Allow me to hit you with a little Vogon poetry, just to notch one color and break my dry streak.  Seriously, I am shitting this thing out.  It is rank as an outhouse.

A Blue Forest

I came to the edge of a blue forest
The trees were green like brocc’li florets
I came to be whom the world ignorest
Bluebirds sang an electric chorus

The understory was a floral idyll
I came to lay down, to relinquish my will
Yet what time was it? The time to get ill?
Of beastie boys I had clearly my fill

Flowers were alive like a vibrating carpet
Bluebells battered me, the savagest mosh pit
Tossed and beaten ’til I just could not take it
If I had a bone left these petals would break it

You think to lay down, let the roots take you under
You think to escape from the tumult and thunder
But nature’s not gentle, is it any wonder?
The roar of the bluebirds will grant you no slumber.

–

The damn writing events never end in my writing group, wtf.  This is part of a postnanopocalyptic restructuring.  Since nanowrimo the org has burned itself to sad ashes, people are no longer beholden to how they handled the event.  November is a novel writing month.  What else is there?

The org has “summer camp” versions of the novel writing, in April and July, but free of the nonprofit’s shambles, our group is going to space out the camps more evenly during the year, bumping April’s up to March.  This leaves a month’s space between the camps and May, so our overlord came up with an activity to do.  To quote him,

“It’s gonna be May, and the start of a brand new event — 🌻May Flowers!🌻 This event is dedicated to writing short stories for every color of the rainbow, and is self-directed, so no word counts or deadlines.  You can write poems, flash-fiction, whatever you like! 🌈✍️🌼🌸”  I wonder, if I just steal his event posts, could I tease anybody into participating in my comment section?  This is from the first…

🌹🥀🌹MAY FLOWERS… RED 🌹🥀🌹
Today is the first day of May Flowers, and the first of our colors to be featured!  You may write your stories in any order you like, but I will post a color on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, to help inspire you and give you some structure if you prefer it.  Throw your hat in the ring by completing this little survey about your future story (or poem/essay/etc), then get writing!
TITLE:  xxx
PREMISE:  (A brief synopsis of the plot, spoilery or otherwise)
RELATION TO RED:  (Describe what makes your story red)
RED KEYWORDS:  (Include red related words you associate with your story)
THE FLOWER:  (Chose a red flower you’d like to represent your story)  Post your discussions about ⁠red, as well as your completed stories when you finish them!  They don’t have to be edited, just get to the end.    There are no due dates, feel free to work on your story as you like!  See you on Friday… 🌹🌹🌹

and because i’m not posting this til friday…

🌻🌻 MAY FLOWERS… ORANGE 🌻🌻
Today is our second color!  Keep working on your reds, but here’s another one to inspire you.  Throw your hat in the ring by completing this little survey about your future story (or poem/essay/etc), post it, then get writing!
TITLE:  xxx
PREMISE:  (A brief synopsis of the plot, spoilery or otherwise)
RELATION TO ORANGE:  (Describe what makes your story orange)
RED KEYWORDS:  (Include orange related words you associate with your story)
THE FLOWER:  (Chose an orange flower you’d like to represent your story)  Post your discussions about orange, as well as your completed stories when you finish them!  They don’t have to be edited, just get to the end.    There are no due dates, feel free to work on your story as you like!  See you on Monday…  🌻🌻🌻

(EDIT for Change of Plans: I’m going to just edit all the prompts into this post and do the actual works as new blog posts.)

