Vote Vote Vote! Like a baby Stoat! Goodreads Poetry Book of the Year Semifinals!
Dear readers, this is the time when I beg for your vote!
Because of your write-in votes, She Returns to the Floating World is now in the Goodreads semifinal round for Best Book of Poetry of the Year!
I would very much appreciate it if you would go to this link and vote in the semi-final round for my book! The five finalists are chosen on November 20th!
http://www.goodreads.com/award/choice/2011#56614-Best-Poetry
I have some stiff competition (particularly from friends and mentors Aimee Nezhukumatathil and Dorianne Laux.) It’s a good year for poetry books. If selected, I promise not to raise poetry taxes!
A new interview up at California Journal of Poetics, and More Weekend Excitement
The wonderful Gina Barnard (a very talented poet in her own right) interviewed me for the California Journal of Poetics, and it’s up at their site now:
http://www.californiapoetics.org/interviews/1655/an-interview-with-jeannine-hall-gailey
I get to talk about other books that influenced She Returns to the Floating World, my obsession with women turning into animals, and my childhood in Oak Ridge. There’s also a little shout-out to Kathleen Flenniken’s new upcoming book, Plume.
In other exciting news, I finally succumbed in the fourth week to whatever weird cold/virus/upper respiratory thing I’ve been fighting – I came home shaking and feverish yesterday and determined to put a hold on my crazy whirlwind of social activities until I am all the way better. (It doesn’t help that it’s mid-forties and stormy outside, the recipe for my asthma to act up. I know, cold rain, what a shocker in the NW! In California, they’re still wearing skirts and sandals…ah well…)
This means a weekend curled up, finally finishing at least one of my book reviews, starting Murakami’s thousand-page super cool opus IQ84, and deciding whether the last Harry Potter movie was better or worse than the book. And sleeping. And lots of hot drinks. (Is it weird that I end up writing a lot of my book reviews while I am sick and feverish? Then I end up using words like “gimlet-eyed” and “splenetic” and wondering later…who wrote that?)
I’ve also been trying to come up with a last line for a poem. It turned out to be much harder than I thought. Everything I’ve come up with seems harsh, trite, too easy…Sometimes I tool around with last lines even after I publish a poem. Last lines are hard!
I also want to thank the lovely magazine Hollins Critic, as I just got my contributor copies for October’s issue, and a nice little check. I so appreciate magazines that still actually pay their content providers!! Thank you, Hollins Critic! My little poem, “Holiday Redux,” is on the last page, if you’re interested, and the issue also contains a good review of WA State book award winner Frances McCue’s book, The Bled.
Useful links: Success After the MFA, Organizing a book manuscript, tips for submitting to journals
You know I have a special interest in how to organize poetry manuscripts (I’ve run a couple of workshops on it, do manuscript consultations, and pretty much always have a friend’s MS in hand (or my own) to think about how it could be organized. There weren’t a lot of helpful articles out there just a few years ago, but lately there has have been a few articles published. This latest is my Erika Meitner on her experiences reading the slush piles and the “mix-tape” versus “project” book manuscript organization strategies – read it here. I very much write on my obsessions, so I’ll write 100 poems on one subject, then another…for instance, I’ve been writing a series on Oak Ridge, Tennessee, another series on fairy tales, etc. If you look at my books, they’re really the result of sifting down the pile of poems I’ve written around a certain subject or set of subjects.
I’m also very interested in how MFA programs prepare their graduates for the post-graduation environment – especially these days, when teaching jobs (and jobs in general) are few and far between. How do we earn a living? How do we define “success” for post-MFA grads? This article from the Chronicle of Higher Education discusses whether success means publishing a book, getting a tenure-track teaching job, winning grants or awards….read it here.
I know for me, I didn’t necessarily have “getting a teaching job” as a goal after my MFA, but I was definitely interested in publishing a book and in working somehow with literary magazines. Hmm, now that I’ve done those things, I notice my goals shift and change over time. Do you think that most MFA programs do a good job of preparing graduates for the realities of life after MFA? How do you define success as a writer?
And last, for any readers just starting out sending to literary magazines, Bob from Writer’s Market has a good bunch of tips here. My two best tips are: read the magazine and read the submission guidelines closely.
There has also been some controversy around reading fees and contest fees at literary magazines and publishers. Necessary evil or unacceptable? You can’t get it online, but the latest Poets & Writers has an article talking about the issue.
http://www.pw.org/content/novemberdecember_2011
My very first book award, a reading report, poetry in translation…
Woke up to a little good news this morning…my book She Returns to the Floating World won a Silver Medal in the 2011 Florida Publishers Association Book Awards. (Thanks Kitsune Books for the nomination! You can read about all the FPA winners here.) Though it is Silver, it is my very first book award, so I am excited, especially as I have felt, well, a little discouraged lately in the poetry arena. Thanks Florida!
