Flash Contest #23: Create a piece of flash fiction written from the perspective of the first object you saw when you woke up this morning. Your narrative should be no longer than 250 words. For our first monthly version of our regular Flash Contest we decided to request a piece of flash fiction from an unusual perspective: that of a random object. Given that we asked for the perspective of the first thing the writer saw when they woke up in the morning, we gained a lot of insight into the inner lives of lamps, pets, curtains, toys, clothing, bedding, books and magazines, desk items like pens and pencils, and many other stalwarts of the bedroom. It was so much fun to read the various lively and perceptive voices you gave to these inanimate (or non-human) objects. Many of them seem to take a very dim view of the humans they have their silent eyes on most of the day (or night), especially all the things they witness that they would rather not see . . . We are delighted to share the work of our winners with you on this page. Congratulations to all of them, and to our Honorable Mentions. Remember: the next monthly flash contest will be based on the first weekly prompt of October! Winners “The Silent Stalker” by Chloe Chan, 12, Bellevue, WA “Worst Fear” by Scarlet He, 9, Scarsdale, NY “Travails and Humiliations of a Cotton Shirt” by Iago Macknik-Conde, 13, Brooklyn, NY “Wanted” by Daniel Wei, 13, Weddington, NC “Woes of a Blanket” by Lacole Yang, 13, Irvine CA Honorable Mention “Story of the Bed” by Vaishali Andukuri, 10, Oakland, NJ “Day of a Pencil Box” by Judah Davidoff, 9, Brunswick, MD “The Proud Life of a Blanket” by Lucy Kershen, 13, Norman, OK “The Life of a Lamp” by Chloe Mancini, 9, Glenside, PA “New and Improved” by Sanvi Patel, 11, Midland, MI “Morning from the Eyes of a Doll” by Joycelyn Zhang, 10, San Diego, CA Chloe Chan, 12Bellevue, WA The Silent Stalker Chloe Chan, 12 Ding ding ding! The half-awake girl below me groans loudly as she hears the alarm clock ringing maliciously in the morning. Finally, after rolling around on the bed, she wrenches the teal green blanket off and stumbles–if not sleepwalks–into the bathroom. I see everyone and everything from a bird’s eye view. I know the secrets of everyone. There are some things I would rather not see. Just like when I saw a toddler picking his nose with his thumb. Just like when I saw a laughing mother binge-watch “Kitchen Nightmares.” Just like when I saw the girl make up an excuse to her teacher when she forgot her homework. “My dog ate my homework,” is what she mumbled. The girl exits the bathroom and heads downstairs into the kitchen. Yes! My favorite part of the day! I hear a racket of pots and pans. I smell an assortment of berries, batter, and butter. Hmm . . . is she making pancakes for breakfast today? I look at her, hovering over a brown, spongy pancake with a spoonful of aromatic berries to go onto her pancake. Yum! Oh, how I wish I could taste this masterpiece! But I am unable to do so. You may be wondering what I am. Well, I can’t tell you my answer or else scientists will come after me! Just thinking of this gives me a nightmare! You will just have to guess. At least, I call myself the silent stalker. Scarlet He, 9Scarsdale, NY Worst Fear Scarlet He, 9 I peered through the tinted green tank. Big human woke up. Left room. I swam around. Plants on the bottom of my tank grew. Grew and grew . . . never-ending growing. Soon, my whole tank was filled with the long stems of plastic plants. You could no longer see the rainbow rocks at the bottom of the tank. I swam around once more, dazed. The human had not come back. Where had she gone? All I see is an ocean of green and black. It had been at least a few hours. Human still not back. Plants overwhelming me. I closed my eyes. I drifted to the top of the tank, my belly facing up. My worst fear had overcome me, once again. I opened my eyes. Where was the green? A big grinning face was looking through the tank. The water was clear, like clear glue, and the plants were gone. The rainbow rocks reflected off the tank, casting a shimmering glint. Iago Macknick-Conde, 13Brooklyn, NY Travails and Humiliations of a Cotton Shirt Iago Macknik-Conde, 13 I am a shirt. A red cotton shirt, but fading fast. That’s because of my wearer, thirteen years old and going on six. I kid you not, the brat took me to the Y last Friday and used me as a swim-shirt. First of all, he keeps me on while he changes into his swim-trunks, and there are just some things you can’t unsee. As if that’s not humiliating enough, then I have to swallow the insults from the swim-shirt gang in the pool. “Aye, what’re you doing here in the water, you landlubber!” The creeps talk like pirates like they think that’s cool. Dorks. “Ahoy, scallywag, try to not choke your swimmer!” The swim-shirt closest to me jabbers on, and I realize that air is trapped below my collar, turning me into a buoy. So now I’m suffocating the little moron. Finally the class ends, with the kid half dead, my body drenched, and the seadog losers laughing their hems off. Two days ago, I get some relief at last when the cleaning lady arrives. She puts me inside the washing machine and then lays me inside the dryer for a full-body massage. Best of all, she sets me on the highest shelf of the closet, next to an unmatched sock who has been hiding here for longer than I’ve been alive. We should be good for a few years: no way the brat can reach us without a stool
Writing Workshop #21: Metaphor
