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Need more grammar practice? Here’s a site where you can get one-on-one instruction from a grammar expert. www.grammar-lion.com Many of you wonder if you should have a professional editor.  I recommend it!  Here is one who I’ve worked with who is stellar. https://www.grammar-lion.com/pages/grammar-lion-editing You’ll love her.  

Some phrases just roll off the tongue.  I like “rolled oats” because of the long “O” in both words.  In fact it inspired me to see if I could extend it.  This is good practice for poets since the sounds of words in poetry is so important.  Here’s mine.  You try one too. Lonesome Jones owns forty glorious rolled oat stores for those poor bores ordering s’mores.

I waltzed out of the local grocery store, pushing a cart full of bags and shoved them in the back of my Honda Fit.  I slid into the driver’s seat and then huffed in annoyance. A folded flyer was stuck under the windshield wiper. I yanked open the door, balanced on my left leg, and reached around to pull the flyer loose.  I unfolded it and read the

For some reason this phrase evokes Thanksgivings as a kid when odd smelling grandparents and weird uncles came over for a big turkey dinner.  It wouldn’t be long before one of them would scowl and say, “In MY day, we…” with a variety of endings.  Perhaps they walked ten miles to school and back (barefoot) and thought I was a slacker because I was in a car pool. 

Never-Never Land was where Peter Pan and the Lost Boys lived.  Two stars on the right and straight on until morning. I find myself using this phrase often as a place that doesn’t exist.  (Example:  Trump’s attorney Michael Cohen has been living in Never-Never Land.) But what if we could create our own, preferred Never-Never Land?  What would it be like?  Yes, this is a tricky question.  The

Fire has so many connotations.  It can be the source of warmth, a way to cook food, a lovely candle flame, a cozy crackling campfire to create camaraderie, or even the way to clear a field.  The flip side is fire as the destroyer of homes, a way to scar the skin, how to burn a favorite pot, or a force that easily gets out of hand. But

This is a poetry challenge. Think back to that great song in West Side Story when the women argue about whether it’s better to live in American or Puerto Rico.  Sing this in your head: I like to be in America! O.K. by me in America! Ev’rything free in America For a small fee in America! Rhythmically, this is a fascinating lyric.  It combines  3/3 time (waltz time

The orchestra played “The Waltz of the Dancing Bears” as the couples alternately swirled and pounded their feet to the deep bass music, heavily accented by drums.  Candles burned in silver candelabras placed on the window sills of the ball room.  All wore white, shining in the dim light.  Sir Milos Westerman spoke.

And….

Details can seem annoying when you’re reading (too much scenery or a paragraph endlessly describing how a room looks), and I’m often told by students that they skip those parts.  Even so, when details are connected to events and dialogue, they add a lot of depth. Your challenge, should you choose to accept, is to add interesting details to these boring sentences, without writing a whole paragraph.  One