{Update to previous post: Hey, guess who else showed up in the “Honorable Mentions” of the Year’s Best Fantasy & Horror? Aimee Nezhukumathathil!! Wow! Also, Albert Goldbarth. And the poet that reviewed my chapbook for The Pedestal Magazine, JoSelle Vanderhooft. There was only one poem chosen for the actual anthology, everything else was prose.}

First of all, go read Charles Jensen’s excellent post called “What Makes a Writer?” It talks about rejection in a very interesting way.

My anthology could beat up your anthology! Or at least beat it in Worlds of Warcraft…
I don’t know if this is news you should congratulate or mock me for…
Sure, we all know Reb Livingston made it into this year’s Best American Poetry – which we are all very happy for her about! Way to go, Reb! – but I got into The Year’s Best Fantasy & Horror! A kind editor pointed out that he had seen my name in there, and sure enough, I went to the local bookstore and found the new 2006 edition, opened it up to the introduction, and in the section marked “Poetry,” the editors talked about my chapbook, “Female Comic Book Superheroes.” Four poems from the chapbook were listed as “Honorable Mentions” in the back as well – although my first name had lost one of its “n’s” So, anyway, this was a huge surprise! I don’t usually consider myself a fantasy and horror writer, but I’m going to go with the flow. Kelly Link, one of the editors, is one of my all-time favorite female writers, right up there with Atwood – if you haven’t read her short-story collection, Stranger Things Happen, you should go out and get it, it’s amazing.
I also had two acceptances – one from Sentence, who included a nice note about the poems I sent – and another from a magazine I just discovered, called The Magazine of Speculative Poetry.

I went to Susan Rich’s book launch reading and party for Cures Include Travel, her newest edition of poetry, at Elliot Bay Bookstore. The room was more full than I had ever seen it for a poetry reading, the crowd was very responsive, and the party afterwards – thrown by the women’s residency center Hedgebrook – was so crowded you could barely move. So, a happening event. Congrats, Susan!

If you’re in California, you might be able to hear my radio interview tomorrow night (Wednesday Sept. 6th at 8 PM) with JP Dancing Bear on his “Out of Our Minds” radio show on 91.5 FM out of Cupertino. Exciting! My first ever live radio interview. Tune in for scintillating revelations!

Last night, I got to go to Bumbershoot to see some readings from Wave Books and Copper Canyon (Erin Belieu, Matthew Zapruder, Arthur Zhe, and Eileen Myles) and hang out a little bit with the famous Poetry Bus Tour folks. A set of brave souls going by bus to fifty cities to do readings, picking up and dropping off poets along the way. Erin read from her new book, Black Box, and Eileen really blew me away with the new work she read, especially with a faux-sestina at the end. Good luck on your tour guys! Erin said she may be blogging about the tour for The Poetry Foundation’s journal-thing. She promised gossip!

A reminder for those of you females under 40 – the book prize just for you – Switchback Books’ Gatewood Contest has their final deadline on October 1, so submit!
Thanks to Editor-in-Chief Brandi Homan who has been graciously answering my many questions, I feel much more confident about launching my own little press in 2007.

And, fellow blogger poet Steve Mueske has his First Book Interview with Kate up now!

In other news, in the last seven days I have a. tripped and fallen down my stairs (damn flip-flop sandals!) b. seen the hilarious Little Miss Sunshine (go see it!) c. fallen even more in writer-crush with Margaret Atwood because of her interview in the September 2006 issue of British Harper’s Bazaar – she’s got a great answer to the interviewer’s question about why men feel comfortable reading her books.

Steve Irwin the Crocodile Hunter has passed away. It was very sad. He was only 44, about the age of my oldest brother. It was also one of the first times I ever saw the usually profane and insulting guys on the Aintitcool talkback boards actually write kind and moving words about another person. On the news, people kept announcing his death with a sort of “I told you so” sneer.

Good News Abounds!

Check out Aimee Nezkumathil’s interview in Kate’s First Book series – here’s a great quote – “I think little girls, especially, are trained early on to say sorry for everything: for being loud or too quiet, for being first, being last, for winning, for losing. But on the page, I know I can be as bold (or as nuanced) as I want to be. No apologies needed (unless they are to myself, during revision!).”

Tom C. Hunley (publisher of Steel Toe Books and a darn fine poet) and Steven Schroeder will both be featured on Verse Daily this week! (Tom’s poem Here!) (Steven’s poem Here!)

My friend Kathleen Flenniken will have a poem from her new book, Famous, on Poetry Daily this week on Friday.

Lana Ayers, another good friend, has a chapbook, “Love is a Weed,” now available from Finishing Line Press: http://www.finishinglinepress.com/2006newreleasesandforthcomingtitles.htm

Congrats to all of these great poets! We’ve got to celebrate 🙂

All right, friendly readers: I need your help. I’ve finally got myself organized to send out some submissions, but I’m flipping through my bookcase-o-lit-mags and wondering:
What are the best journals for prose poems? I haven’t really dallied with this form before but notice that many journals don’t publish these at all, or at least not often. I’ve already got Sentence on my list.
Tell me your picks! And a big thanks in advance!

I’ve got some new and welcome company at Steel Toe Books! Everyone congratulate Mary B!

