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A JCPL librarian interviews published writers about their favorite writing prompts—exercises that can help inspire, focus, and improve your creative writing. Whether you’re a beginner or a pro, a novelist, essayist, or poet, you’ll find ideas and advice to motivate you to keep writing. A partnership with the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning.
PtoP Ep 32 Lyon
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Carrie: [00:00:00] Welcome to the Prompt to Page podcast, a partnership between the Jessamine County Public Library and the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning. I'm your host, librarian and poet, Carrie Green. Each episode, we interview a published writer who shares their favorite writing prompt. Our guest today is George Ella Lyon.
Harlan County native George Ella Lyon writes in multiple genres for readers of all ages. She has published five poetry collections, a novel and memoir for adults, novels and poetry for young people, and many children's picture books. Her most recent titles include Back to the Light: Poems, and Time to Fly.
Her poem Where I'm From has gone around the world as a writing model. Married to musician and writer Steve Lyon, she served as Kentucky Poet Laureate in 2015 to [00:01:00] 2016 and was recently inducted into the Kentucky Writers Hall of Fame. Welcome, George Ella, and thanks for joining us.
George Ella: Oh, I'm glad to be here.
Thanks for inviting me.
Carrie: So you're going to be the keynote speaker for the Carnegie Center's upcoming Books in Progress conference, which will take place May 30th through June 1st. And I believe the theme of the conference this year is, Do you have a book inside you? So I was just wondering what you would say to any listeners out there who might be grappling with that question themselves.
George Ella: I think you have to write to find out. You know, I don't think it's a thing, it's something you can reason yourself toward. At least in my experience of writing, the answers come through the writing itself, and you have to trust that, and you have to dwell in uncertainty. Because that's the one thing that's certain, is that you'll be uncertain.[00:02:00]
You know, you won't know , where this is going to lead you. You won't know if anyone If you'll, anyone will ever publish it, or if they do, if anyone will read it, all those are outside questions and you have to go on the imperative of your heart and your spirit. And, that's a difficult thing because, you know, we are such a product oriented society and we confuse
worth and monetary value and speed, you know, and everything has speeded up and is at this moment continuing to speed up. So this I think writing in my experience takes Olympic patience In every stage but the gifts it gives are immeasurable And, , if you've got to do it, you've got to do it.
Carrie: That's [00:03:00] right. Your bio mentions that wonderful prompt, Where I'm From, which started from a prompt that you kind of created for yourself. Correct?
George Ella: Well, it started with, Joe Carson, a wonderful East Tennessee playwright and poet, and actor, has a book called Stories I Ain't Told Nobody Yet.
And there's a poem in there, number 22, of these pieces that are all based on something somebody said. Jo heard it. She did not, you know, write it in the usual sense. Although it's not, it's not transcribed, but she heard it and then she brought it to the page. And this woman is complaining that she, she loves Johnson City.
She's, imprinted on the mountains. They're her mother. She votes, she pledges allegiance, but every time she opens her mouth, somebody says, you're not from here, are you? And it, it hurts. And she says, I'm from the people who don't have roots like trees. [00:04:00] I'm from the bed, I get up out of every morning. I think she has like six things in that poem.
And the poem, there's a lot more of the poem besides that. But I was so struck by that and by the fact that I'm from people who do like, have roots like trees. So I decided to try to write one myself. And then I had so much fun and I wrote it differently than any poem I'd ever written because I just kept making lists.
I didn't try to finish it. I did that for at least two weeks, and then I took what I had and, you know, edited it together, but there was like no pressure. And so I took it to a teacher's workshop and in 1994, so that's 30 years ago. And just today I got a, I got an email from someone who's been working on her where I'm from poem for years and she loves it.
And she [00:05:00] wants me to read it and yeah, I don't know where she is or anything, but. But it's just, it's been a huge gift to me and it has a life beyond anything I could have conceived of. I, I, Zoomed with third graders in Senegal who wanted to read me their where I'm from poems.
Carrie: Oh, wow.
