June Gloom, Art is Good for the Soul, Book Ranks, AmWriting, Book Launch Approaching
Yes, though most of June has been an undifferentiated mass of grey skies and chilled, sixty-ish weather in the Great Pacific Northwest, the day after another lunar eclipse, the sun shines down out of blue skies on us. It makes me feel optimistic. Plus, yesterday I had blueberries, and we all know they are a superpowered fruit! (And I may have had a couple of recent poetry acceptances – after some small flurry of rejections – from lit mags with initials COR and APR to cheer me up as well!)
Today I am going downtown to meet up with awesome artist Deborah in her studio. I may also make a quick trip to check out the new exhibits up at Roq La Rue (since our bridge to downtown will be closed all weekend…)
I thought you all might enjoy this longish lyrical essay on the pitfalls of saying: I am writing.
Mary Biddinger made me aware of this new evil Amazon thing: tracking Hot New Poetry Releases. My new book is right now, at this second, #61. Now we authors can torture ourselves not only with overall rank, but how our book is ranking with other hot new books! Oh, the humanity! (Did I mention today was the first day my new book has a rank?)
Kristy Bowen joins the discussion of book poetry contests started a few weeks ago on HuffPost. She points out, quite rightly, that getting it to some independent presses without being friends with right clique is even less likely than winning a poetry book contest. Thank goodness for independent presses that look outside their own circles for likely talent! Like my presses (Thank You, Steel Toe Books and Kitsune Books, for taking a chance on me!) This is what I would say to poets trying to get their books published: I think you have to try all the avenues to know which avenue is the right one for you.
OK, sorry for that cranky rant yesterday. I just get very irritated when poets, of all people, on the Poetry Foundation site, of all places, complain about how hard it is for them to read poetry. Grr.
So, on to happy news of some friends:
Aimee Nezhukumatathil’s poem “After Challenging Jennifer Lee to a Fight” will be featured today on Garrison Keillor’s Writer’s Almanac on NPR. You can read and listen to it here: http://writersalmanac.publicradio.org/programs/2007/10/15/#thursday
Laurel Snyder’s new book is out! Say hi!
Mary Biddinger not only has organized poetry shelves but will become the Editor of the Akron Series in Poetry! Go congratulate her!
Postcard from Ohio and New York…
Well, I’m worn out – you couldn’t ask for two better hostesses than Mary Biddinger at University of Akron and Aimee and Dustin at SUNY Fredonia! I loved meeting all their students, the audiences for the reading were so enthusiastic (25 minutes of Q&A at Akron!) and it was just a pleasure to hang out with the lovely and talented Mary and Aimee, talking about poetry and lit mags and babies and lip gloss.
Here are few pics of the fun:
In good news, look for Mary Biddinger today on Verse Daily!
In other news:
My poor sweetie has been so sick, the doctors think he has ‘walking pneumonia.’ I took him to the hospital for chest x-rays today. He’s on the same antibiotics I was taking last week, and they gave him an albuterol breathing treatment at the dr office. Think good thoughts for his speedy recovery!
Still don’t know where I’ll be living after the end of May, and still interviewing for jobs. I wouldn’t mind some good thoughts in that direction too!
In good news, Smartish Pace, after having a review I’d written since 2005 of David Lehman’s last book, finally published it this week! There’s a link to it on the front page, and here’s a direct link:
http://www.smartishpace.com/home/dynamic.html?reviews_lehman.html
I’m finishing up a review of Ivy Alvarez’ Mortal as well. And I’ve started up a (still, fairly lame and new) blog for Crab Creek Review, whose web site has proved more challenging for me than I expected, due to its programming – a Unix server, old PHP programming, old server-side includes – I’ve programmed web pages with Microsoft technology for so long (um, 15 years?) it’s a shock to my system! I’m not even sure exactly the way to change the price of the subscription because I’m not sure of the code in the order form! And the CSS form looks like something I’ve never seen. I don’t understand having a CSS – I mean, there’s barely any style to the Crab Creek pages right now, why do they need such a complicated style sheet? I could remake the site from scratch, like I don’t already have enough to do…
More mini-review madness
Mary Biddinger’s Prairie Fever:
Don’t expect any mild-mannered nature poetry about prairie wildlife here, although wildlife does appear, torn and bedraggled, birds dead on windowsills, red flowers appearing on throats. Full of dark fragmentary looks at the inner and outer violences of the bored bad girls of the prairie, poking dead bodies with sticks, rinsing their hair with beer, and making out in abandoned barns. Stark, vivid writing illuminating shadows with lightning-sharp imagery and bone-cracking emotion.
Did some more Expedia work today, then combed Craigslist for places to live, which were all too expensive, which made me comb Craigslist for more part-time work. All in all, depressing.
In reading news:
Peter’s new book reading at Open Books was standing room only, and Peter was wonderful. His new book even has a couple of mythology-alluding poems in it! You know I’m a sucker for those. Here’s the first few lines from “Case History: Persephone:”
“The visiting surgery resident
inserts the icy speculum
while the mother stands nearby
clutching her only daughter’s pale hand.
Outside the window – a barren
January day. The long fields lie empty,
their edges stitched with bare trees.”
Isn’t he a great poet?
Does anyone write nicer rejection slips than The Atlantic…
Since they’ve gotten a new poetry editor? Yesterday in the mail, on typed heavy paper, was the following note:
Dear Jeannine Hall Gailey,
Diverting poems, especially those that find you flexing your wit – after sifting through submissions upon an afternoon, I’m inclined to think that maybe we should all take a leaf from your little brother and read more poetry that doesn’t begin with I. Alas, our backlog is diabolical at the moment, and we’ll have to pass with regrets. Many thanks all the same for the chance to see more of your work.
Sincerely,
David Barber
Poetry Editor
It was very clear the editor had actually read and responded to the poems, (including a reference to a line in a poem “My Little Brother Learns Japanese” which goes “He reads poem/that do not begin with ‘I’”) which is a rarity these days in the cold literary mag market. Not only that, he responded in a timely manner, with mild encouragement but no promises – a perfect kind of rejection. I mean, if the Atlantic, who gets hundreds of thousands of submissions a year, can be so civil, in a note that got back to me in less than three months – why can’t other literary magazines do more than an inch of printed paper with a pre-printed “Thanks but no Thanks” after ten or eleven months? It makes me want to submit only to places as nice as these guys. Tell me your “best rejection slip” stories – share your stories of nicer-than-expected editors. Let’s praise those who make an effort to actually encourage us!
The Post-MFA Blues
I don’t want to discourage anyone in the middle of an MFA program, or those who are thinking about attending. But I will say that since graduation, I have experienced more of a letdown/depression/slow leaking out of hope than anything I’ve experienced since my total health breakdown of a few years ago. What I wonder is, Why? I didn’t go into an MFA program expecting really anything out of it, except for time to write (which I got – enough to finish one first book and get a good start on a second) and some feedback and encouragement (which I got, wonderful feedback from wonderful mentors.) I didn’t expect graduating with some extra letters to change my life, land me a dream job in publishing or academia, or some kind of mystical “now my writing life can begin” aura. But still, now that I’m out, and settling into the daily grind of freelance work for “the Man,” house-related chores, and writing without deadlines or feedback, I feel less inclined to write or submit, I double-think new poems or chuck them. I don’t want to send my new book manuscript out. I think I’m stuck in a negative-thinking pattern, and I don’t know how to get out. Any advice from others who’ve got through post-MFA blues?
In answer to the above, see The Atlantic’s article, So You Want to be a Writer?
And, go check out Mary Biddinger’s new book cover!
