10-Minute Spill

Our assignment this week - well, the first one, I don't know if there will be more - was a little...strange. I'm not sure that I cared for it, at all. So here is what our assignment was -

THE TEN-MINUTE SPILL (original lesson by Rita Dove, former US Poet Laureate)

In this exercise, you will be asked to take an adage or proverb ("a penny saved is a penny earned," "a stitch in time saves nine," etc.) that you have changed in some way ("a penny saved is a rat's fortune," "a stitch in time saves Biggie from the bullet," etc.), and combine it with five of the following words in a ten-line poem: blackberry; cloud; mother; nick; whir; needle; cliff; spell; run; thought; will.

The hitch: You have ten-minutes. Go.

Of note: trust the music of the language; trust improvisation; don't worry if it makes sense at first; look at how many of the words can be either nouns or verbs; have fun!

Please email your results to me by close of day Tuesday.

Yeah, it was a little odd. Oh well. Here was my response, using the proverb, 'Familiarity breeds Contempt'

"Family breeds contempt." Nine years old and in a school for the first time. Children are unforgiving, and I hear the titters before I finish the phrase.

The hated 'tsk' from our teacher cuts through the air, casting an eerie spell over the room. A thousand eyes bore into me like needles.

Her voice is dry, like the sour blackberries from the bush in our yard.

"Mae." she ignores the laughter from my classmates, and I will myself to look at her. "The word is familiarity, not family."

I nod and I feel my eyes cloud with tears as she continues, speaking slowly as though I am a child, "Do you understand me, Mae? FA-MIL-IAR-I-TY?"

I nod again and she sighs heavily, "Do we have to call your mother again, Mae?"

I shake my head and close my eyes. "Familiarity." I hear the laughter again, and the whispers, the harsh words of my classmates.

She nods once, satisfied with my answer, "You may sit, Mae. Nick, continue..."

I sit and sigh, looking out the window. I can hear their whispers all around me as they stare, wondering at my intelligence.

They all think I am stupid. I can't tell them I know the words in the book, and that my mistake was intentional. I can't tell them it was my only way I knew to cry for help.

(Note - I realized that I'm an idiot and screwed up some tenses in there. Fixed.)