The Other Side

It's been a good number of years since I participated in writing contests, HarperCollins and a number of other creative writing endeavors. I remember a time when I would go searching google for contests without entry fees, comb through author blogs and websites for inspiration and challenge myself with prompts and topics outside of my comfort zone.

But... I stopped. In truth, I'm not entirely sure why. Perhaps I have too many artistic outlets to let any one take over for too long? I entered college? I started working? I discovered a love of fiber arts?

In any case, the recent acquisition of a new phone and the pre-installed applications led me to start reading news articles again. That will be a topic for another day but to continue... Flipboard utilizes a very similar idea to Pinterest, where users "flip" articles onto their boards and create "magazines" of associated content just as users "pin" onto their "boards" on the latter. In any case, you can add a number of topics you're interested in to follow articles other users have flipped, or you can add your own while browsing the internet.

It was through Flipboard that I found myself reading about a number of free entry fee writing contests while eating leftover pizza (don't judge, I know you've done it too) for breakfast and drinking my coffee.

One entry that caught my eye was hosted by Cha. Cha is an Asian Literary Journal founded in 2007 and based in Hong Kong. They have a strong focus on Asian themed work as well as showcasing Asian writers around the world. This ties into another article I read about the paucity of female Asian American writers, but in truth, both published and unpublished authors, there are quite a few if you take the time to look. Many do not have traditional Asian names - Chen, Patel, Wong, Kim - just to name a few from different cultural backgrounds, or they use pen names, evven use their married surnames.

To take a leaf from these articles, today's challenge will be to participate in the Cha "The Other Side" Poetry Contest. Unfortunately, that also means there won't be an entry until the contest winners are announced; however, use the opportunity to think about what the phrase means to you and how you're going to interpret it. Write one, two, or even three poems, each no longer than 80 lines and submit it according to the guidelines in the link above. Until then, tap away at that keyboard, scribbling on scraps of sheet paper and perhaps you'll see a post referring back to this one in a month or two.

Will you delve into the world of science fiction/fantasy? Conjure up days of long past? Or perhaps make it a personal anecdote?