grace grits and gardening

ramblings from an arkansas farm girl

Familiar

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For no good reason, I held my breath as I passed the sign welcoming me to Wind Gap, the way kids do when they drive by cemeteries. The row of houses along Main Street still stood, yet well-tended hydrangea had been replaced with cheap toys and mismatched clay pots filled only with dirt. A man in coveralls ambled past the General Store and waved as his gaze followed my ordinary rental car. I automatically pulled to the grass and lingered. The stand of cottonwoods near the edge of the school yard now towered above the town. Windows once offering escape for my wandering mind were trapped behind sheets of plywood. The air smelled familiar.

This exercise was written for the 7x7x7x7 Writing Prompt…


  1. Grab the 7th book from your bookshelf.
  2. Open it up to page 7.
  3. Pinpoint the 7th sentence on the page.
  4. Begin a poem/a piece of prose that begins with that sentence
  5. Limit it in length to 7 lines/7 sentences.
Note:  The first sentence in italics was taken from Sharp Objects by Gillian Flynn. 

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Comments

  2. Ooooh. I’mma so do this one. As soon as I figure out WHICH book shelf to pick the 7th book from. The paperbacks in my library? The hardbacks in my library? The ‘to read’ shelf in my bedroom? The stack of books on the piano? 🙂

  7. Thanks for taking us readers with you on your visit to Wind Gap…It’s funny, but the school there brought to mind the junior high building I once attended. Awesome piece of writing, Talya.

Food. Farm. Garden. Life.

THANKS FOR READING!