The theme of my weekend was poetry in translation, as I went down Friday night to listen to wonderful translator/poets read their work at the Wave Books Translation event at the Henry Art Gallery. My favorite reader was Whiting Award winner Don Mee Choi, who read a beautiful Snow White-inspired work she had translated in Korean. She worked on an anthology of Korean women poets that I’m going to have to look up and buy, I think!
The theme continued at a reading on Saturday…Really enjoyed the Day of the Dead reading at the Lake City Library with other wonderful readers including Judith Roche, John Burgess, Carolyne Wright, Chris Jarmick and host Raul Sanchez. Several poets read their work in both English and Spanish, and it was lovely to think about the sound of poetry and how it translates through language (and what doesn’t.)
Where I’ll be This Weekend
November 5th, 2011
LAKE CITY LIBRARY
4 TO 5:45 P.M.
12501 28Th Avenue NE, Seattle Washington 98125
Day of the Dead Poetry Reading curated by Raul Sanchez.
The following poets are reading: John Burgess, Jeannine Hall Gailey, Judith Roche, Christopher J. Jarmick, Raul Sanchez, Carolyn Wright, and Scott Galasso!
Hope you can make it!!!!
Otherwise I’ll be enjoying Wave Books‘ Translation Poetry Weekend at the Henry Art Gallery, which I need to rush to get to right now. More info about that schedule here:
http://www.wavepoetry.com/special_section/44
Whew! These November poetry weekends are going to knock me out! On week 3 of my cold…Also, still seeking teaching jobs as well as part-time copywriting jobs (so if you’re in the position to hire a poet…you know…), grants, and working on polishing two more book manuscripts and sending them out…
November Doldrums
I’ve been reading around the blogosphere about people being a little down, and I think it’s been getting to me too: the November doldrums. The days are getting shorter, the little bit of sunshine we get is really cold, job applications and poetry submissions seem harder and heavier, somehow…
I don’t know if this will cheer anyone up, but if you’re a speculative poetry writer who loves persona poetry, you probably want to submit to the Science Fiction Poetry Association’s poetry journal Eye To the Telescope, in the next month, because…guess what? The guest editor is me!
http://eyetothetelescope.com/submit.html
And, if you’re a member of Goodreads, I’d be honored if you wrote in She Returns to the Floating World as your choice for Best Poetry Book of the year! (Write-in votes are by “Your Choice” at the bottom of the page) as your favorite poetry read:
http://www.goodreads.com/award/choice/#56024-Best-Poetry
Of course, my lovely friends Dorianne Laux and Aimee Nezhukumatathil are also very good choices. It’s a tough year for poetry competitions!
So what are you doing to battle the doldrums this November? I’m baking, staying in denial about the ever-shortening days, and I’m getting ready to read with a bunch of friends at a reading celebration for Day of the Dead:
Saturday, November 5 @ 4-5:45 pm
Day of the Dead reading with Judith Roche, Carolyne Wright, Jeannine Hall Gaily, Chris Jarmick, John Burgess, Scott Galasso, & Raul Sanchez at Lake City Library.
Spoooooky Halloween Poems…Zombie Girls, Monsters, Witches…Oh My!
Yes, it’s almost Halloween again, and though the East Coast got blasted with ice and snow, the weather in Seattle is predictably cold and grey. We are carving pumpkins and putting together our Snow White/Woodsman costumes for tomorrow. (With all the fairy tale television on lately…I couldn’t resist!)
And I’m posting a few poems to get you in the spooky spirit! Zombies, Monsters, Witches…And be sure to check out the “Poems that Scare You” at Escape into Life for a Halloween feature with a new poem from me and two other talented poets…
They Are Not Regenerating
by Jeannine Hall Gailey
We are not zombies, thrown into a pool
of dubious origin and coming back beautiful
but decaying
unsure of how to live – pretending to swim,
eat yogurt like regular girls.
We are not clones, despite being drawn to specifications
(36-26-36) and bearing bouffants and bikinis
we might hack each other to pieces
but we are not confused about our identities
(living or not living) we continue
in this shape we were given
our cells cannot regenerate and the scientist
names us “Dead”
we are not regenerating we cannot reproduce ourselves we cannot be anything
but the fulfillment of your fantasy, flesh-eating or not.