🌼😎🌼 MAY FLOWERS… YELLOW 🌼😎🌼
New week, new color!  Here’s another one to inspire you.  Throw your hat in the ring by completing this little survey about your future story (or poem/essay/etc), post it, then get writing!
TITLE:  xxx
PREMISE:  (A brief synopsis of the plot, spoilery or otherwise)
RELATION TO YELLOW:  (Describe what makes your story yellow)
YELLOW KEYWORDS:  (Include yellow related words you associate with your story)
THE FLOWER:  (Chose a yellow flower you’d like to represent your story)  Post your discussions about yellow, as well as your completed stories when you finish them!  They don’t have to be edited, just get to the end.    There are no due dates, feel free to work on your story as you like!  See you on Monday…  🌼

🪴🌿🌵 MAY FLOWERS… GREEN 🌱☘️🌴
Today is nature’s favorite color!  Throw your hat in the ring by completing this little survey about your future story (or poem/essay/etc), post it, then get writing!
TITLE: xxx
PREMISE:  (A brief synopsis of the plot, spoilery or otherwise)
RELATION TO GREEN:  (Describe what makes your story green)
GREEN KEYWORDS:  (Include green related words you associate with your story)
THE FLOWER:  (Chose a green flower/plant you’d like to represent your story)  Post your discussions about green, as well as your completed stories when you finish them!  They don’t have to be edited, just get to the end.    There are no due dates, feel free to work on your story as you like!  See you on Friday…  🌼

🦋🪺🦋 FLOWERS… BLUE 🦋🪺🦋
A new color to bring you into the weekend…  Throw your hat in the ring by completing this little survey about your future story (or poem/essay/etc), post it, then get writing!
TITLE:  xxx
PREMISE:  (A brief synopsis of the plot, spoilery or otherwise)
RELATION TO BLUE:  (Describe what makes your story blue)
BLUE KEYWORDS:  (Include blue related words you associate with your story)
THE FLOWER:  (Chose an blue flower/plant you’d like to represent your story)  Post your discussions about blue, as well as your completed stories when you finish them!  They don’t have to be edited, just get to the end.    There are no due dates, feel free to work on your story as you like!  See you on Monday…  🦋

🌃🪻🌃 MAY FLOWERS… INDIGO 🌃🪻🌃
A new color for a new week…  Throw your hat in the ring by completing this little survey about your future story (or poem/essay/etc), post it, then get writing!
TITLE:  xxx
PREMISE:  (A brief synopsis of the plot, spoilery or otherwise)
RELATION TO INDIGO:  (Describe what makes your story indigo)
INDIGO KEYWORDS:  (Include indigo related words you associate with your story)
THE FLOWER:  (Chose an indigo flower/plant you’d like to represent your story)  Post your indigo discussions as well as your completed stories when you finish them!  They don’t have to be edited, just get to the end.    There are no due dates; feel free to work on your story as you like!  See you on Wednesday…  🪻

🍇🪻🍇MAY FLOWERS… VIOLET🍇🪻🍇
Today is our last color of the official rainbow, but there are still exotic colors more to come…  Throw your hat in the ring by completing this little survey about your future story (or poem/essay/etc), post it, then get writing!
TITLE:  xxx
PREMISE:  (A brief synopsis of the plot, spoilery or otherwise)
RELATION TO VIOLET:  (Describe what makes your story violet)
VIOLET KEYWORDS:  (Include violet related words you associate with your story)
THE FLOWER:  (Chose an violet flower/plant you’d like to represent your story)  Post your violet discussions as well as your completed stories when you finish them!  Please include the above survey, and paste/upload/link your story.  They don’t have to be edited, just get to the end.    There are no due dates; feel free to work on your story as you like!  See you on Friday…🪻

🦇🥀🦇 MAY FLOWERS… BLACK 🦇🥀🦇
We move on now to the colors outside the rainbow… Throw your hat in the ring by completing this little survey about your future story (or poem/essay/etc), post it, then get writing!
TITLE:  xxx
PREMISE:  (A brief synopsis of the plot, spoilery or otherwise)
RELATION TO BLACK:  (Describe what makes your story black)
BLACK KEYWORDS:  (Include black related words you associate with your story)
THE FLOWER:  (Chose a black flower/plant you’d like to represent your story)  Post your black discussions as well as your completed stories when you finish them!  Please include the above survey, and paste/upload/link your story.  They don’t have to be edited, just get to the end.    There are no due dates; feel free to work on your story as you like!  See you on Monday…  🦇

