Songwriting Without Boundaries Read online

  Your turn. List two other things that arrest, then find related nouns, verbs, and adjectives for each member of the list. Try to apply them to policeman. Write a sentence or a short paragraph for the good ones.

  DAY #11

  PLAYING IN KEYS:

  USING LINKING QUALITIES

  Okay, here you go again. Today you’ll be working with two prompts and will be asked to create two responses for each one—four explorations in all. Take your time.

  Start with the noun cathedral. Here are some qualities:

  It inspires.

  What else inspires?

  SUSAN CATTANEO: Moon

  Moon inspires: astronaut, mysterious, faraway, remote, glowing, controlling tides, waxing, waning, eclipse

  The cathedral eclipsed the other buildings in the city and its congregation waxes and wanes depending on people’s need for faith.

  Music inspires: flowing, in time, rhythmic, scored, fluid, toe tapping, expressive, cadenced

  The cathedral rose up from the street, a melody in fluid stone that harmonized beautifully with its stained glass windows.

  CHANELLE DAVIS: Teacher

  Teacher inspires: knowledge, learning, patient, wise, keeper, books, information, instructs, delivers, pass on, link, education, school, old

  The cathedral is a patient teacher, linking generations with divine knowledge.

  Your turn. List two other things that inspire, then find related nouns, verbs, and adjectives for each member of the list. Try to apply them to cathedral. Write a sentence or a short paragraph for the good ones.

  Here’s another quality of a cathedral:

  Being at the pinnacle.

  What else is at the pinnacle?

  SUSAN CATTANEO: The Super Bowl

  St. Peter’s Cathedral is the Super Bowl of churches, dominating over the city, a giant spectacle for all to see.

  KRISTIN CIFELLI: Rolls-Royce

  Decorated in Michelangelo frescoes, and bigger-than-life-sized marble statues, St. Peter’s Cathedral is a Rolls Royce: expensive, bursting with pride and status, and only to be used for extremely special occasions.

  Now, your turn. Write your own.

  DAY #12

  PLAYING IN KEYS:

  FINDING LINKING QUALITIES

  Once again, you’ll respond to two prompts. List at least three qualities for each prompt. Then, for each quality in your list, ask, “What else has that quality?” and look for related nouns, verbs, and adjectives, and apply them as usual. Write a sentence or a short paragraph for each one.

  Maple Tree

  ANDREA STOLPE: Is beloved

  What else has that quality?

  A family heirloom: worn as jewelry, precious, vintage

  The maple tree is a family heirloom, draping around the neck of the lush green yard.

  CHANELLE DAVIS: Changes colour

  What else has that quality?

  Woman: makeup, blusher, eye shadow, dress up, naked, beauty, elegance

  The maple tree slowly undressed herself to reveal pale smooth skin, her red dress gathered around her feet.

  SUSAN CATTANEO: It sprouts

  What else has that quality?

  Rumors: tongues wagging, painful words, whispered behind backs, the cut of the words, tattletale, gossip, secrets

  The maple tree gossiped with the wind, leaves whispering secrets about the coming autumn.

  Go ahead and list three qualities of a maple tree.

  Now ask, “What else has that quality?” and look for nouns, verbs, and adjectives related to the new object, and apply them as usual. Write a sentence or a short paragraph for each one

  Here’s your second noun to work with:

  Traffic

  What quality does traffic have?

  ANDREA STOLPE: It’s congested

  What else has that quality?

  Congested: Nose, bulbous, pointed, used for smelling

  The traffic was an allergenic nose, a bulbous stack of congestion along the wrinkled highway.

  SUSAN CATTANEO: It’s slow

  What else has that quality?

  Old man: baggy pressed pants, wisps of gray hair, yellowed teeth, wheezing, shuffling feet, stooped shoulders, a folded newspaper under his arm, sensible shoes

  Wheezing exhaust, the traffic shuffled along, its stooped shoulders resigned to waiting.

  KRISTIN CIFELLI: Honking

  Trumpet: blare, toot, symphony, ducks on a pond

  The traffic plays a symphony of horns, honking, in three movements that seem never-ending.

  Go ahead and list three qualities of traffic.

  Asking, “What else has that quality?” look for nouns, verbs, and adjectives related to your qualities, and apply them as usual. Write a sentence or a short paragraph for each one.

  DAY #13

  PLAYING IN KEYS:

  FINDING LINKING QUALITIES

  Again today you’ll respond to two prompts. List at least three qualities for each prompt, and for each quality in your list, ask, “What else has that quality?” and look for related nouns, verbs, and adjectives and apply them as usual. Write a sentence or a short paragraph for each one.

  Here’s the first one:

  Handshake

  CHANELLE DAVIS:

  strong

  gestures peace

  congratulates

  What else has that quality?

  Sumo wrestlers: Fat, sweat, heavy wrestling, locked in, gripping

  The businessmen shook hands, sumo wrestlers gripping each other tightly, each trying to tip the other off his feet.

  White flag: wind, peace, flapping, cloth

  The handshake is a white flag, flapping briefly in the winds of peace.