The Monster Speaks: It’s Not So Bad
By Jeannine Hall Gailey (from Becoming the Villainess and based on the legend of Melusine, a French queen who, they say, turned into a dragon…)
Being a monster, really. It slows down traffic
from neighbors and I’m finally getting the respect
I deserve. For years they snickered behind curtains
when I passed by, but now they cross themselves
(I think in reverence.) They clutch babies
to their chests and wail. They lay their hands
over the eyes of the dead. I can peek
in their windows, raid the pantries, curl
up in their attics for a night. I found a picture
they carved of me in black slate.
It wasn’t a very good likeness, but they meant
well. Children dream of me.
I am no longer lonely, I enjoy the dark,
the click-click of my claws against glass,
the way my tail sparkles in moonlight. Even
this new voice bewitches me. If you put
your ear on my chest, you can hear
the new, unfamiliar thumps of four hearts,
each stronger than the last. Touch the skin
between wing-bones, the delicate eyelids.
In this body I’ve become myself again.
As I circle the castle, the song that scrapes
my throat agitates the stars themselves.
The flames of my voice burn the acrid air of night.
Introduction to Witchcraft
by Jeannine Hall Gailey (This poem is new and unpublished, so it may go *poof* after All Hallow’s Eve…)
*Poof*
Strange Horizons, Surviving Poetry, Whiting Awards…
So, I escaped from the teen workshop without any major injuries, though I woke up this morning feeling flu-y again. Guess the cure is just…rest!
If you’re in the mood for science-based poetry, my poem “Tickling the Dragon” about the death of Louis Slotin – who inspired the creation of “Dr. Manhattan” of “The Watchmen” fame – was featured a day or so ago at Strange Horizons:
http://www.strangehorizons.com/2011/20111024/gailey-p.shtml
I think I have a psychic link of some sort with the mysterious group that hands the Whiting Awards, because all the writers I thought I’d discovered were then given the award – Ilya Kaminsky, Jericho Brown, Dana Levin, and now…Eduardo Corral. I liked them all before they were famous, as we protest about our favorite indy bands…
Redmond Teen Poetry Workshop on Mythology and Superheroes
- At October 24, 2011
- By Jeannine Gailey
- In Uncategorized
1
Here’s what I’ll be doing tomorrow:
http://www.pnwlocalnews.com/east_king/red/community/132343343.html
So if you are – or have – a high school kid who loves comic books or mythology and might be interested in writing a poem or two, bring them out! 6-8 PM.
Watched the new fairy-tale series, “Once Upon a Time,” last night – it wasn’t bad at all! I loved the creepy actor playing Rumplestiltskin, and I thought the lighting and colors and imagery of the show were all really beautiful. Too bad I’m not writing for it! PS Hollywood makers of fairy-tale shows – I am available for work!
Reading Report from an Artist’s Reception and a Wonderful New Review
- At October 22, 2011
- By Jeannine Gailey
- 0
Thanks very much to The Pedestal Magazine and critic Michael Adams for a wonderful new review of She Returns to the Floating World
http://www.thepedestalmagazine.com/gallery.php?item=20261
You want a copy? Get one here or here or order a signed copy from me here!
So, I want to come out and say it: artists and art-lovers make for great poetry audiences! Deborah Scott’s wonderful paintings from her show “Waiting for Prince Charming” were in a lovely setting at Georgetown’s All City Coffee (I had seen them in a studio setting, but they were all the more impressive hung together thematically and with good lighting.) I read poems inspired by similar fairy tales – Snow White, Princess and the Pea, Alice in Wonderland – and the crowd, most of whom had never been to a poetry reading before, were kind and attentive (and bought books!) It was probably the most fun I’d had at a poetry reading in a while. Here is a picture of the curator, artist Deborah Scott (with the tiara, appropriately) and me, and other photo of one of the paintings from her Snow White series…
Jeannine Hall Gailey served as the second Poet Laureate of Redmond, Washington and the author of Becoming the Villainess, She Returns to the Floating World, Unexplained Fevers, The Robot Scientist’s Daughter, and winner of the Moon City Press Book Prize and SFPA’s Elgin Award, Field Guide to the End of the World. Her latest, Flare, Corona from BOA Editions, was a finalist for the Washington State Book Award. She’s also the author of PR for Poets, a Guidebook to Publicity and Marketing. Her work has been featured on NPR’s The Writer’s Almanac, Verse Daily and The Year’s Best Fantasy and Horror. Her poems have appeared in The American Poetry Review, Poetry, and JAMA.
