Writing Prompt: Yuletide
Visual inspiration + mental exercise to start your writing week
So many of us have profound memories of this in-between week. Off from school. Home or away. Warm or cold. Beloved or bereft. For all the joy of the season, it’s also a time of melancholy, especially for the lonely.
Metaphortography Prompts are free visual and verbal writing prompts for inspiration and reflection. This is the Monday section of Aimee Liu’s MFA Lore. Our Wednesday section is Writer In The World, a curated collection of essays on the writing life by acclaimed MFA faculty and alumni. Writers in Conversation and other MFA Core essays on the craft and business of creative writing will drop each Saturday. Receive some or all of these newsletters by subscribing now:
It’s still the season. According to Saint Bede, back in the Middle Ages, yuletide encompassed both December and January, so feel free to keep the wreath on your door, if you’re so inclined. And savor what you can of the holiday spirit between these traditional pillars of Christmas and New Year’s. So many of us have profound memories of this in-between week. Off from school. Home or away. Warm or cold. Beloved or bereft. For all the joy of the season, it’s also a time of melancholy, especially for the lonely.
What lies between the hoopla of gift-giving and the glare of another oncoming year can be naughty or nice, hopeful or depressing, peaceful or pressured. Or an unsettling mix of all the above.
Yuletide: from the Old English word "geōl," meaning a midwinter festival combined with "tide," which refers to a time or season. The term has been used since the late 15th century
: the period of several days around and including Christmas Day
Here is your writing prompt:
As you contemplate the image above, let your mind wander to a scene from your actual or fictional past that takes place during the winter break between Christmas and New Year’s:
What’s the weather outside? What does it look and sound like? What does it smell like? How does the air feel on your skin?
What are you doing, or preparing to do? How do you feel about this activity—excited, happy, anxious, irritated?
Who’s present? How are these people treating each other— and you? How do you feel about them?
What lies behind you in this moment— a first semester, family at home, work, health issues, a move, the beginning of a new relationship, or perhaps a breakup? How do you feel about leaving this behind?
What are your expectations in this moment for the new year—school, career, relationships, gains, losses, hopes, dreams? How do you feel about these prospects?
Now cast your mind forward like a fortune teller to project the actual future to come. How is this future influenced by the events that are behind you in this scene? How does the real future align with or contradict your expectations in this moment?
What emotions are kindled as you reflect on the events within these three frames —past, present, and destiny?
Now write this scene in a way that reflects not only the physical setting and interactions but also synthesizes the details of loss, anticipation, and fate that the questions above have unpacked for you.
What’s the overall tone that emerges? Joy? Melancholy? Excitement? Foreboding? Regret? Delight? Pride? Sorrow? Love? Whatever it may be, revise the scene so that every detail resonates with that tone.
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Loreates’ Corner
I’m delighted to introduce you to a few of the wonderful stacks by writers in our community. Please read, subscribe, and share! And if you’re an MFA Lore subscriber with a great writing stack that I haven’t mentioned, please drop the link in a comment, so I can add you to our Corner.
Edward Humes writes The Art of Being There :
Barbara at Projectkin writes @projectkin:
Dylan Landis writes Dylan Landis :