George Ella: Yeah. So, I'm not doing that prompt today because, if by some, miracle you've avoided it, you can find it on my website.
Carrie: Yeah. And, so, I mean, that's a good example of you using a prompt to, as you said, take the pressure off of your own writing. Is that something that you, do you turn to prompts regularly?
George Ella: It, it depends. Sometimes when I'm work, like when I was working on Many Storied House which is the, the book that came from that, that was generated by the prompt, we're gonna do I, because the [00:06:00] poems take place in the different rooms in the house where I grew up.
So when I, when I was actually at a writer's retreat and I had some dedicated time. There were things that I knew needed to have poems, but I hadn't, you know, I hadn't written them yet, so I, I, I typed them up, cut them up, put them in a bowl, and I would just draw out one, and I'd say, okay, I'm going to do this now, and of course it might not work, but, It did help me.
And my one prayer was, please don't let me, the first day was, please don't let me draw the flood. And of course, of course, because you can't avoid a flood when the, when the water's coming in the front door and you just got to write. So
Carrie: that's right. And, and how did it work out getting the flood the first day?
George Ella: It did.
And, and it, I discovered there wasn't just going to be one flood poem. Of course, I thought I could struggle through [00:07:00] it and have it done, but but I had my I had my father's journal and what he had written about the flood. And so I one of the poems is a found poem from his journal.
Carrie: Oh, very cool. Well, that seems like a pretty good segue into talking about the prompt, if you want to start with that.
George Ella: Okay. I call it Mapping Your Memory House. And it comes, I like my Where I'm From poem, this is, this is not totally original. I first had a drawing and writing prompt from a book called The Practice of Poetry, and it's a prompt by Rita Dove, where you draw your mother's kitchen, and then you ask all kinds of.
Well, she says you have to put the three things in the, in the drawing, and A woman relative has to come in the room and say something in the course of your poem. So, and Joe Carson had a drawing exercise, and Leitha Kendrick had a drawing [00:08:00] exercise. I just, developed this one. I think we're all, you know, we're all in this together.
Carrie: Absolutely.
George Ella: We all do part of something. So, the first, the, you, you don't want to do this on a little bitty piece of paper, you know, you want at least a, an eight and a half by eleven is, is good. So, the first thing is draw the floor plan of a place you have lived, not where you live now, because you're too close to it.
And if it's a multi story house, well, all houses are in the story sense multi story, but just do 1 floor. Because you can do the other parts later, include all the rooms and then once you've done that and don't, this is not about drawing. So, you know, don't worry about proportion, or, oh, oh, no, this is on the too close to the door.
You know, don't worry [00:09:00] about that. Just be quick and make a note of a memory in each room. And just a note, just a word that will, you know, that will let you know. Nobody else has to be able to read this. Include the hallways, the bathrooms, the closets. Write this directly on your map. I should say also, don't let the map take up the whole page because you're going to write some around that drawing.
Oh, but never, that doesn't matter because you're going to do something else. So then look at your, look at your plan and choose the memory that has the most energy for you right now. The one that surprised you, or maybe the one that scared you, or something that you get a heart connection to, a visceral connection to.
Then, draw the scene, take another piece of paper, draw that room at the moment of the memory. [00:10:00] So, again, this is not about being an artist. Nobody else has to be able to interpret it. Nobody's going to see it. But what has, you know, the very, the things that have to be there. And they can be stick figures.
Maybe you're the only person there. But once you get that, I ask these questions. And to those who are listening, you know, you can stop this after each question and, and do it. And I think that would be better than listening to the whole thing because it's good to be taken by surprise. Because you, then you, you're gradually waked up to the writing moment.
Put yourself back there, and you may want to close your eyes to do this. Who was with you? Maybe nobody. How old are you? Now, maybe you don't know exactly, but approximately. So write that on your [00:11:00] paper outside your room, then, take a sensory inventory.
What can you smell? What can you taste? What can you touch? What can you see? What can you hear? I usually try to go to sight last because that's the, that's the sense we lead with, and you've already drawn, you know, you've already given us a picture, given yourself a picture of it. If you can't get all 5 of them, do what you can.