  Gold medal: shine, first place, winning, sports event, race

  The handshake was a gold medal at the end of a long race to win the development contract.

  ANDREA STOLPE:

  fingers clasping

  confident

  final

  What else has that quality?

  Lovers: honeymoon, naive, poetry

  A handshake is lover’s poetry, fingers clasping in a honeymoon of beautiful imagery.

  A lawyer: argumentative, bends truths, secretive

  A handshake argues with the confidence of a lawyer, overruling anyone who might challenge its final word.

  A parent’s word: strict, non-negotiable, must be obeyed

  A handshake parents an arrangement with a strict and unwavering decree.

  Now, go ahead and list three qualities of a handshake.

  Asking, “What else has that quality?” look for nouns, verbs, and adjectives related to your qualities and apply them as usual. Write a sentence or a short paragraph for each one.

  Okay, here’s your second noun:

  Sunrise

  CHANELLE DAVIS: It’s slow

  What else has that quality?

  Rosebud: petals, unfolding, bloom, scent, bees, pollen, stem, leaves, garden

  The sunrise began as a tiny bud, slowly unfolding its petals of red light into the morning sky.

  CHARLIE WORSHAM: It ignites

  What else has that quality?

  Match: explode, burn, set fire, flame, scratch, sulfur, cardboard box, cigarette, flicker

  A sunrise is the strike of a match: that first burst of light exploding in the atmosphere, setting fire to the day.

  SUSAN CATTANEO: It’s beautiful

  What else has that quality?

  Princess: golden hair, silk gown, dainty slippers, eyes flashing, full red lips

  The sunrise lifted her dainty skirt and tiptoed over the mountain, placing one satin toe of light into the darkened valley.

  Your turn. Go ahead and list three qualities of a sunrise,

  Asking, “What else has that quality?” look for nouns, verbs, and adjectives related to your qualities, and apply them as usual. Write a sentence or a short paragraph for each one.

  There’s nothing mysterious about finding metaphor. It’s a step-b
y-step search that yields positive results in most cases. Expressed identity is a great diving board, plunging you into a pool of possibilities. Simply keep your eyes open under water. There are lots of things to see.

  DAY #14

  SIMILE

  Before moving on to the next challenge, you’ll take a look at simile.

  You learned in high school that the difference between metaphor and simile is that simile uses like or as. Of course, it also uses than. True enough, but that’s like saying that measles are spots on your body. They are, but if you look deeper, the spots are there because a virus is present. There is something more fundamental going on.

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge called metaphor “an act of the imagination,” whereas he relegated simile to “an act of fancy.” He identified the difference between metaphor and simile as a difference of degree, depending on how much the two ideas shared in common. If they shared only a few, simile. More, metaphor.

  This would be a candidate for simile:

  Like a lobster boil’d, the morn

  From black to red began to turn

  —SAMUEL BUTLER

  A boiled lobster doesn’t have much in common with morning except that they both change from black to red: The morning sunrise reddens the sky, the boiled lobster turns from black to red as it cooks. Metaphor wouldn’t work here:

  Morning is a boiled lobster

  The boiled lobster of the morning

  Morning’s boiled lobster

  While in metaphor, the two terms share several qualities. It’s perhaps a good guideline for choosing between metaphor and simile, but I prefer making the choice in terms of commitment.

  Love is a rose.

  Where do you focus? On the second term?

  Love = rose

  Or the first term?

  Love = rose

  If you want the texture, smell, color of the rose in focus, use metaphor.

  Love is a rose.

  If you want love as the focus, use simile:

  Love is like a rose.

  Simile doesn’t transfer focus: like works as an energy blocker—it reflects energy back onto the first term, refusing to let the energy pass to the second term. The is of metaphor allows free passage of energy to the second term, and lights it up.

  Freedom is riding a bike for the first time without help.

  The energy is transferred to the bike rider here. You see her wobbling down the sidewalk, a breathless parent smiling and gasping as he watches her pull further away—a harbinger of things to come.

  Freedom is like riding a bike for the first time without help.

  Here you stay focused on the concept of freedom. Maybe you reflect a bit on the feeling you had when you first rode your bike alone, but muttering the conclusion, “Yup, that’s what freedom is like.”

  Simile is an excellent tool for working with abstract concepts like freedom or emotions like hope, trust, or bitterness. A way of making them specific. Of course, metaphor is a perfect vehicle for those purposes, too.

  Like has a bad reputation these days. Its legitimate uses are either as a verb

  I like the smell of evening.

  Or to introduce simile.

