Writing Exercises Based on a Specific Prompt \u00a9Sherry Quan Lee, June 2025-June 2026 <\/p>\n
Prompt: I Am<\/strong> #1<\/p>\n I am Septuagenarian Quan Lee; once that man\u2019s wife, then another, I come from chow mein and Egg rolls, mahjong and canasta. I come from I am the first in my family to earn a Bachelor of Art degree and the only one to I am from South Minneapolis, Our Redeemer Lutheran church, Sibley Park dances, I am from Minnesota Nice but have temporarily resided in Massachusetts, I met a guy, online, when I turned 70. Love was in the air. He grew up in Lake City. I earned a MFA, a master\u2019s in fine arts degree focusing on Creative Writing. And I did.<\/p>\n Prompt: write about food<\/strong> #2<\/p>\n I come from loaves and fishes. One pound of not so lean ground beef fed a neighborhood of girls I am my mother\u2019s youngest daughter, the daughter too young to remember the father; except, by his absence.<\/p>\n Living on Aid to Dependent Children (AFDC), that\u2019s what they called the \u201chandout\u201d in the 50\u2019s. Back then it was more generous than it is now. We were allowed to keep our house. A stucco house with a hill in front, a choke cherry tree and a maple tree in the back. In the winter we had an ice pond in the back yard because Mother kept us at home, kept us sheltered. Kept us a secret. (Father also provided a small amount of child support. He drove up the alley once a week, honked his horn, and one of us kids ran out to get the $7 check.)<\/p>\n The neighbors were kind. Mothers had coffee get togethers, almost daily. Hills Brothers Coffee. Percolator on a gas stove. My coffee was in a tiny cup that something came in. It was more milk than coffee. But it was nice to sit with the women as they smoked and drank and gossiped. But what did they talk about?<\/p>\n Vi made the best chocolate drop cookies, with chocolate frosting, and a walnut on top. These were special. But thanks to Vi\u2019s husband who worked at Wonder Bread Bakery, we were often gifted with Hostess Cupcakes, Snowballs, and Twinkies. We reciprocated with Nankin chow Mein, egg foo young, and white rice; but that\u2019s a story for another time.<\/p>\n After dad left, we made trips to stand in line and get government food handouts (this was before the cheese). Mother didn\u2019t make us drink the powder milk, she used it for baking: angel food cakes, Boston cream pies, I don\u2019t bake. When my teenage sons decided they had enough sugar, enough Captain Crunch, they said no to anything sugary. So, I had no reason to bake like my mother did. Mom was heavy from her own love of sweet things.<\/p>\n How was a pound of hamburger enough for a neighborhood of kids, when today doesn\u2019t it take a Big Mac and a large fry and a Coke to fill us up? Even if it even does, is it food we are craving or something else that we can\u2019t name. Prompt: write about a photo or item you have brought with you<\/strong> #3<\/p>\n Ethan<\/p>\n What are your eyes telling us? Every photo from the time you were born says to me:<\/p>\n Grandma, look at me, see me, know me. But can you know me? Probably not. Not now, maybe never. <\/p>\n I have my father\u2019s eyes, his nose, his dark complexion. But Mom\u2019s here too. I have her mouth. Funny, mom likes to talk. Jabber jabber blah blah. I love her verbosity because, well, I can only speak with my eyes.<\/p>\n It\u2019s a mischievous look, and I am a handful. But give me a ball to bounce and I will stop hitting and biting-you.<\/p>\n Dad, why aren\u2019t you bouncing balls? Hit them hard. Get out all your frustrations, your sadness. If we knew back when you were a child, you too might be diagnosed as autistic. We are more alike than just brown eyes. Our eyes want to tell a story. Telling yours might ease your pain.<\/p>\n I am 16 now, but age is just a number. I am who I am and my grandma loves me. Prompt: letter writing<\/strong> #4<\/p>\n Dear Martha,<\/p>\n I loved a poem once. It was wrapped inside a purple felt cover. Maybe 2 inches wide, 2 \u00bd inches in length. Here it is, on my shelf of books, with the few I have yet to give away. It is tattered. Faded. Like I left it out in the rain.<\/p>\n Martha Courtot, because of your words:<\/p>\n “It is not time to be together. It is a time to be separate, to learn what it means to be alone.”<\/p>\n Because of your words I understood why I was alone (but not so much why I was lonely.<\/p>\n I held on to your promise that when our work is done, we would come together.<\/p>\n “We are waiting until it is safe” you said.<\/p>\n Have we ever been safe?<\/p>\n I am 78 years old. Time brings me closer to my past, closer to my future; days seem insignificant.<\/p>\n I remind myself I can\u2019t get time back. Do it today. Make that phone call. Go out for a walk. Write that poem. Take that nap. Yet most of my days pass by, lost. Like the friends that I meet, then they disappear. We come and we go. We run into each other or we don\u2019t.<\/p>\n Martha, I have wandered and waited but now I need my friends.<\/p>\n My friends are my poems. I read poems, I identify with them, I live by them, sometimes I criticize them. One day I read a poem, your poem. I read it over and over again. It sustained me from the first time I met it.<\/p>\n I heard the singing and the music and I thank you. But today, my words\/my stories will risk not being safe.<\/p>\n
\nand then another, and another BUT always me. Even when I didn\u2019t understand
\nwho I was, I was a map to who I am now. <\/p>\n
\nbaseball in the street and Captain May I.<\/p>\n
\nearn a master\u2019s degree. I was 48 years old-a mother, a wife, and a student.<\/p>\n
\nand Roosevelt High School where we painted the bleachers maroon and gold and
\nI couldn\u2019t wear pants to school and short skirts were frowned upon.<\/p>\n
\nColorado, Illinois, and Washington. Outside of the U.S. of A. I have
\nonly visited Mexico, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. Now I enjoy, especially short,
\nroad trips: Michigan in the Fall, Colorado any time, the North Shore, and Lake City.<\/p>\n
\nNow Lake Pepin is my next fav lake to Lake Superior. But now that I live
\nIn Prior Lake, Spring Lake, which I can sit by and walk by because Three Rivers
\nPark District made it possible, is my fav lake because it\u2019s my neighbor.<\/p>\n
\nI was 48 years old. Everyone said, \u201cwhat are you going to do with a degree in poetry.\u201d
\nI said, \u201cI\u2019m going to believe in myself.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n-and one boy, my brother.<\/p>\n
\nbanana cream pies, and so much more. <\/p>\n
\n\u2003<\/p>\n
\n\u2003<\/p>\n
\nTribes. The paper: was it handmade, hand stitched?<\/p>\n