🆆 Micro Monday: Do It For You

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This is Writer-ish with Darien Gee, where I help you write your most powerful stories in 300 words or less. If you’re new to micro prose and writing with me, check out this post here.

If you do what interests you, at least one person is pleased.

Katharine Hepburn

Write about a fire.

Set the timer for 10 minutes and start writing. When the timer goes off, give the piece a title, count up the words, add it to your TOC, and share it the comments below.

This section features micro prose (300 words or less) by me and other writers, including members of our community. Submit your work for consideration here.

To My Daughter Reading Tolkien by Theresa Falk

Here is the thing I wish I could tell you: your mother is broken.

You probably already know.

At nine you are all longness and longing: Legs and arms wrapped around themselves in a quiet, unknowing quest to keep your girlhood alive. Fingers tipped with chipped nail polish grasp book after book, turning pages to find answers to who you are and why you want to be. Do you slay the dragon or ride it? Do you dare to take its gold?

I stand watching you from the kitchen, wishing I could hold those hands with my own and tell you, definitively, to avoid the dragon altogether. That it would be infinitely safer to never enter the cave. That I have done so time after time and have been burned to a crisp, and that despite the strength I portray, despite the firmness in my voice as I tell you to put the book down and come to dinner, that sometimes all I feel I have to give you are shards of my hardened shell.

But I know I am wrong. Because you look up at me, put the book down, and in your eyes I see fire: flames that are not unlike my own. Take it back, I hear you say.

Take back the fire. It has not died, you say. It is only sleeping.

Let me awaken you again.

231 words. An earlier version of this work appeared in the micro essay collection, Nonwhite and Woman: 131 Micro Essays On Being in the World, which received a Silver IPPY award for multicultural nonfiction. Theresa Falk is a writer, speaker, and educator based in Honolulu, Hawaii.

• There is no live writing session this week, but you can access past sessions in the library and add a few more pieces to your TOC!

• South 85 is open to flash non-fiction under 750 words that fit the theme “city | country”

Submission guidelines

• Rawhead is open to flash prose under 1,000 words

Submission guidelines

Paid subscribers can follow these suggestions for revising their micro or preparing their work for submission. 🌿

Hello writers!

For those of you who have been wanting a copy of my award-winning chapbook, Other Small Histories, it looks like a small batch is temporarily available (it’s been sold out for the last couple of years). The cost is $8 if you’re in a position to support them or $5 with code BACKLIST.

Order here: https://poetrysociety.givecloud.co/product/Gee/other-small-histories-by-darien-hsu-gee

Starting in August, our “What’s Happening This Month” post will include both free and paid features. If you’re a paid subscriber, you’ll automatically be able to view the paid-only links, downloads, and benefits within any free post. 💃🏻 I’m hoping this makes it easier to find what you need in one spot instead of two. The replay of the craft portion of our monthly co-writing Zooms will continue to live in the Paid Subscriber Hub.

I love a good poll, and it was so helpful to see what people want for our next micro prose writing workshop on Substack (included with any paid membership), and it’s official: I’ll be launching “A Field Guide to Your Life” next month!

One of the choices that didn’t make the top 3 was “My Life in Pets,” but I wasn’t ready to give it up. It has a new name, “’Fur, Feathers, Fins and Scales,” and I’ll be teaching it with Abigail Thomas as a one-day workshop in September. Look for more details on both workshops next week.

Thank you for being here, and for the kindness, curiosity, and creativity you bring to our community. I’m grateful to have connected with you in our little corner of Substack, and I look forward to what comes next.

warmly,
Darien

P.S. To see what’s happening on Writer-ish this month, including all upcoming Substack Lives and what you might have missed (catch the replays!), here’s the full calendar.