🌧️🌧️ MAY FLOWERS… GREY 🌧️🌧️
It may seem like a non-color to some, but it can still inspire…  Throw your hat in the ring by completing this little survey about your future story (or poem/essay/etc), post it, then get writing!
TITLE:  xxx
PREMISE:  (A brief synopsis of the plot, spoilery or otherwise)
RELATION TO GREY:  (Describe what makes your story grey)
GREY KEYWORDS:  (Include grey related words you associate with your story)
THE FLOWER:  (Chose a grey flower/plant you’d like to represent your story)  Post your grey discussions as well as your completed stories when you finish them!  Please include the above survey, and paste/upload/link your story.  They don’t have to be edited, just get to the end.    There are no due dates; feel free to work on your story as you like!  See you on Tuesday…  🌧️

🌼🦢🌼 MAY FLOWERS… WHITE 🌼🦢🌼
A blank canvas, a clean sheet of paper; what will you create?  Throw your hat in the ring by completing this little survey about your future story (or poem/essay/etc), post it, then get writing!
TITLE:  xxx PREMISE:  (A brief synopsis of the plot, spoilery or otherwise)
RELATION TO WHITE:  (Describe what makes your story white)
WHITE KEYWORDS:  (Include white related words you associate with your story)
THE FLOWER:  (Chose a white flower/plant you’d like to represent your story)  Post your white discussions as well as your completed stories when you finish them!  Please include the above survey, and paste/upload/link your story.  They don’t have to be edited, just get to the end.   There are no due dates; feel free to work on your story as you like!  See you on Friday…  🌼

🦋🪺🦋 MAY FLOWERS… CYAN/AQUA 🦋🪺🦋
A new color for the weekend…  Throw your hat in the ring by completing this little survey about your future story (or poem/essay/etc), post it, then get writing!
TITLE:  xxx
PREMISE:  (A brief synopsis of the plot, spoilery or otherwise)
RELATION TO CYAN:  (Describe what makes your story cyan)
CYAN KEYWORDS:  (Include cyan related words you associate with your story)
THE FLOWER:  (Chose a cyan flower/plant you’d like to represent your story)  Post your cyan discussions as well as your completed stories when you finish them!  Please include the above survey, and paste/upload/link your story.  They don’t have to be edited, just get to the end.   There are no due dates; feel free to work on your story as you like!  See you on Monday…  🦋

🌸🌺🪷 MAY FLOWERS… PINK 🌸🌺🪷
Perhaps the floweriest color of all…  Throw your hat in the ring by completing this little survey about your future story (or poem/essay/etc), post it, then get writing!
TITLE:  xxx
PREMISE:  (A brief synopsis of the plot, spoilery or otherwise)
RELATION TO PINK:  (Describe what makes your story pink)
PINK KEYWORDS:  (Include pink related words you associate with your story)
THE FLOWER:  (Chose a pink flower/plant you’d like to represent your story)  Post your pink discussions as well as your completed stories when you finish them!  Please include the above survey, and paste/upload/link your story.  They don’t have to be edited, just get to the end. There are no due dates; feel free to work on your story as you like!  See you on Wednesday… 🌸

🍂🐿️🍂 MAY FLOWERS… BROWN 🍂🐿️🍂
The earthiest of tones…  Throw your hat in the ring by completing this little survey about your future story (or poem/essay/etc), post it, then get writing!
TITLE:  xxx
PREMISE:  (A brief synopsis of the plot, spoilery or otherwise)
RELATION TO BROWN:  (Describe what makes your story brown)
BROWN KEYWORDS:  (Include brown related words you associate with your story)
THE FLOWER:  (Chose a brown flower/plant you’d like to represent your story)  Post your brown discussions as well as your completed stories when you finish them!  Please include the above survey, and paste/upload/link your story.  They don’t have to be edited, just get to the end.    There are no due dates; feel free to work on your story as you like!  See you on Friday for our final color…  🍂

