travel | Sharon Bonin-Pratt's Ink Flare

Sparked by Words

Posts tagged ‘travel’

Tramp with Me the Prairie

Tramp with me the prairie, shaft and grain

We’ll mow down the swat-knee grass

Share stalks of brittle wheat between us

Lips kiss, remind our hearts to beat again

Ford with me the river, pool and cascade

We’ll slosh through opaline ripples

Spray unfiltered water along our thighs

Hips touch, we slide and shiver, gasp for air

Climb with me the mountain, cliff and gorge

We’ll bushwhack a cloddy trail

Break live oak limbs that scratch our arms

Bloody wounds, mine into yours into mine

Hike with me the desert, sand and ravine

We’ll roam across arid gullies

Weave spiney ribbons around our heads

Cheeks sore reddened with sun, by wind

Surf with me the ocean, froth and wave

We’ll float on currents far from shore

Bind seaweed between our damp wrists

Ride a waxing swell ashore on our backs

Quest with me new frontier, stars and moon

We’ll explore the trajectory of flight

Orbit bare into milieu of solar dust

Universe small for the breadth of our being

Prairie image courtesy goodfreephotos.com, public domain images

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inspiration, Poetry

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Road Trip, a Writer’s Guide to Communication

We travel for business, new experiences, pleasure, education, thrills, or health. We search for our ancestors, scout a possible new homeland, try out a language we’ve studied, embrace cultural diversity, gain historical perspective, collect artifacts and souvenirs, photograph everything in sight. Myriad reasons fuel our expectations and desires for travel. They color our impressions when we return home. Whether road trip through the United States or journey across borders, the lure of travel causes us to pack our bags and board the dog. We lust for adventure as we voyage. We write (and read, but this post addresses writing) for the same reasons. We want to know what’s over there in the mystery, or literary, or science fiction genre, so we begin with a dead body, a poetic remark, or an alien invader. We jot down vicarious experiences of new or ancient cultures, even ones that are purely imaginary. We explore distant constellations, the depths of a cavern, or the Paleolithic era, all the while describing snapshots of the images in our brains. We have an adventure in our writing. (more…)

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inspiration, writer's life

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Sharon Lynne Bonin-Pratt began her writing career the way so many others have done: by first doing everything else. Winning entries in grade school art, story, and essay contests convinced her to become a writer, but the real world intruded in adulthood and demanded she pay bills, raise kids, be a contributing member of the community. Along that rutted path she worked in the commercial art field designing patterns for surfer shorts, bikinis, and Hawaiian style shirts, taught after-school art through a city recreation program, and structured an art curriculum for three private schools. Ten years ago the writing muse, struggling to breathe in letters to friends and art articles, found its way to the surface. In a two-week period Shari wrote 60 pages of her first historical novel, and didn’t stop for three years. By then a second book demanded paper – OK, computer space – and now the third is in final revision stage. Of course, final revision is two words with a long shadow and a little footprint. Some folk claim they will write when the floors get vacuumed, the family accounting completed, the new garden planted. Shari is proof that all those things can be successfully ignored but not the urge to write. Her fiction explores human relationships, revenge, rage, forgiveness, redemption, and all the labyrinthine quandaries that mess up otherwise perfect lives. She resides in Southern California with her husband who’s learned to vacuum but not to cook. And the garden needs help.