The Rumpus poetry feature today, New Pages mention, and more!
My poem “The Robot Scientist’s Daughter [brushes with death]” is featured up on The Rumpus today: http://therumpus.net/2012/04/
A nice early birthday present – thanks Rumpus!
Also, NewPages.com coincidentally featured a link to my old essay on Poemeleon on women poets and persona poetry here:
http://newpagesblog.blogspot.com/2012/04/women-writers-and-persona-poem.html
So thanks to New Pages too!
A lot of poets are born in April, aren’t they? Tracy K. Smith celebrated her birthday yesterday with a Pulitzer for Life On Mars, which I also celebrated as a win for “geek” poetry! And for scientist’s daughter poets everywhere. (Women poets whose fathers are scientists include Margaret Atwood, Louise Gluck, Tracy K. Smith, Kathleen Flenniken, and me.) Yay! On the down side, fiction writers everywhere were kicked in the teeth when they didn’t choose any winners for fiction this year. Ouch. Personally I think they should have picked Helen Phillips strange, wonderful collection And Yet They Were Happy.
Remember to pick up a ticket to the April 26 event at Hugo House, “Poets and Music.” Local musicians put some local poets’ work to music, including mine! Collaboration at its finest. Joy Mills is producing a song based on a poem, “Sleeping Beauty Loves the Needle,” from my upcoming third book. I feel really honored.
Here’s a link with more info:
http://www.strangertickets.com/events/4784131/the-bushwick-book-club-seattle-and-the-richard-hugo-house-present
Another beautiful sunny day today as we wind towards the end of October. We carved a huge pumpkin last night, and I’ve been craving pumpkin-related foods (pumpkin seeds, pumpkin pancakes, etc.) We’ve been in Napa almost a month now. I can’t believe it!
I’ve been remiss in announcing a couple of publications:
–A few poems and a review in the new “Gender” issue of Poemeleon
–A new poem, “The Robot Scientist’s Daughter Journeys West,” in issue 6 of The L.A. Review. (I don’t think the poem is available online, only in the print version. Sorry!)
Lots of good writer friends in both journals, including bloggers like Kelli R. Agodon, Deb Ager, and Diane Lockward.
In other writing news, I got an acceptance from a speculative journal I really like, and two more well-written, personalized rejections. I don’t know what’s up with all these personal, positive rejections – do the editors have more time to do this these days? Are editors getting nicer? I like getting notes on particular poems – it makes me feel like someone is really reading them, as opposed to the form rejections, where you don’t know if anyone really did.
Still haven’t gotten to San Francisco – one, because I’m on crutches, and two, because I’m still fighting back against the mother of all tummy bugs that’s been bothering me for almost two months now. (I’ve resisted taking the scary antibiotics for it, because of the listed side effects such as hallucination and numbness of the hands and feet – and oh yes, nausea and vomiting, which are exactly what you want more of with a tummy bug – but my resistance is crumbling…) On the plus side, the ankle shows encouraging signs of improvement, and hopefully the stomach will soon as well!
In reading news, I discovered a new, California-based journal called The Normal School, which has a magazine-like layout and some really funny stuff, including an essay by Ander Monson on his wikipedia entry and self-googling habits. I might look for some funny poems to send them…
Things have been going a little slower on the “walking” front that I had hoped. I’d hoped I’d be easily walking about by now (it’s been almost seven weeks!) but I’m still barely hobbling around, still in the cast and still mostly via wheelchair. At least my hand cast is off – but the right hand still isn’t strong enough to use a crutch. My immune system went bonkers this month and I’m really anemic (just had a bunch of new blood tests) so that may be why the healing is a little slower than normal. And to that I say, Meh!
On a happier note, I found out I was nominated for two different poems for the Rhysling Award, and the poems will appear in the Rhysling anthology for 2008. Next year, I’m going for three! For those of you who haven’t heard about it, it’s an award for science fiction and speculative poetry; previous winners include Margaret Atwood, Ray Bradbury, Isaac Asimov, Jane Yolen, and Ursula Le Guin. Thanks to Poemeleon and Mythic Delirium for the nominations…in the words of academy award starlets, I’m honored just to be nominated.
We’re doing our taxes, always exciting. This year (2009) isn’t shaping up to be as financially helpful as last year, at least so far. That’s probably a common story – the downturn affects everyone, even poets! Speaking of which, buy my book (here – signed book and free broadside included! – or here,) buy a book from your favorite small press, go to a reading – keep the poetry economy (such as it is) going! I am thankful for the organizations that donate to poets, to the universities that pay poets to give readings and classes, to literary magazines that pay the small amounts they can and the publishers who pay our small royalty checks, to the individuals who buy poetry on a regular basis. The little things really do add up.