🪙⚔️🪙 MAY FLOWERS… SILVER & GOLD 🪙⚔️🪙
Our final colors…  You may consider this as one or the other, or do both!  Throw your hat in the ring by completing this little survey about your future story (or poem/essay/etc), post it, then get writing!
TITLE:  xxx
PREMISE:  (A brief synopsis of the plot, spoilery or otherwise)
RELATION TO SILVER/GOLD:  (Describe what makes your story silver/gold)
SILVER/GOLD KEYWORDS:  (Include silver/gold related words you associate with your story)
THE FLOWER:  (Chose a silver/gold flower/plant you’d like to represent your story)  Post your silver/gold discussions as well as your completed stories when you finish them!  Please include the above survey, and paste/upload/link your story.  They don’t have to be edited, just get to the end.    There are no due dates; feel free to work on your story as you like!  I’ll keep this event up for a while longer so you can keep flowering at your own pace…  Thanks for being here with us for this new event!  🌼🌹🌷🪻🌺

🌻🌹🌻🌹🌻🌹🌻🌹🌻🌹🌻🌹🌻🌹🌻🌹🌻🌹🌻🌹🌻🌹🌻🌹🌻🌹🌻🌹🌻🌹

Anyway, this is how I’ll get blog content for a month.  Have at thee!

TITLE:  Acid Drops
PREMISE:  Girls do drugs.  One sees herself falling apart.  The other would put her back together.
RELATION TO RED:  Blood, of course.  The image and the idea of it.  Life and life lost.
RED KEYWORDS:  Scarlet blossoms, blotches and splotches, pools of red.
THE FLOWER:  The Rieger cultivar of begonia.  There are various colors, but these will be red.  According to the “Cyclopedia of Practical Floriculture” (1882) the proper floriographic meaning of begonias is deformity (this agrees with earlier sources), owing to the way the large leaves are inconsistently shaped.  If I got that right.  I got to scarlet begonias by way of Sublime and The Grateful Dead.

TITLE:  They’re Just Monkeys
PREMISE:  A man draws monkeys at the zoo.  Another man sees the art and is impressed.  The monkeys see it too.
RELATION TO ORANGE:  My monkey of choice is the golden lion tamarin, which is a very orange monkey.
ORANGE KEYWORDS:  Leonine mane, golden ruff, shimmering fur, glints of orange, tiny hands (amirite?).
THE FLOWER:  The common marigold, Calendula officinalis, maybe the most well-known orange thing besides the fruit.  There are various colors, but these will be orange.  Being a more common flower, it shows up in all the floriography references.  Some suggested meanings, from most common to least common: cruelty, grief, sorrow, despair, trouble, inquietude, contempt, chagrin, pain, jealousy, pretty love, sacred affection, caress.  I ain’t goin’ into all of that.

TITLE:  It Was All Yellow
PREMISE:  Remember when that song “Yellow” by Coldplay was on the radio?  Wild times, my guy.
RELATION TO YELLOW:  It is self-referential.
YELLOW KEYWORDS:  Malaria, jaundice, blondness, a pox, a plague on every house.
THE FLOWER:  The dandelion.  Apologies to PZ, but these weeds suck.  I’ve read a few botany people talk about how majestic well-loved trees are so much bullying charismatic megaflora, blotting out the precious sun needed by other plants.  Dandelions are the trees of the lawn, devouring all the space that might otherwise host a diversity of lil’ cuties.  There are so many strange little plants on my lawn, but where the dandelions grow, there is no room for the delicate in-betweeners.

TITLE:  Leaglize Maraguana
PREMISE:  Named after some pencil graffiti witnessed at my high school in 1992, this is about passion for the plant.  Also, it’s an exercise in my usual bullshit as a writer – coming up with silly names for lowlifes.
RELATION TO GREEN:  Leafs needs green to photosynthesize, so I’m given to understand.
GREEN KEYWORDS:  Nugs, buds, baggies, the sticky, the illy, indo, cannabis, idk.
THE FLOWER:  Green flowers are hard to find.  I’m gonna do a different plant, if the admin will legalize it.  Man, I’m such a poser.  It’s not like I even do drugs.  I’m just on kind of a kick I guess.

