Building a Sustainable Writing Practice with Stefania Gomez, Maggie Queeney, and Holly Amos, Plus More Writing Prompts

For the month of January, we’re focusing on what keeps us writing. How do we refresh our writing habits and routines? How do poets sustain their writing practices? Today, Holly Amos enlists the help of poets and educators Stefania Gomez and Maggie Queeney. Stefania and Maggie both work in the Poetry Foundation library, and they share some of their inspirations, tips, challenges, and resources. Holly offers two writing prompts, and we hear advice on how to keep making via clips from CAConrad, Jordan Peele, Vi Khi Nao, Ocean Vuong, and Anne Waldman. 

Links and writing prompts mentioned in the episode:

–Tricia Hersey’s Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto
–Felicia Rose Chavez’s The Anti-Racist Writing Workshop: How to Decolonize the Creative Classroom
–CAConrad’s website contains many (Soma)tic Poetry Ritual links, and here’s CA speaking about them on Poetry Off the Shelf
–Vi Khi Nao on boredom on the Between the Covers podcast from Tin House 
–Jordan Peele on writing Get Out at the 2017 Film Independent Forum 
–Anne Waldman gives advice to young writers at the Louisiana Channel
–Ocean Vuong talks about where he wrote his first book on Late Night with Seth Meyers

Boredom Prompt

   1. Do something boring. It could be sitting in front of a window, watching a TV show that is boring, listening to a podcast that's not that engaging, but don't multitask—do just the one thing, and do it for as much time as you have (fifteen minutes if that's all you have, or thirty if you've got longer).

   2. While you're doing whatever boring thing you're doing, have a timer go off every three minutes, and when it goes off, write down three words. 

   3. Now, use the words you wrote down to begin your poem. What do they have in common? What's the thread you're finding? Or string them all together for your first line.

Dream Writing Space Prompt

   1. Envision the place where you're writing in ten years in your dream life. What does that space look like? What's there? Who's there? How tall are the ceilings? What is the light like?

   2. Spend ten minutes writing in detail about the space. Embody that future self in that future space. 

   3. Now write a poem “remembering” your old writing space (so “remembering” your current writing space).