Writing Journal Entry: Bleeding Writer

As I am a writer

The ink is my blood

I bleed words

With pain and sadness

With joy and happiness

With hope to build a home

And love to heal the world

And with romance,

Well--

Let's leave that for space

For that alone can contain

All our romantic fantasy.

~Bleeding Writer by Marietta DeGrant // Writing Journal Entry

My Writer’s Notebooks

 I have a confession to make. Actually, it is not a confession. I was born like that. I am obsessed with notebooks. (Stationery in general)

I have kept so many notebooks since I started to write. The sight of notebooks with so many blank pages makes my skin grow goosebumps. Every page has an adventure to help us cherish every word written on it.

I am still an old fashioned writer. I still write in notebooks. I am trying to love the digital way of writing. When I was interviewing Krizick, he told me he loved the digital way of writing. I am trying to learn that way of writing digital, but don’t think I will be feeling the vibes while doing that. The probability that I will be adapting that strategy would be low.

I introduce to you, my 2017 writer’s notebook.

Well, it is not exactly a new notebook. I had this notebook in High School, I saw my friend, Vanessa (Hi! Vanessa, if you are reading this) holding it (It was originally for her) and I begged her to give it to me. She gave it to me and I wrote my favourite quotes in them. But I don’t do that anymore and I decided to use it as my writer’s journal/notebook. There are so many blank pages in it right now, and I want to exhaust them with my words. Using this would be better than buying a new one. (To be honest, I might just go on to buy new ones. Remember what I said in the beginning of this post?).

I decided to cover it with brown paper and put some of the words that describe my personality; Like Dreamer, Born in the 90’s. If you look closely, you’ll see kelewele. (Oops. My bad). Hashtag (#) is the new way of talking on social media in our generation.

My writer’s notebooks are where I hide my writings. Maybe, I’ll bring them out.

Let’s Chat: Do you have any obsessions over stationery?

Do you keep notebooks where you write your heart out, whether you are a writer, or not?

The Writer’s Voice….and a Backpack

It’s been few days into the New Year and the Harmattan suddenly disappeared. (Well, good riddance). Instead, the weather has become somewhat hot, and high. I bet the sun has made New Year resolutions too.

I have been writing some bad poetry recently. I am more into writing short poetry and shorter ones.

Like these ones…..proudly photoshopped on African print cloth.

I have been searching for my kind of writer’s voice. I have been trying new ways of writing. Last year was a good writing year to the extent of having my debut play staged. I’m so blessed.

I am hoping to try spoken word. My voice is not the smooth, soft type and my voice over gadgets sounds like something else. Maybe, I need to sip more water before talking over gadgets.

My creative writing journal is almost full, and I am planning to use an old notebook to continue writing. Now, I carry my journal everywhere, so I use my backpack more often.

I need to go out more often and explore the living life and write about them. I am hoping to share my works with you online and be more creative and write more creative content and share more creative content. I want my blogs to have more creative content, not just news and how to do certain things.  I want to write things that we all relate to.

This semester would be a busy one. The year 2017 would be a very busy one, from this month till December.

Here’s to the year of writing more and staying out and becoming more creative in every aspect…even in fashion.

Let’s chat: What have you planned with your writing life, or what do you want to read from me?

I’m trying to love Mondays

Dear Monday,

I have a love-hate relationship with you. Did you know that? I love you because, you’re like a fresh page for me to make things right. I hate you because you can be very exhausting, and full of pressure. It gets annoying sometimes. I love you because my mind is refreshed from weekend fun and relaxation. I hate you because your alarm clock sounds different and really scares me.

The streets are all full of moving beings and to talk of traffic—ahh, I cannot contain it. I use the moment in the public transport to catch up on social media. Gosh, that makes me miss the weekend more. Friends post pictures on social media about their weekend. It makes me want to cry mpo. Friday, Saturday, Sunday, I miss you guys.

Sundays are the shorter days. I bet you still some hours from Sunday, don’t you Monday? You are having some Sunday Funday, there noor, darkness falls. Aden, bra?

Do you know what makes me miss the weekend more? When I go to school or work and I am asked how my weekend went. Even if I did not have fun, it makes me miss the Friday night feels on my bed. The chillaxing and hugging of the pillows, that was so amazing.