  Like the smell of evening …

  Unfortunately, our culture has co-opted it to be used as an interruptor, causing me to write the following lyric:

  LEAVE MY LIKE ALONE

  Pat Pattison/Greg Barnhill

  Like clouds that lace the open sky high above Nevada

  Like dust behind the horses on the dry plains of Montana

  Like thunder in the summer in the hills outside Atlanta

  The pictures that I like come rolling by

  But like, I don’t like like when it’s like used like it’s like nothing

  Like I don’t like like when it’s like used instead of said

  Like, “she’s like, no way,” “he’s like OK”

  Man like that’s so like not my tone

  Now won’t you just LEAVE MY LIKE ALONE

  Yeah LEAVE MY LIKE ALONE

  I like the smell at evening when the dew is on the grasses

  I like the songs of ice cream trucks weaving past like laughter

  And little children clutching quarters, like the memories they gather

  I like to go there every time I close my eyes

  So like, I don’t like like when it’s like used like it’s like nothing

  Like I don’t like like when it’s like used instead of said

  Like, “she’s like, no way,” “he’s like OK”

  Man like that’s so like not my tone

  Now won’t you just LEAVE MY LIKE ALONE

  Like somewhere in the valley girls abandon their vocabularies

  Total conversations made of only so and like

  And it’s so hard to distinguish

  When you murder the king’s English

  So like I wrote this little song, I thought I’d try because

  You see, I don’t like like when it’s like used like it’s like nothing

  Like I don’t like like when it’s like used instead of said

  Like, “she’s like, no way,” “he’s like OK”

  Man like that’s so like not my tone

  Now won’t you just LEAVE MY LIKE ALONE

  Please just LEAVE MY LIKE ALONE

  *Find the complete song at patpattison.com under “patsongs.”

  Today you’ll be working with simile. You’ll be asked to find three similes for each term, plus a description explaining the connections. Like this:

  Thirst is like a guest who won’t go away.

  You can bear it for a while, but the longer you wait, the more uncomfortable you feel, until you finally have to head for the bathroom and close the door.

  Thirst is like a buffalo hunter on the dry plains of Montana.

  It stalks everywhere, looking for prey to bring down, peering through tumbleweed at figures moving in the distance toward the waterhole. If it has its way it’ll stop them cold before they can get there.

  Being thirsty is like being the parent of a teenage daughter.

  Always wanting another little drop of information and attention, in the dry landscape of texting and sleepovers, after the waterfall of affection from childhood has long since turned to a trickle.

  Your turn. Find three similes for each of the following terms. Then write a short elaboration on each one.

  Trust is like:

  1. Trust is like a good night’s sleep. It allows your mind to rest, and you can rely on it. —CHARLIE WORSHAM

  2. Trust is like a patchwork quilt, made from swatches and squares of people and experiences. It is many colors, many patterns, and frayed at the edges. Over the years it lies threadbare, but still provides warmth and comfort in the cold of life. —ANDREA STOLPE

  3. Trust is like a roof. You don’t really notice it until it’s gone. —MO McMORROW

  Now you try. What is trust like?

  A bad joke is like:

  1. A bad joke is like a penny you drop that falls through an open grate on the sidewalk. For the joke teller, it is more an embarrassment than a true loss. —CHARLIE WORSHAM

  2. A bad joke is like a fart in an elevator. You are forced to politely stand there and sniff it in until the door opens. —CHANELLE DAVIS

  3. A bad joke is like spilled milk, spreading over the tablecloth of conversation, drowning the napkins. You try mopping up the white and milky liquid, but it has already started to seep into the wood of the table, smelling more and more sour. —SUSAN CATTANEO

  Now you try. What is a bad joke like?

  Divorce is like:

  1. Divorce is like a fighter pilot’s ejector seat. When the marriage is going down in flames, press the button for a second chance.—CHANELLE DAVIS

  2. Divorce is like a bushfire. Without it some trees don’t seed. —MO McMORROW

  3. Divorce is like a car crash: Anger like twisted metal, the ambulance comes too late to save anyone, the pavement is strewn with old memo
ries, the same arguments like the same turn in the road that you always take too fast. —SUSAN CATTANEO

  Your turn. What is divorce like?

  A waterfall is like:

  1. A waterfall is like a bridal veil, white and flowing down the smooth back of the rocks. —CHANELLE DAVIS

  2. A waterfall is like hair, falling in luscious strands off the rocky head of the cliff, made gold in the sunlight, smooth until it hits the bottom in a froth of curls, the whitewater rafts have oars that comb through the currents. —SUSAN CATTANEO

  3. A waterfall is like a construction worker. Pounding and jackhammering the stone face of the mountain, gallons of raw strength pour over the cliff. —ANDREA STOLPE

  Your turn. What is a waterfall like?

  Hope is like:

  1. Hope is like a teddy bear, comforting to hold onto, squeezing it tightly when you’re afraid, and helping you rest your head to sleep at night. —KRISTIN CIFELLI

  2. Hope is like spandex, stretching across the flab of life. The wider the challenge, the thinner it becomes, but it will take more than a pint of melted dreams to split the seams of this stargazer. —ANDREA STOLPE

  3. Hope is like a faithful dog. It guards your dreams and walks two paces in front until you get to your destination. —CHANELLE DAVIS

  Your turn. What is hope like?

  Wow! Congratulations! You’ve finished the metaphor challenge and should be seeing the world with new vision, or at least, I hope so. You are well-prepared for the third challenge, which entails going deeper into metaphor and learning to extend and manipulate it.

  Take a little time off, if you’d like. You’ve earned it. Let these ways of looking seep into your bloodstream. Don’t be gone too long, though. The next challenge is fun and will keep you moving forward. You will cross boundaries you may not have seen before.