes, spacetech (battle-exosuits?), alien architecture/tech (gravity-well telescopes), AI civil rights, odd planets, the aliens never came because someone (one of us) told them to run, figuring out cross-species 1st aid with a language barrier, Reality Ensues with equal-oppertunity space pirates, tech designed for multiple species, Mundane Utility*...

*I once read a book where the humans lost their sense of superiority after watching one species carry 5x what a human could, before another type of alien carried the stuff up the wall. And two stories where the (colder) nonhuman made an excellent heat-sink to treat fevers...

If you can choose something that intrests you, maybe it'll focus the prompts enough to get something really interesting?

[(Anonymous)]

Awesome old folks

Awesome young folks

Unconventional problem solving (of outside-context problems?)

Trope subversion(s):
Maybe mix-em-up-genres? Ie a princess war movie instead of a 'twu wuv' story? Or a shapeshifting lover story, but instead of a creepy romance, write it as a comedy with the human friend/partner being the cloudcuckoolander's minder?

[jtthomas]

Unconventional living arrangements
Making do and doing without
Admitting defeat
Society versus disability

[we_are_spc]

Busking out

unconvential ways of telling a 'coming out' story

crossing cape lines for a common cause/mutual goal/other situation you desire

music as healing (I like your player piano, more of them, please?)

Flashmob out of nowhere with soup musicians workingalongside narie/supernarie ones. Just basically a fun rollicking jam session out doors.

ballet in space/or an actually *opera* in space, LOL

-SPCFolk~

[mama_kestrel]

Really like the exoplanets and other scientific discoveries theme.

Another suggestion: Give our children wings.

[erulisse]

Along with the exoplanets thing: space colonies.

You must not be from around here....
Truth is stranger than fiction
Living in harmony with nature
Yarn
Running off to join the circus
Ghosts

[(Anonymous)]

Cloud cities. :)

Also, check out Vacation Guide to the Solar System - I think you'll like it.

[erulisse]

Oh cool! thanks for the tip

[(Anonymous)]

You could also try An Introduction to Planetary Defense which has some interesting ideas about tech (exo-battle-suits! Gravity-well telescopes from stars!) and complexities of warfare in space. (I like it for the ideas, not the 'we must xenophobically prepare for the alien invasion' bits.)

From my Magpie Monday prompt

[ng_moonmoth]

Remediating externalized costs. Ideally, in better ways than just paying off the putative owners of the affected areas. And I'd also like this to expand well beyond just environmental damage. What is the cost to society of employers treating their workers as disposable and replaceable, for instance? And who's going to wind up paying when that substantial bill comes due?

Re: From my Magpie Monday prompt

[erulisse]

well, here in L-America there are a lot of physical issues from the way that most places insist that retail cashiers must always stand and look/be busy. Foot problems from having to stand in one place most of the time, back problems from crappy ergonomics, shoulder and wrist issues from repetitive motion. I can't tell you how many colleagues I saw over the years I was doing that work have to quit because of physical wear and tear issues.... but the way the workers' comp rules are, you can't usually qualify unless your issue is an obvious result of a discrete incident that happened while you were on the clock and you report it -right- then.

Re: From my Magpie Monday prompt

[(Anonymous)]

I had a cooworker with medical issues where she shouldnt be standing. To paraphrase her, the work was better than being homeless.

I also had my Boomer parent tell me I should get a job where I wouldn't be on my feet all the time. I pointed out that I might not have a job if I insisted on a sitdown one...

On the bright side, my managers were reasonable to the fact that people were occasionaly sick, dizzy or pregnant, and would either make accomidations or nicely ask us to get up/go to the break room.

Re: From my Magpie Monday prompt

[ysabetwordsmith]

I remember reading about why the "disability" rate is so high in the South: because that's the only way people can get support. There are almost no jobs, and the ones that exist are hard on the body. A suggestion was made that those people should get sitdown jobs instead. It was inconceivable to them because 1) there were no such jobs and 2) even if there had been, none of those people would qualify for that type of work.

[zeeth_kyrah]

Parts and wholes
Elemental truths and lies
Important questions