Life is always a bag of mixed blessings, isn’t it? I’ve been struggling with an ongoing health problem (which I won’t go into here, suffice it to say it’s been making me very tired and cranky) but seem to be writing poetry at record rates. We finally found a cute little townhouse a bit cheaper than our current place to rent next year, which takes a weight off my mind – but it’s a long trip from the new place to visit all my poet-friends. I’ve been getting almost daily rejections this week – but also received two more acceptances from Pearl (who wrote a very sweet handwritten note) and American Poetry Journal which, along with the Iowa acceptance, I think makes a record for most acceptances I’ve ever gotten in one week. Then, sitting down with friends yesterday, I found out that a lot of them are going through really terrible times – losing jobs, loved ones, etc. So I am trying to think good thoughts for them and wishing that poetry could do more than it can – that it could magically alleviate money problems or health problems or grief or anything. Sometimes I wish good things would happen in vacuums – so that when they do occur, you could totally focus on the good thing and appreciate it. But instead, it always seems like any celebration is hindered by a hundred other problems. This seems to be an ongoing theme in my blog lately, hmmm – how to be grateful and positive in a world that seems daily to become more challenging to navigate. Like a lot of other people who write poetry, probably, I struggle with not getting so overwhelmed with the feeling that “these bad things are happening, and they’re never going to end.” Wintertime in Seattle is always a struggle. I’ve already started dreaming of the Arizona desert, all the cacti and hummingbirds and lizards, sun and sand. I have no trips planned to Arizona, just, you know, idle mental wandering.

I also started on The Best American Poetry 2004, finally, and just finished the two introductions by David Lehman and Lyn Hejinian (usually, sadly, my favorite part of the BAP series – the essays.) And I have a new stack of poetry journals to review for New Pages, and new goals to turn in for second semester of school, and an article for Seattle Woman Magazine that’s almost due. So back to work I go.