The very cool Kate has an interview up with me at http://www.kickingwind.com/82006.html, where she has been interviewing poets about their first books. I’ve been following the interviews avidly for a while now, so I felt honored to be in the other poets’ company. I do think I sound much less sophisticated than the other poets. Read if you dare! (Warning: Anyone claiming there’s no such thing as robots may be a robot themselves.)

All right, feeling more myself, finally. Went to a fun reading last night by Elizabeth Austen and Christine Deavel at the new-age shop (with a great stage) SoulFood Books. I finally got some work done, yay! Maybe the lull in August is normal – after all, it seems like about 5,000 things start being due in September – job openings, book contests, lit mags, grant applications.

Any techies still out there reading this blog? If so, you may want to vote in the Made in Express contest where all the contestents (all men, by the way, what’s up, women of technology?) have created their own cool little projects, including a very interesting robot project. Disclosure: One of the contestents may be related to me. Hint: my father is a robot scientist. I’ll leave the rest up to you.
http://www.madeinexpresscontest.com/finalists.asp

Next, two items in the “Crass Commercial World o’ Poetry” Department…oh, the cynicism…

This note on What the Hell is Up With Your Author Photo…How much should we stress out over those book photos anyway? Well…see this article from Writer’s Digest…writersdigest.com/articles/hogan_bookjacket.asp
It talks about how a magazine sent out a post to PR reps for publishers in NYC asking to see pics of an “Attractive female writer, aged 25-35” for a feature they were doing. Which seems like style before substance, no? On the plus side, this matters more for multi-million selling fiction writers that poets.

Also, I saw an interesting ad somewhere for a $600 conference for first poetry book manuscripts, where participants got to hang out with key publishing folks (publishers from Four Way, Alice James, Tupelo, etc) and got manuscript critiques. It seems like it’s a lot cheaper option than an MFA for folks who are just trying to get a first book out there and don’t care about teaching. What do you guys think of this? Is it a trend? Do you think it’s worth it? I probably would have considered something like this, when I was pondering the big scary poetry publishing world four or five years ago and felt like a clueless outsider…

Been feeling down because of the whole, general state-of-the-world problems – you know, problems I can’t fix or control, like terrorism and flying and war. I know some people are like, turn off the news, you’ll feel better, but I know the bad is still out there, waiting. I keep having dreams about going into politics.
I did manage to make it out to the reading at Hugo House to celebrate the latest issue of Cranky, a great local mag, very eclectic. Saw many friends briefly. And the next day my husband dragged me down to Pike Place market to get flowers and coffee and generally cheer up. And that helped. I wrote a poem afterwards, which broke my over-a-week-long no-poem-writing spell. The poem was about a fox goddess. Actually, she was originally a human figure, and the foxes were her messengers, but I guess some of her worshippers now consider the fox to be the representation of her. And I watched a show on foxes on Animal Planet afterwards. Then read more Japanese mythology. So it all worked out.
Have not been sending out submissions. Bad me. I have new poems stacking up with no places to go. Must write a blurb and a review and do more homework. Sorry that you have to witness my “to do” list – but if I don’t keep track here, I’ll probably forget!
Oh, August, when will you become September?

Watched the Gen-Y friendly (pop cultural references to the Animatrix, Van Halen, Evangelion, and South Park, anyone?) anime series Fooly Cooly (Furi Curi? FLCL?) this weekend, and now I can’t get this song, “I Think I Can” by The Pillows, out of my head. Here’s a link to a video (which includes clips of the anime) so this song can be in your head too. Don’t say I didn’t warn you!
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-7821642967984690264
I ended up doing a full eight-hour day of real (non-volunteer, non-homework, non-poetry) work yesterday. Ah, the drives of capitalism.
I Think I Can!
PS – All anime viewing can be considered homework, since my thesis revolves around Japanese pop and mythological culture.

Is it me or has the news become so completely depressing it feels like a car landing on top of you in one of those video games every time you watch it? I barely scan the headlines, terrible, terrible. Injustice, destruction, rape, death, war. How to fight against this? In the comics, in a fight for earth, Wonder Woman versus Mars the God of War, Wonder Woman countered Mars’ Nazis with the Sermon on the Mount, with doves. In real life, what to do?

Also, on a not-related note, do not eat light ice cream that is made with eel blood. For more info, google “unilever ice cream eel” and see what you come up with. Organic only, baby! (Not responsible for nausea brought on by reading this story. Member FDIC. Not available in Alabama or Tennessee. Sorry Tennessee!)

The Blue Angels will be shutting down the 90 Bridge from the East side to Seattle on Saturday from 12-2:45, which screws up traffic. In case, for instance, you’re trying to get from Bellevue, Washington to a Saturday at 3 PM at The Richard Hugo House poetry reading/art show, I would recommend leaving early and taking a different route.

Oh yes, that’s right:

The Wild and Wicked Tour:

Co-sponsored by Richard Hugo House, The Wild and Wicked Tour presents readings of two new books of poetry from Steel Toe Books, “Becoming the Villainess” by Jeannine Hall Gailey and “Blue Positive” by Martha Silano, and a one-day-only display of artwork by the book’s cover artists, Michaela Eaves and Tom Collicott. 3-5 p.m. FREE. Hugo House’s Cabaret.

Totally worth it just to check out the artists’ killer work. Not that Martha and I are chopped potatoes, or anything. We’ll bring it. Oh yes.

In other news:
Check out our own Rebecca Loudon’s interview about her first book here:
http://www.kickingwind.com/80206.html
I love this series.