The Wordsmith's Forge

Here are the notes for "Play Off the Energy of the Crowd."

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This poem came out of the May 2026 crowdfunding Creative Jam. It was inspired by a prompt from siliconshaman. It also fills the "wait" square in my 5-1-26 card for the Greek Myth Fest bingo. This poem belongs to the Blueshift Troupers series.

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This poem came out of the February 2026 crowdfunding Creative Jam. It was inspired by a prompt from curiosity. It also fills the "Nonsexual Touch" square in my 2-1-26 card for the Valentines Bingo fest. This poem has been sponsored by a pool with fuzzyred. This poem belong to the college arc of the Shiv thread in the Polychrome Heroics series.


Warning: This poem deals with a minor fall from a tree, superpower overstrain, and worried friends. If these are touchy topics for you, please consider your tastes and headspace before reading onward.

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This poem came out of the May 5, 2026 Poetry Fishbowl. It was inspired by prompts from my partner Doug, lone_cat, and see_also_friend. It also fills the "Family" square in my 5-1-26 card for the Greek Myth Fest. This poem has been posted in memory of Shirley Barrette. It belongs to the Antimatter and Stalwart Stan thread of the Polychrome Heroics series.

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This poem is spillover from the May 5, 2026 Poetry Fishbowl. It was inspired and sponsored by janetmiles. It also fills the "Building" square in my 5-1-26 card for the Greek Myth Fest. This poem belongs to the series Monster House.

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Here are the character notes for "The Worst Thing in Life."

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The Poetry Fishbowl is now CLOSED. Thank you for your time and attention. Please keep an eye on this page as I am still writing.

My internet connection has been spitty for a week, losing hours every day. The Poetry Fishbowl is open, but don't panic if the response rate is slower than usual. Figure it will close around 3 AM if I can't post closure.


Starting now, the Poetry Fishbowl is open! Today's theme is "Older Scenes and Forgotten Characters." 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.

I'll be soliciting ideas for characters we haven't seen in a while, dimensional travelers, time travelers, man out of time, alternate self, historians, futurists, explorers, inventors, quantum mechanics, quantum physicists, mad scientists, partners, teachers, clergy, leaders, superheroes, supervillains, teammates, alien or fantasy species, failure analysts, ethicists, activists, rebels, other remnant characters, revisiting older scenes, filling in details, missing scenes, learning from the past, moving on to the next scene, researching, revising theories, teaching, adventuring, leaving your comfort zone, discovering things, conducting experiments, observation changing experiments, troubleshooting, improvising, adapting, cleaning up messes, cooperating, bartering, taking over in an emergency, saving the day, discovering yourself, studying others, testing boundaries, coming of age, learning what you can (and can't) do, sharing, preparing for the worst, expecting the unexpected, fixing what's broke, upsetting the status quo, changing the world, accomplishing the impossible, recovering from setbacks, returning home, older storylines and series, the multiverse (quantum physics), the multiverse (F&SF), landing pads, world portals, liminal zones, schools, churches, libraries, laboratories, supervillain lairs, makerspaces, nonhuman accommodations and adaptations, starships, alien planets, magical lands, foreign dimensions, mysterious storms, crystal balls and other magical scrying devices, chronoscopes and other technological scrying devices, psychohistory (academic), psychohistory (science fiction), puzzling discoveries, sudden surprises, travel mishaps, the buck stops here, trial and error, weird food, secret ingredients, supplements that turn out to be metagenic, intercultural entanglements, asking for help and getting it, strange loops, fix-its, enemies to friends/lovers, lab conditions are not field conditions, superpower manifestation, the end of where your framework actually applies, ethics, innovation, problems that can't be solved by hitting, teamwork, found family, complementary strengths and weaknesses, personal growth, and poetic forms in particular.


Currently eligible bingo card(s) for donors wishing to sponsor a square:

Greek Myth Fest Bingo Card 5-1-26


Among my more relevant series for the main theme:

An Army of One features the autistic secession in space.

Arts and Crafts America is largely about using crafts to solve problems.

