September Theme: The Stories We Carry
Big Question: Why do certain stories stay with us?
Week 2: Memory and Storytelling
What I wrote below is based on the following creative writing prompt included in Saturday’s Writing Prompts About Memory and Storytelling post.
Prompt: Childhood Memorial
Write a poem about a place from your childhood or a character’s childhood.
Why did I choose it?
I chose this prompt because the older I get, the harder it is to look back. And not because things are becoming more challenging to remember. But because they’re getting more emotional to recall and sit with. Which I was not expecting. I always assumed the older I got, the harder it would be to recall memories, especially from my childhood. But the opposite seems to be true for me. At least for now, my childhood memories seem to be some of my strongest, for better or worse. And the one place that will be forever embedded in my memory, my psyche, my heart, maybe even my soul, and most certainly at the center of the story of my life, is my grandmother’s house. The one place I wish still existed in the real world, that was always a refuge for me to be loved and free, that will now only survive in my mind.
Let me know if this prompt, or any of the others shared yesterday, brought up any interesting ideas or memories you want to explore this week in the chat or comments so we can discuss!
My Response: Grandma’s House, Revived
The crick of the storm door opens to the warm stories seeping and emanating from the softness of the front walls adorned in tapestries of the living hanging over the shag carpet leading straight to the cabinet of curiosities and tokens gleaming with trinkets and tales reaching straight into the heart from the corners of the welcome room possessed by the salt of the earth refracting off the light in the main hall showcasing the shelf of books and tomes keeping yarns of devotion and lore beating with the pulse of life from the arteries of the private study stocked with epistolary global stamps adhering to the sheets created between the beds of rest and repose dreaming of parables and fables breathing with sighs of spirits from the solid foundation of the home saved underneath fond native threads woven into the music piercing above and within the keys of the piano and typewriter echoing ballads of scores and scales telling the legends of history and time from the lofty popcorn of the ceiling hanging low recorded for the witnesses of treasured moments wafting through the impromptu serving hatch onto the dining table of sunlight and cake evoking chronicles of suppers and candle smoke holding recipes of lessons and embodied scents from the familiar tastes on the spoons in the kitchen passed around and down to the children looking out the sunroom panes over the blue buoys of glass and seasoned china absorbing daily diaries and morning narratives issuing sweet hymns of invigorating songs from the birds on honeysuckle vines in the backyard integrated into the beams above routine memories remaining alongside the sheer drapes drawn across the renovated den of entertainment and diversion watching and reading romantic sagas and mysteries protecting a childhood well spent in imagination from the horrors of reality activated beyond its scaffolding built to enshrine this inner sanctuary of love and light steepled into the myths and remembrances that come alive whenever the recollection of Grandma's house is revived.
My Reflection and an Invitation
This poem still needs a lot of love and care, and a ton of revisions, but writing it resurfaced so many memories for me, in a way that I genuinely wasn’t expecting. As I wrote it, I truly felt as if I was moving through my grandmother’s house, as if I was a ghost with senses that were still activated and useful. I could practically smell and hear and even touch things around the house, and hear my grandmother laugh and sing. And that was a lot more emotional than I thought it would be.
I will probably revisit and revise this poem someday soon, so stay tuned.
How about you? What did this prompt or poem surface for you?
Leave a comment or join this month’s Drafters Workshop Chat so we can discuss your writing related to Writing Prompts About Memory and Storytelling, or anything else you’re currently working on.
Whether you join the chat to share your responses to this week’s prompts, ask questions, workshop an excerpt of something else you’ve written, or simply want to encourage others, we’d love to see you there as we explore the stories we carry and how they impact our lives throughout September.
Continue Exploring September’s Theme, The Stories We Carry
This Week: Memory and Storytelling
Writing Prompts About Memory and Storytelling
ICYM Week 1: The Books That Changed Us
Writing Prompts About Books That Changed Us
Can a book genuinely change who we are?
What My Favorite Books Say About Me
The Anatomy of Books That Have Changed Us
20 Banned Books That Have Changed Us