Japanese Haiku Writing

So the title doesn't really capture the essence of what I'm going to show you guys...I really couldn't think of better words to describe it, so anyway.

So midterms were last week (I aced and Beed all of them, FYI), and my English teacher said for extra credit, since we were reading some Japanese literature last class, that we could structure a paragraph off of a haiku that we found and liked. Meaning that we would start the paragraph or story off of the three lines, then continue making a story out of it. Haikus are very short and sweet, simple pieces of writing, but that is the beauty of them, I think. That something so beautiful about nature or anything you like can be captured in as little as three lines. It's not easy to capture the essence of something in that little space, but when one does, it's beautiful.

I recently wrote my extra-credit paragraph, and I must say, I am very pleased with how it turned out. I think I'm going to make more because I enjoyed it so much. Yes, I think I will.

Here's what I have so far:


A field of cotton--
as if the moon
had flowered
~Matsuo Basho

A field of cotton--as if the moon had flowered, was spread before me, vast and emitting angelic white light from the rays of the sun, as if it were the surface of the moon.
I put my bare toes underneath the down surface, and what I felt was not cotton; it was air. Soft, fluid air. This air was like the sea moving with the summer breeze, swaying like a ball dance in a grand castle--the Castle of the Sky.
The Castle of the Sky was mysterious to many, but not myself. Much of my time was spent in the Castle, caring for it, nurturing its inhabitants, making it my own, since no one else did. Gallivanting through the Castle was my favorite pastime. No one ever lost their patience with me, for no one ruled this particular castle. It is a free land.
Yes, a free land with full green-leaved trees, bursting with luscious fruits and plentiful with beautiful sanguine blossoms. The fields were of many, endless and open with opportunity for fresh, new growth.
As I step into this balldance, these moon flowers, I make a dance of my very own, underneath the Castle of the Sky.


So, what do you think? What I was thinking is that I would make four season paragraphs out of this guy's haikus. I really like them and think they are wonderful, so I would find one for each season and write a paragraph on it. I've started autumn, but it is yet to be finished. The paragraph above would be the summer paragraph.

Happy writing, and I hope your new year is going well so far! I don't know about you, but I'm enjoying ever spare minute of free time I get! :)

My 500 words: A Writing Challenge

So...NaNoWriMo went awesome! Admittedly not at first, because I was actually at a loss for a good idea and any sensible words, but things turns out alright. I actually switched my story three days in, because I didn't see the storyline I had chosen going anywhere without more thought and work than just thirty days. I was really behind progress for the first two weeks because I spontaneously thought of this really random idea and it took me a while to think of where it out to go, plot and detail-wise. I was almost always at the least three thousand words behind for those two weeks, but on that 15th day, all I did was write, for eight straight hours. I still wasn't completely caught up, but I was off to a good start. For the next week I struggled to stay on task with the word count, but when Thanksgiving break came, I actually was really ahead of the word count. The thing is, I still haven't ended the book yet because it's a really hard story to end (because it's a sad book and a lot happened), but I did reach almost 51,000 words at the end of November. I guess I should tell you what the book it about, huh? So, I'm going to give you the non-formal, whole-book synopsis because I don't really have a good one yet that makes sense. Because, like I said, a lot happens and I'm not sure I can sum up the basics but still leave a lot to the reader. There are five best friends: Gemma, Alyssa, Mandy, Timothy, and Will (the story is told in the first-person POV of Gemma). They go on a trip to Paris in the winter break of their senior year, a trip that they've been planning since they were freshmen. The book is laid out so there is one chapter in the present, then one chapter in the past, alternating turns. The whole Paris trip is not in the book, more like little scenes from the trip over the course of the book, as past chapters. The past chapters aren't just from Paris, they're from freshmen, sophomore, junior, and senior years, and over the summer. The book starts out with a prologue where Gemma is describing falling into the ocean and watching a plane explode above her. She is in extreme pain and lands in the below-freezing water of the Atlantic ocean. As she does so in a state of near-unconsciousness, she contemplates many aspects of fate and life, especially the fear of her imminent death. The actual first chapter begins with Gemma waking up in a rescue helicopter. She is listening to her one surviving friend (and kind-of boyfriend) tell her that their friends are dead, that the helicopter could find them. She can't open her eyes and is still in a daze, but she thinks she is dreaming. But she wants to tell Will that she loves him. Eventually when they go back to their hometown (Adena, Ohio) from Belfast, Maine, they look in their friends' rooms to find keepsakes and to silently say goodbye. Mandy was a writer, and in her room they find a book that she had not yet told them of, and a set of suspicious and mysterious letters to an unknown identity. They pass it of as props for one of Timothy's plays (he is a playwright), and take the book. Gemma reads the book over the course of the story and is infinitely confused by it. Her and Will comfort each other and are there for each other, but at the funeral Will tells her that he and Alyssa dated secretly for half a year in their sophomore year. This greatly upsets Gemma and they get in a fight. They make up eventually, but from then on things aren't quite the same. Over the course of the book they also get updates on the plane crash from the news and they find out that the plane didn't crash because of the reason they thought; instead, someone had corrupted the gas tank. They don't know what to make of this. Gemma hears Will talking to someone about the plane crash (she doesn't hear much, but enough to be suspicious), but when she confronts him about it, he lies to her and says he was talking to someone from school. She persists that he is lying, but he insists that he is not. She lets it go but soon she hears him talking to the same person, but this time he says the name of the news broadcaster, who desperately needs to keep her job. Will was giving her anonymous tips so she could have something to broadcast. They get into a heated fight and Will tries to apologize for lying, which is Gemma's greatest pet-peeve. She grew up with parents who never paid any attention to her, who always lied about what they were going to do; so it's more than a pet-peeve. Gemma doesn't listen and is still angry at Will for his lying, because it wasn't the first time he had lied to her. He apologizes for being a coward and tries to run home, but it is snowing (he's wearing a white T-shirt, mind you) really hard outside, and he gets hit by a car that was driving to fast and didn't see him crossing the street. Will dies hours later of internal injuries and head trauma, leaving Gemma heartbroken and regretful. As it turns out, her friend Mandy was recruited by the CIA in their freshman year, and there was a terrorist on board their flight back to Ohio. Mandy corrupted the plane's gas tank and sacrificed many lives so the government would be able to keep this dangerous French terrorist from entering the United States. To get her mind off of all that has happened, she gets a job at her local diner that her and her friends used to go to all the time in the summer. She meets an older college guy, Aiden, who goes to Penn State, like she was planning to. Over the summer, she discovers that she wants to sing on Broadway and live in New York (she's a singer-you find that out earlier in the book). The book is going to end with an epilogue, but I'm still not sure what the last words will be. Last words are always the hardest. Obviously, I left some major details out, but that's the gist. If you have any general ideas about how to end it (which I know is hard to ask for with the meager details I gave you) than just post it in the comments below! I will be eternally grateful. Please keep in your knowledge that this story is copyrighted. I can't even imagine having my ideas stolen (it's kind of my second writing worst nightmare), so I just want to ensure that it doesn't happen. Thanks! So this 500 words thing is something I signed up for this January. You basically write 500 words every day of January. It's supposed to help you become an amazing writer and stuff. And a more confident writer, which is going to help me, because my writing confidence level is in the depths right now. I'm considering making a fan page for my writing once I self-publish my first book: The Ignorance of Me, Daphne Willowston. I'm still working on ending and editing it, but it's coming soon! Yay! Happy New Year! :)