Do not, do not censor yourself. Do not criticize yourself. Do not stop yourself. Then, can you hear anybody talking? In your memory, did anybody say anything, including you? If you're the only person there, maybe it's what you were saying to yourself. Maybe there's music playing. Maybe as in olden [00:12:00] days, there's a radio, you know, an actual, you know, maybe you were listening to something on your headphones, I know, I don't know.
But anyway, if you can get another voice, that's good. And if you know, you know, you don't remember exactly what the other person said. Again, this is using what you do remember to extend into what is plausible. And it's like they say, when you are recalling a dream and then you get an insight that wasn't in the dream, that's still part of the dream, you know, the dream is still working.
So, so with this prompt, is there music Now, is there something in this scene that you can't draw? And I don't mean because you lack the skill, but do you have a strong sense of something, a feeling,[00:13:00]
an atmosphere? Maybe it's the season, you know, maybe the windows are open and the, you know, the cool air or the hot air or whatever is blowing in. Maybe, maybe it's Christmas. Maybe it's the day after something. So write that down. Adrienne Rich says somewhere that the moment of change is the only poem. So, I think we often remember something because it's a moment of change.
That's why it stands out. You know, that's why my first memory is going to California when I was four. And it's because everything was different. It's because when we drove through the night, I slept in the rear window of the car, I had my own private dome car. What could be better? [00:14:00] I wasn't safe, but I was ecstatic.
So is this a moment of power? And if it is, who has it? and does it shift from one person to another? Cause that's sometime why we remember, like when you're little and you're doing something and it's a great idea and you're just having so much fun. And then a grownup walks in and you see from their point of view and you realize,
oh no, oh no, I should never have done this and they've got the power now, you know, yours is gone. So, oh, did I just conflate the moment of change and the moment of power? I think I did. They're kind of the same thing, but not exactly. So you can look through both of those lenses and see what reveals something to you.
And then I like to sit for a moment and just look at all those [00:15:00] notes. that I've made. Check in with, with myself. Don't try to decide where to begin, because that puts you in evaluation. Just start wherever, and it could be with a line of a song. If you were listening to a song, it could be something somebody said.
It could be a detail, and then just write, just write it and whether it's written in, in a poem shape or whether it's coming in dialogue or however, just allow, just allow it. And sometimes, I have found, well, not, this hasn't happened for me, but I've had. another person who did it say, as soon as she finished it, wait, there's something behind this.
There's another memory behind this one. And she went right back, the rest of us went on and she went right back to where she needed to be. So, it lifts, you know, it lifts the veil in a way. And, and it's always [00:16:00] important to have Kleenex because, you know, you might need it, but that means things are flowing.
So, it also, you know, sometimes it can be hilarious and how absurd some things like the time we tried to flock the Christmas tree in the, in the kitchen and we had to get it all wet. And then my mother had ordered this kit that attached to the vacuum cleaner. This is a bad, somebody, we needed an intervention, because of course the bag blew up, and we all looked like snowmen, and the tree was just dripping, and the snow was in the cabinets, which were shut, yeah, yeah, so.
You know, a house is full of stories and from this you can go to a friend's house, you can go to your band room, you can go to a place outside, you know, woods, any [00:17:00] place where you have, you have dwelled with feeling. And it's just so rich. I mean, I knew when I was working on Many Storied House that there would be a poem in the junk drawer.
I had no idea, you know, but everything else was in there. And so there was. Your car. You could map your car. So, you know, especially a car that was particular, particularly important to you. So I invite you to, to relax. And have fun, and if it doesn't catch you the first time, try it another time, because some days the doors are open and sometimes it doesn't strike you as fertile.
Just the way, sometimes I try to read a book and I think, why did anybody tell me to read this? I just, you know, it's heavy as lead. And then [00:18:00] maybe six months later, I pick it up and it's, what was, you know, then I wonder, what was wrong with me? This is, you know, I have to read this. So we, we change. And so we have to give ourselves lots of time.