The Bear Tunnels is about time travel to early colonial New England.

The Blueshift Troupers travel space to help planets in distress.

A Conflagration of Dragons involves civilization collapse.

Daughters of the Apocalypse is mostly about poor, brown, nonmale, queer, and/or disabled people.

Eloquent Souls features soulmates and soulmarks.

Feathered Nests is science fiction about avian aliens with unusual sex/gender dynamics.

Fledgling Grace has a mortal realm, an angelic realm, a demonic realm.

Hart's Farm is a Swedish free-love commune.

The Hollow Way features various mystical occurrences including strange travel paths, but the series is apparently unpublished.

Kande's Quest has a mortal realm and a demonic realm.

Monster House includes a variety of unusual characters.

Not Quite Kansas has an angelic realm, a demonic realm, and two versions of a mortal realm.

The Ocracies is a fantasy setting with diverse political systems.

One God's Story of Mid-Life Crisis has a mortal realm and a divine realm.

Path of the Paladins has a mortal realm and a divine realm.

P.I.E. is urban fantasy with a disabled hera.

Schrodinger's Heroes is all about trying to save the world from alternate dimensions.

The Steamsmith features a black, genderqueer, British steampunk engineer.

The Time Towers compares time travel to Jenga.

Tripping into the Future is about one-way time travel and its consequences.

Walking the Beat is lesbian romance.

Shorter series appear on the Serial Poetry page.

Or you can ask for something new.

Linkbacks reveal a verse of any open linkback poem.


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 "Older Scenes and Forgotten Characters." 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. There are multiple perks, the top one being a half-price poetry sale on one series when donations reach $300.



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 Dreamwidth, other blog, Twitter, Facebook, 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.

Linkback perk: Linkbacks reveal a verse of any open linkback poem. One person can do multiple links if they're on different services, like Dreamwidth or Twitter, rather than all on LiveJournal. Comment with a link to where you posted.


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) 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.

4) If donations total $100 by Sunday evening then you get a free $15 poem; $150 gets you a free $20 poem; and $200 gets you a free epic, posted after the Poetry Fishbowl. These will usually be series poems if I have them; otherwise I may offer non-series poems or series poems in a different size. If donations reach $250, you get one step toward a bonus fishbowl; four of these activates the perk, and they don't have to be four months in a row. Everyone will get to vote on which series, and give prompts during the extra fishbowl, although it may be a half-day rather than a whole day. If donations reach $300, there will be a half-price sale in one series.


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 "Older Series and Forgotten Characters." See above for details. 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 New Book of Forms by Lewis Turco 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, and additional perks at $100-$300 in donations. Linkbacks reveal a verse of any open linkback poem. The rest of the poems will go into my archive for future use.

This poem came out of the January 6, 2026 Poetry Fishbowl. It was inspired by a prompt from see_also_friend. It also fills "The End of the World" square in my 1-1-26 card for the Public Domain Day Bingo fest. This poem has been sponsored by a pool with fuzzyred. It belongs to the Shiv thread of the Polychrome Heroics series. It follows "Cause a Riot of Color."

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This poem came out of the April 7, 2026 Poetry Fishbowl. It was inspired by a prompt from nsfwords. It has been sponsored by the general fund poll. This poem belongs to the series Monster House.

Warning: Do not read with mouth full.

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The general fund currently contains $25. Everyone is eligible to vote in this poll. I will keep it open at least until Tuesday night. If there is a clear answer then, I'll close it. Otherwise I may leave it open at least a little longer. Here are your options...

"No Faster or Firmer Friendships" belongs to Polychrome Heroics and needs $45 to be complete. Josué makes friends with Maria-Vera. You could reveal a bunch of new verses here.

"The Doom Puff" is $15. You could sponsor that outright, and have $10 left for "No Faster or Firmer Friendships."

There are four epics from April: "Any Terms You Offer," "Eat It Happily Because It Is Good," "Edge of Enchantment," and "An Equally Valid Way of Being." This would make a good start on any one of those.