"Summertime" is one of my favorite songs. Originally heard in the 1935 Opera Porgy and Bess, it is now one of the most well-known Jazz pieces. Your Friday Prose mission, should you choose to accept it, is to take a line from the song and use it to open a short story, poem or prose piece.

( Lyrics are under the cut )

As always, Friday Prose Prompts never expire. If this prompt doesn't inspire you, feel free to revisit earlier suggestions.

There are a series of books that are nothing but a series of found lists - it's interesting to try to reconstruct the story around the person who was shopping for some weird assortment of bits, or who writes perplexing notes next to certain items. There are lots of stories to be made up about them...

Which would be a fine project, but not quite what I had in mind. Your assignment, should you choose to accept it, is to write a series of to-do lists that tell a clear story. No dialogue, no narrative, no description - just simple bullet points that convey a clear storyline.

Love sucks. Falling in love, being in love, falling out of love, all of it.

Apparently Saint Rafael is the one who hooks you up on February 14, Saint Valentine is the saint of passing notes—through the bars to the daughter of his jailer the morning they chopped off his head.

So.

Here is your prompt! Write a short piece—poem, story, whatever—to the son or daughter of your jailer.

It is National Poetry Month. With that in mind, write a short story or scene based on a poem. You have one hour and no word limit. The poem you choose may be by another writer or it may be one of your own, but please include a link to the poem with your response.

You have one thousand words to describe a photograph. It can be any photograph, an image of your childhood or an embarassing facebook collage. Do not link to the photo--let us rely on your words to see the image; that's why I am giving you so many.

When you're finished, post your response here or create a new entry to the community.

I'm irresponsible. Pretend it's Friday, and that I am the beloved auraesque.

Friday Prose Prompt: reveal a character's traits through a hobby of theirs. Alternatively, use yourself as an example--what would a third party be able to glean from a hobby of yours? (You could use writing as the hobby, but that's probably a bit of a cop out.)

This does not have to be an existing hobby! Invented hobbies are fair game!

You have 500 words and no time limit. When you are finished, you may post your response here or create a new entry to the community. Go!

This week, your Friday Prose Prompt is to write about springs and clockworks. You have 500 words and no time limit. When you are finished, you may post your response here or create a new entry to the community. Go! :)

You're lovely mod smeddley has been getting snow, while I have sunshine in my city. We're due for a rain shower, soon, thoughl. With all that in mind, your Friday Prose Prompt is to write about strange weather. You have one hour and no word limit.

This week, your Friday Prose Prompt is to write a short story or scene inspired by the leap year. You have 366 words.

When you are done, post your response here or create a new entry to the community. Remember, Prose Prompts never expire. Feel free to revisit previous prompts and post your responses to the community.

You've just won an Oscar for best screenplay. Write your acceptance speech in 500 words or less.

Remember, Friday Prose Prompts never expire. If you don't care for this week's prompt, feel free to revisit previous prompts. You may post your responses here or create a new entry in the community.

Write a love poem or letter to another write_away member. No word count or time limit.

This week your Friday Prose Prompt is to write a short story or scene based on an Old Wives' Tale. You have 500 words and no time limit. The scene must illustrate the tale without outright saying it.

When you are finished, post your response here or create a new entry to the community.

You are a famous literary character (or a character of your own). For this week's Friday Prose Prompt, write a diary entry in 500 words the point of view of that character.

When you are done, you may response here with your piece or create a new entry to the community. If you go the famous route, let your fellow write_away members guess who you are.

Over the past year, the "Green" trend has become increasingly popular. This week, your Friday Prose Prompt is going green, too. Write a short scene about something green. You have one hour and five hundred words. When you are done, you can post your work here or create a new thread in the community.

This week's Friday Prose Prompt is based on a popular meme circling my friendslist. Visit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random and use the title of the first article to appear (No cheating to get something good!) as the title for your short story or scene. You have one hour to write a scene inspired by that title.

When you are through, you may post your response here or create a new entry to write_away.

Happy New Year!

This week, your Friday prose prompt is to write a prompt. You have one hundred words to come up with a prompt for a short story or scene. You may reference any topic, time period, people or animal.

But there's more! :)

Come back Saturday or Sunday and take a look at the prompts your fellow write_away members came up with. Choose one (or a few) and write a short story or scene within one hour. You can post your response here or create a new entry to the community--remember to include the prompt (or prompts) you chose.

This prompt is the last for 2007. In celebration of prompts past, your Friday Prose Prompt is to take a peak at the prompts from the past year. Write a short scene or story that includes at least one prompt. You have 500 words and no time limit.

Past prompts can be accessed from the "Friday" link to the right.

Tonight will be the longest night of the year. With that in mind, your Friday Prose Prompt is to write about night. Write a short scene or story that takes place at or is significanntly affected by night. You have 500 words and no time limit.

The roommates and I have been cleaning out our fridge before winter vacation, so this week your Friday Prose Prompt is to write a short story or scene in which the main character finds something in the icebox that does not belong. You have one hour and no word limit.

When you're done, post your response here or create a new entry to the community.

This week for your Friday Prose Prompt, I want to try something a little different. Turn on the radio, hit random on your mp3 or CD player, or find a music station on your television. Listen to the next full song that plays. Once it finishes, you have one hour to write a short story or scene inspired by that song.

When you're done, post your prompt response here or in a new thread to the community. Don't forget to tell us the song you heard (or you can make us guess!).

Congratulations Nanowrimo participants! Our own smeddley has won this year. :)

This week, your Friday Prose Prompt is to write about a deadline. You have 500 words and no time limit.

When you're done, you can post your response here or in a new entry to the community. Remember, Prose Prompts never expire. If this week's prompt doesn't inspire you, feel free to peruse previous prompts.

Today is Black Friday, and this morning my Grandmother and I were up at 4 a.m. to join the hordes of shoppers at the mall. So with the joys of retail in mind, your prompt is to take a look at customers_suck or bad_service and write a short scene inspired by any entry posted today (November 23). You have 500 words and no time limit.

When you are finished, you may post your response in a new entry or reply here. Please link us to the story you used as your inspiration, and be polite in those communities! :)

This week's Friday Prose Prompt is brought to you by the lovely lindskaba.

Imagine yourself in freefall. You have 500 words to write about what you feel as you are tumbling downward. Why are you falling? What will happen when you hit the bottom? Is there a bottom?

As always, feel free to post your responses here or in a new entry to the community.

The weather is changing in my New England city, and the fall leaves we're famous for are changing to gold and red. With that in mind, your Friday Prose Prompt this week is to write a story about nature. You have 500 words to write a scene that takes place outside.

Remember, Friday Prose Prompts never expire. If you don't like the prompt this week, you are more than welcome to look through the archives. Feel free to post your prompt responses in a new entry for critiques, or post here just for the exercise.

Today is the Day of the Dead in Mexico, but rather than write about death in this week's Friday Prose Prompt, your assignment is to write about a birth. You have up one hour to write, and bonus points if you can incorporate a sugar skull into the story. When you're done, you can post your story as a response to this entry or create a new thread in the community.

Go show your mods some lovin' for their responses to last week's prompt. abstract_apathy would love to hear your thoughts on a story that began as a prompt response, too.

P.S.
Good luck to all of you participating in NaNoWriMo this year!