You know, Suzuki said, one of my children took Suzuki violin, and Suzuki said, give yourself 10, 000 chances. Can you imagine, you know, that's, that's freeing. It's also humbling, you know, because we want. Man, we want to drive through our writing time. Somebody hand us a poem out that window. It doesn't work like that.
Carrie: No, it sure doesn't. But that's, that's a wonderful way of slowing down, I think, having to draw everything. And I, I think so many of us, myself included, are afraid of drawing and getting over [00:19:00] that, I think might help. I mean, I've read that drawing, that we all should be drawing, and that drawing does open different pathways in your brain.
George Ella: I know, and, and it also can, if you're a teacher, it, this exercise can teach you something about your students, because, for example, I had a student who seemed, he never, there were no details in his writing. I mean, if you've got something so specific as someone in a kitchen cooking, what would be in the pot would be ingredients.
That was as close as you were getting. But, when he drew, He drew the kitchen. He drew the pattern in the linoleum. His attention was visual. It wasn't that he didn't notice things. It's that that was his way. And so, you know, I would tell him, when you're [00:20:00] writing, visualize it, draw it. And then you can write from your drawing because that's where it comes to you.
And I would never have known that. . Mm-Hmm. . So, but yes, I know what you say about being on the other side of the brain and that we access different parts and we create new connections. And I think that's one of the reasons that this takes you by surprise because you over there, wherever there is, and your brain and Mm-Hmm, and also the fact that I don't draw well or realistically or I just have to let that go.
I just have to do it and it's sloppy and you know, but that's not what it's about.
Carrie: Right.
George Ella: So that's freeing, too.
Carrie: Mm hmm. And I could also see maybe fiction writers using this to map out where their characters lived, or worked, or something.
George Ella: Absolutely. Absolutely. To draw the house, or more than one house, in your fiction.
I [00:21:00] think I have done that. And it often tells you what you don't know that you need to know.
Carrie: Right. Well, do you have any, final words of advice for our listeners about writing or process or anything?
George Ella: Something that has helped me, and I go back to sometimes when I am a little bit lost. Well, I remind myself that lost is actually on the map.
We just can't see it. But everybody gets there, goes there, you know, it's not some peril that only happens to the person who's lost at the time, but somewhere St. Teresa of Avila says, do what most kindles love in you. And if this is what it is, you know, give it your all and give yourself the joy, the challenge, the time, the patience, because it's there, [00:22:00] it's, it's there.
And there, as we said at the beginning, there are no guarantees except that it is there. And you can be, you can be in it. And I think you can be part of the, of all who, who are doing whatever it is they're called to do. It's a great, it's a great, it's a privilege, you know. And if, and to know what you mean to do, however you manage to do it, this is what I mean to do.
You know, that is in itself empowering. So, but I would also say seek community. Because that is the, that is sustaining. And I I've always, except for one place we lived, I've always had a writer's group and, and they have been my, my lifeline. We've raised children together. You know, we've lost our way and found each other and, and we've taught [00:23:00] each other.
And when I first came, moved to Lexington, I was able to get in a writer's group with Jane Gentry Vance. And, it was, you know, such a blessing of my life. I've, I've been really blessed with good teachers and good writing buddies, and I am today. We do it by ourselves, but we can't do it by ourselves.
You know, can't keep doing it by ourselves. We need to know people who, if we're crazy, they're crazy too.
They're the kind of crazy we need. So crazy in. You know, crazy in love with what we do, and what we read and what may come next.
Carrie: That's right. Well, very, very well said. Thank you so much for joining us and for sharing your prompt.
George Ella: Well, thank you for having me. I hope it's, I hope it helps.[00:24:00]
Carrie: Thank you for listening to Prompt to Page. To learn more about the Jessamine County Public Library, visit jesspublib.org. Find the Carnegie Center for Literacy and Learning at carnegiecenterlex. org. Our music is by Archipelago, an all instrumental musical collaboration between three Lexington based university professors.
Find out more about Archipelago: Songs from Quarantine Volumes 1 and 2 at the links on our podcast website.