There’s a blank page before me and, damn it, if I don’t blame Lin-Manuel Miranda.
“It’s like the drip, drip, drip that’ll never stop.”
“Encanto.” “Hamilton.” Something to take your mind off the writing, she said. I watch and I hear the words of Lin-Manuel and I stew and the next morn comes and the day is still gray.
“Rise up.”
My mind doesn’t stop now. It’s an endless loop of Lin-Manuel and his rhythm.
“Rise up.”
Again, Lin-Manuel, get out of my head.
“Rise up.”
The blank page awaits. I try morning, then noon, then night. But the words still don’t come.
“Oh, no. We don’t talk about Bruno.”
Rhyme after rhyme fills my head. But my words do not come. Not the words that Lin-Manuel Miranda writes. So creative. So talented. So damn good.
Yet, all I have is the blank page and Lin-Manuel in my head.
“I’m willing to wait for it. Wait for it. Wait for it. Wait for it. Wait for it.”
NOTE: The above work came from a writing prompt presented during a recent Pen to Paper Live session hosted by the Charlotte Lit organization. You can register here. In the session, presenter Kathie Collins offered a writing prompt taken from a recent workshop led by poet Jessica Jacobs. We were challenged to try some layered writing in which we’d use some metaphors, physical objects, paintings, etc. to connect an experience we were feeling.
Michael Banks 360 