An update from our twenty-first Writing Workshop! A summary of the workshop held on Saturday September 12, plus some of the output published below We were so happy to be back this week for the first in our second series of Writing Workshops, and the twenty-first one we have held this year! This time, our founder William Rubel focused on a very useful figurative tool for writers: metaphor. We started with two simple and common ideas–that a man is a rat and time is money–as examples for discussion. We watched some movie clips and read some specific examples from literature that displayed the power of stating that a character IS another object, animal, or force of nature, from Juliet as the sun in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, via the “spider” Drummle in Dickens’ Great Expectations to Hagrid’s “mane” of hair expressing his lion-heartedness throughout Harry Potter, as well as describing his shaggy look. After half an hour of writing Liam, Simran, Gia, Anya, Peri and Elbert read their work to the group for feedback from William. We heard a selection of stories, long and short, and poems, including haikus; several were powerful responses to the ongoing wildfires in California, and all of them were rich with metaphor and creative imagery. Some of those we heard, and more written during the class, are published below. What a tremendous start to the new season! The Writing Challenge: Write a poem or story that builds and develops at least one strong metaphor. The Participants: Nova, Rithesh, Katie, Charlotte, Georgia, Peri, Anya, Simran, Scarlet, Liam, Maddie, Jonathan, Olivia, Tilly, Samantha, Janani, Helen, Madeline, Ella, Chloe, Ma’ayan, Keyang, Dana, Charlotte, Cassandra, Ava, Jayden, Maggie, Sophie, Enni, Juniper, Sierra, Elbert, Hera, Nami, Dhesh, Sophia, James, Ever, Emma, Gia, Sophia, Eden. Dhesh, 11Fulshear, TX Metaphor Dhesh, 11 His beard was like tangled wires, His eyes were dark, similar to the night sky, His hair was shaped like a hair dryer, Why is he dressed up like this to a Prom, I thought? But, it turned out, he was dancing with my mom! Anya Geist, 14Worcester, MA Leaves of Autumn Anya Geist, 14 Leaves twirled through the air, their edges curled as if singed by fire, their vibrant colors beaming as though they were fire. They touched the ground with the grace of a ballet dancer, and then sat silent, waiting for the wind to blow them along. In the night, their color faded with the rest of the day, and they were merely dark silhouettes, phantoms that crept up from the ground. The wind would creep down the roads, through the bony fingers of bare tree branches that made an otherworldly glow in the rare light of the moon, and the chilly breezes would, on occasion, ruffle a few leaves, causing them to crinkle and scrape the sidewalks as they rolled away; a truly ghostly noise. Day dawned, and the leaves burned brighter than ever. They were the sun, strong and shining in the light of daybreak, in the crisp freshness that fell over the world. Any notions of ghosts, of spirits that haunted the world, had been blown away, just as that eerie wind was replaced by fresh gusts that smelled of apple cider and Thanksgiving food. Children giggled gleefully as they walked to and from school, stomping on fallen leaves, catching them as they flew through the air, jumping in neat little piles that blew apart at the slightest touch. Leaves were the harbinger of fall, of that magical time filled with shiny, crunchy apples freshly picked off of trees; of orange Jack-o-lanterns carved into complex patterns, lit by a flickering candle; of all of the good things that made their eyes shine in the cooling weather. And so autumn went, with the leaves that flew gracefully to the ground. Peri Gordon, 10Sherman Oaks, CA Desert Prison Peri Gordon, 10 Water is gold in the desert It’s a superhero Or the last ticket to the show that is life. I’ve been lost here for days A prisoner in an endless jail. The desert is a jail. The lack of water is the executioner. I am at its mercy. The search for water is my final trial. Then what is water? Water is the sign that I am decidedly innocent That my life will be spared. But even if I find it I doubt I’ll ever escape this prison. This desert. Then water just means I stay here longer Lonely and afraid Free from the executioner But not from the jail. Liam Hancock, 12Danville, CA Running From Time Liam Hancock, 12 He runs with his sneakers kicking up gravel, his knees pumping, his hips and chest drawn out with sharp intakes of breath. He is a free man, he is a slave who has broken his shackles and left them in my hands. He is a butterfly who has first sprouted his wings. Once before, he lived as a creature, squirming and writing in my fingers. Could hardly get out of his own way. But he’s liberated now. And is that a cause for celebration? Because I’d kept him in chains for a reason. I’d firmly gripped the keys in my hands, the locks and bolts hanging listlessly from my fingers. Back and forth, back and forth they dangled, like time pressing continuously forward and yet hesitating and moving back again. Time, when he was locked away, was of no value to me. With one variable of Ian’s murder off the table, I had ample opportunity to solve the equation. It didn’t take long for me to realize that I needed to let him go. I had the numbers. I had the memories, the moments. I had everything I needed to uncover him and bring justice, a judge in my black, velvety gown hammering the mallet down onto the broad oak desk. Guilty. Somehow, someway, I knew he was. I had the numbers. I had the equation. But he had me. And I have to face
Weekly Creativity #117 | Flash Contest: Write flash fiction from the perspective of an object
Create a piece of flash fiction written from the perspective of the first object you saw when you woke up this morning. Your narrative should be no longer than 250 words. This is the first weekly prompt of September, so it is also the topic for our monthly flash contest: entries due by midday Pacific time on Sunday September 13!
