Hey Toads,
I first focused on the fact that I was scheduled for this prompt right at the end of the rigors of April. My head rang slightly every time I thought about it, as in “omg--I have to come up with a prompt?” Then, oddly, two of my favorite lines would reverberate--“never send to know for whom the bell tolls/it tolls for thee.”
The lines are from John Donne, and, at first, made me think this prompt should be about bells, or, really, the use of repeated sounds in poetry--repeated words, or phrases--a repetition that always seems to me like the tolling of a bell. (Even when the words and the poem have nothing to do with bells.)
But then I looked up the Donne lines, which come from “No Man Is An Island”--
No man is an island,
Entire of itself,
Every man is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manor of thy friend's
Or of thine own were:
Any man's death diminishes me,
Because I am involved in mankind,
And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls;
It tolls for thee.
So, because these words keep ringing in my mind--and because they are such beautiful words-- I’m giving you a couple of choices for the prompt today--(i) is to write something arising out of the idea of tolling/ringing/knelling--this can be need not be about a bell; it could involve any kind of repetition (or not.) A great example is Break Break Break by Alfred Lord Tennyson.
The second choice is to write about connection: what connects you, or someone or something else, to some kind of mainland. Note that this choice does not require autobiography--it can be about the connection of anything between anything else--though, it can also, of course, be about yourself and your own tethers. (The connection does not have to be positive.)
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| No Toad -- in this case, frog--is an island either. |
For fun, and further inspiration, here's a very middle of May kind of video of Judy Garland and Gene Kelley:
BTW--this is Manicddaily/Karin Gustafson --also unfortunately known on Blogger as Outlawyer. All the above pics, other than the Indian one, are mine. (The Indian one is by my daughter Meredith Martin.) The elephant is from my children's counting book, 1 Mississippi. (Check it out!) All rights reserved.