Dawn breaks in pastels
Scattered city lights
Which had powered night
Fade with encroaching day
Soon enough extinguished
While the trail
Marking my departure
Rises from the darkness
Now a frothy white
Upon grey slate
Receding mountains’ majesty
Diminishes with steady progress
In some few hours to be lost
Behind the moon-swelled sea
Held fast by Earth’s own gravity
So go I
Beyond the realm
Of all I know
To places
I’ve not yet loved
Coast Mountains and Vancouver
Horseshoe Bay to Nanaimo Ferry
The Strait of Georgia
British Columbia, Canada
Pic and a Word Challenge
Last week we rocked the Cradle. This week, let’s indulge our Travel bug. Or seek something else to inspire you in this photograph of the Coast Mountains rising above Vancouver, seen from the Horseshoe Bay to Nanaimo ferry on the Strait of Georgia, British Columbia, Canada.
The Pic and a Word Challenge is (usually) a weekly creativity prompt offered (also, usually) Mondays.
With each challenge I provide a photograph of mine along with a single word. The challenge? Use the pic and/or word as inspiration to create something — a photograph, a painting, video, prose, poetry, fiction, non-fiction, longread or just a few words. You are welcome to use these two elements (photograph and word) literally, thematically or metaphorically. If you create both images and words, all the better.
To participate:
- Use any title you like
- Your response can be words and/or images
- You may use my image to illustrate your post, or any images you have created
- Mention that you are responding to the Pic and a Word Challenge
- Add a link to this post in your response
To help us find your response — whether on WordPress, Instagram, Flicker, Tumblr, etc. — you can also:
- Add a comment on this post to announce your response
- Apply the tag/hashtag “Pic and a Word Challenge” or “#picandawordchallenge” to your post
Each week, I’ll list the previous week’s responses at the end of the new challenge. I may also share some on my social media: Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, Tumblr, etc.
The previous challenge was: Cradle

The word for last week’s Pic and a Word Challenge #293 was Cradle, along with this photograph from the Rocky Bluffs section of Ucluelet’s Wild Pacific Trail, in British Columbia, Canada.
- On Advent – I: Love Has Freed Us All, by Defying Atrophy
- From the cradle, by An Embarrassment of Riches
- Outcome Unknown, by Mapping uncertainty
- Cradle, by WoollyMuses
View all the Pic and a Word Challenges, including the current challenge, on the Pic and a Word Challenge tag page.
Happy Creating! ❤