TITLE:  A Blue Forest
PREMISE:  There’s probably a term for the genre of poem about laying down and dying, letting the plants take you under.  I know I’ve seen a few over the years, tho I don’t recall specific examples.  Definitely feel like one of them was Japanese.  Anyway, it never seems to work that in real life.  Like, turbulent times make you wanna turbo nap, but the turbulence won’t let it happen.  Maybe something about that.
RELATION TO BLUE:  Blue sad.
BLUE KEYWORDS:  Bouncing bubbling obliteration, can you believe?
THE FLOWER:  Bluebells, Hyacinthoides non-scripta, because of that song by Babes in Toyland.  Please nobody tell me if those gals went terf or republican, thanks.

TITLE:  A Deep Darkness
PREMISE:  Ya know that Danzig song “Deep,” from Songs in the Key of X?  I love that shit, tho it is hokey.  Spooky cool mans made out of shadows, gonna have sexual majesty and work some hoodoo.  Gonna try to evoke that kind of thing maybe.
RELATION TO INDIGO:  A darkness deep but not quite black, a cold color that evades definition.
INDIGO KEYWORDS:  Vivid, deep, vibrant, dark, a hole in reality.
THE FLOWER:  False indigo, Baptisia australis, because that bitch has indigo in the name.  It’s a bean?  It’s a bean.  I know shit about fuck.

TITLE:  Make it Snappy
PREMISE:  The flower I chose seeds kind of explosively, looks pokey like ladied-up fingernails.  I’m picturing a noir type lady bossing people around with a snap of the fingers, making herself memorable, I dunno.
RELATION TO VIOLET:  Violet’s a girly name and sounds kinda like violent.
VIOLET KEYWORDS:  Plum-colored jacket with high, rounded shoulders, magenta lipstick, fuchsia nail polish.
THE FLOWER:  The common stork’s-bill, aka redstem filaree, aka Erodium cicutarium, because it’s an adorable little invasive all over my home town, and currently flowering near the end of my lawn.

TITLE:  Down the Drain
PREMISE:  The narrator of this song / poem type of thing is someone a kind of Mr. Jones cartoon of bipolar disorder, ruining his situation off a good mood, and spending the rest of the time in despair.
RELATION TO BLACK:  I had a dream last night that included a song, which was kind of a feeble knockoff of the Gershwins’ “Let’s Call the Whole Thing Off.”  It was being sung by a band leader in Cab Calloway mold, but more heavy-set and sedate.  He was wearing a black suit with bright white embroidered spider web designs on the lapels.  I just expanded the lyrics I remembered to a full length song.
BLACK KEYWORDS:  Black spirits, black humor, the darkness of oblivion.
THE FLOWER:  The “Black Barlow” cultivar of common columbine, Aquilegia vulgaris, because it’s a sprightly little thing in its way, but looks feeble and morbid too.

TITLE:  Cinereous Mourner
PREMISE:  Whatever colonizer gave this bird its English name did a bang-up job.  It’s such an evocative phrase.  Ash grey, sorrow at death – two great tastes that taste great together.  Maybe it’ll be a poem.
RELATION TO GREY:  Named after a grey burd innit.
GREY KEYWORDS:  Cinereous cinders, ashen ashes, grey greyness all in your face.
THE FLOWER:  No flower, the plant is American Beech, Fagus grandifolia, which has grey bark.

TITLE:  Witness the Whiteness
PREMISE:  I tried to say something smart about racism and failed.
RELATION TO WHITE:  I sure am!
WHITE KEYWORDS:  White people.  Can I say wypipo?
THE FLOWER:  The common white clover, Trifolium repens.  Gotta keep it humble, with this European weed.

