A Block Party

A friend and fellow writer told me that it had been a while since she'd written, that she had ideas and phrases floating in and about but nothing she could grab hold of. I told her of a neat book my buddy J gave me called poemcrazy. Susa Goldsmith Wooldridge, the author, teaches poetry and feels confident enough with her abilities to subtitle the book "freeing your life with words." I'm not promising freedom but I do find her exercises rather interesting. Here's a sample (and a prompt for my currently blocked friend):

Jot down in a list the first thing you see when you ask yourself,

If I were a color, what color would I be? (From red to the inside-of-a-watermelong-seed color.)
What shape would I be? (Whatever you see -- an airplane wing shape, a boot shape, a parallelogram, a cone, a diamond.)
If I were a movement, what movement would I be? (glide, hop, wiggle, spin)
What sound?
What animal?
What song?
What number? (infinity, googoplex, eight, sixteen)
What car? (Details: year, color, condition)
What piece of furniture?
What food?
What musical instrument?
What place?
What element in nature? (dust, galaxy, waterfall)
What kind of tree?
What's something I'm afraid of?
What's the word hiding behind my eyes?

Put down the words I am . . .
Write about yourself using answers to the questions above as well as action words . . . Just pile on words. Don't think. See images. Daydream with words. Wander. Gor crazy defining yourself. There are no rules and there's no audience. Be silly, serious, wry or overdramatic.
If you get tired of I am, start lines with

• I will be
• I want to be
• I used to be
• I let go of
• I've forgotten
• I remember

-- as long as you're writing about yourself.