But don’t worry Mondays. You have some good in you. It’s the day of fresh start.

Watch the video here 

Six Word Stories Found in my Creative Journal

Hello everyone!

Today, I stared at my creative journal and became angry with it. In the middle of the year, I thought the journal would be full before the start of October. Those days, I wrote and wrote and wrote and wrote. New ideas were coming and I wrote.

Writer’s block visited me and I was like, why now? It was my New Year goal not to see you at all, and you came without being invited.

I opened a page and saw an entry. The title was six word stories. I remember when I was in my teenage years (The most horrible years of my life), I wondered why there should be a story in six words. I mean, how possible? The writer must describe the dress the character is wearing, the environment, the situation at hand etc etc. So, I thought six word stories are not my thing. I see them to be titles.

But to my surprise, I wrote some this year. Somewhere in July, August, September?

These are six six-word stories I found in my writing journal.

1. I can’t have conversations with pictures

2. He became the word I love: Glorious.

3. I can never forget your stories.

4. The Beach and I: Friends Forever.

5. I drowned in his passionate kiss.

6. We all love somebody in overdose.

They were fun to write and very mysterious. I wanted to explain each of them, but I prefer to leave it look mysterious. I have become MYSTERY myself and I need to write one, too.

Let’s chat: Have you ever written any six word stories? Can I have a look? Tag me @MarieNoelGrant, both Twitter and Instagram.

Prose Poetry: What Do You Do When It’s Raining?

What do you do when it is raining?

Do you pray for those who have leaking roofs?

Or you just jump onto your comfy beds and shout “Time for some cuddling!”

I have lived in a leaking room before

And I did not like it

I could never sleep when it rains at night

I had school the next day, so I had to sleep

But I couldn’t, even if I wanted to

I had to sit and desperately pray for the rain to stop

Am I selfish to ask for that?

But it doesn’t stop, it continues to pour down

After it is done, it would be two hours more for the sun to rise

You can’t even sleep again because the room is colder than outside

You can’t even sleep again because you have to mop up the little pond in your room

You can’t even mop up, because there is power cut

What could be worst?

You can’t sleep because your mattress is soaking wet

And it’s morning. Time to go to school

What do you do when it is raining?

Do you just cover yourself in blankets and complain of the cold?

Or you pray for those who don’t have roofs at all?

To forgive is Divine

I do not know what’s happening, but for a month now, I have been reading a lot on forgiveness. At church, we learn of forgiveness, I read about forgiveness and all these things are not intentional. I just meet them, and you know what, I was assigned to give a talk on Forgiveness at church too.

In the recent book I read, there was a chapter on forgiveness alone. Dr. Clarissa stated four levels of forgiveness she has used in her work with traumatized people over the years. Each level has different layers.

The four stages of forgiveness are:

To forego-to leave it alone

To forebear- to abstain from punishing

To forget- to aver from memory, to refuse to dwell

To forgive- to abandon the debt

In my research to write the talk for church, I learnt that if you are having trouble forgiving another person or even yourself, ask God to help you. Forgiveness is a glorious, healing principle. We do not need to be a victim twice. We can forgive.

It’s just as simple as that.

I am so glad to be learning about forgiveness at this time of my life. First, I wondered why I was coming across this topic, but it’s all good. Maybe, I will seriously need it in the future.

I also want to write that, if someone has offended you without the offender knowing, and it hurts you so much, confront the person, point it out, and let the person know about it.  It’s better that way, rather that harbouring it in your heart yet smiling at the person in public. It’s poison. Let it out and let the person know. If he/she apologizes, thank goodness. If he/she does not, clear the person out of your way. In the end, forgive him/her. You have done your part. Now, you can smile.

Here is a little piece I wrote about forgiveness in my writer’s journal

FORGIVENESS

Sometime, I am grateful you exist

Other times, I wish there was nothing like you

It’s very difficult to forgive some people

The hurt cocooned my heart, I could barely breathe

But, in the end, you are very essential

Very necessary, very useful, very beneficial

Because you teach me inner peace

And you teach me to get rid of negative sentiments

I need someone to forgive me too

I need someone to forget my silly mistakes

And I need to forgive that someone

Every time, I am grateful you exist

Other times, I wish you were always around

Go out there, and forgive someone.

Thank you for reading.