TITLE:  Where a River Flows
PREMISE:  Thinking about people from the Philippines, which is always a treacherous ground to step on, being a white person thinking out loud about people you aren’t.  I hope I don’t mess up.  Mainly going for this topic because the only cyan / aqua type flower I could easily find is from the Philippines, and is so specific to there that it just seemed weird to not include the place.  Also because I think our country has a very close and weird relationship with theirs, and it doesn’t get much mention.
RELATION TO CYAN:  This is the color of tropical waters, which is the clunkin’ metaphor I use for a family history.
CYAN KEYWORDS:  Jade vines, kingfishers, water molecules, water cycles.
THE FLOWER:  Jade vine, Strongylodon macrobotrys.  I cannot fucken believe there’s a real plant that color.

TITLE:  Rose Gold
PREMISE:  Remember MonsterHearts 2024 Day 12?  Isadora and Steppy are cyberpunks.  Steppy is known as Stuck Steppy because she keeps catching knives in streetfights.  Eventually Isadora catches the biggest knife and dies, but corporate paramedics notice her cells match a certain profile and route her corpse straight to Brycine Prosthetics.  They sustain the life in her tissues long enough to reanimate that bod – with experimental photosynthetic cybernetics.  I guess every cyberpunk has its rose thorns, just like every cowboy sings a sad sad song.
RELATION TO PINK:  Pink-ass flowers, son.  Cyberpunk likes pink too.  Neon babes with colorful hair.  Lesbianisms.
PINK KEYWORDS:  Cyberpink.  Does that word make you uncomfortable, Jeffrey?  Vagina.
THE FLOWER:  American wild rose, Rosa woodsii, because it grows at that bus stop not far from the Ballard Bridge where I saw that awesome fan rendition of Misaki from Junji Ito’s Anything But a Ghost, in sharpie on a USPS shipping sticker, slapped on a power utility box.

TITLE:  Horseness
PREMISE:  I’m picturing something like my lycanthropy idea from Touch Me, I’m Sick and Straightup Heckin’, but with horse parts.
RELATION TO BROWN:  Horses are brown.  Some horses.  And horse-mans.
BROWN KEYWORDS:  Bay, chestnut, pinto, palomino…
THE FLOWER:  The acorn of the pedunculate oak Quercus robur.  On a stem it wouldn’t look too out of place in a bouquet of flowers and leaves.

TITLE:  Baba Safia
PREMISE:  A centuries-dead Ruthenian sorceress resurrects herself through tumbleweed seeds.  By a twist of fate, they were accidentally sown in the USA, intermixed with imported flax seeds.  She’d just go her own way on the wind, but some christians piss her off before she gets a chance.  Big mistake.
RELATION TO GOLD:  Let’s say she likes gold.  It shiny.  Gold is a symbol of colonialism, one motivation behind the first New World genocide.  Baba Safia shows up in the wild west, an alien among aliens, and brings their destructive ways back upon them.
GOLD KEYWORDS:  Glint and gleam, sparkle and sun.
THE FLOWER:  Tumbleweed, the most common species known as such in the USA, Salsola tragus aka Kali tragus.  One of its names is “windwitch,” which sounds real fun.  Also known as prickly Russian thistle.  When tumbling, one could call it a sort-of gold color.  In the golden hour.  If you squint.  I swear, man.

TITLE:  Silverfish
PREMISE:  Maybe it’ll be a poem about shiny slimy guys, wrigglin’ and wigglin’.
RELATION TO SILVER:  It’s all nice and good that silver is symbolic of purity and light, but the silverest things in the natural world are fish and bugs and slimy freaks.
SILVER KEYWORDS:  Shimmering, flickering, glinting, sparkling, glistening, slime.
THE FLOWER:  Leucadendron argenteum, the South African silver tree.  Not as silver as advertised, but it can get ball-parkish.

I’ll edit my stories (or poems or whatever they end up being) into this post when they’re done.  Not the best approach to getting blog traffic, but it keeps things tidy. Change of plans: Will edit the prompts into this post, then do the actual works as new blog posts.

–