The Meaning of Rejection

Submittable calls it “Decline.” I like to refer to it as “Returned” when my manuscripts come back to me, which they still do more often than not. As an editor for Poetry South and a frequent submitter to many magazines, I have a complicated relationship with rejection. On the one hand, I have a tough skin because I return far more manuscripts than are returned to me. I get it when magazines send my work back — there are a lot of factors that are out of my control, so I shouldn’t take it personally. And yet, there is always an ounce of regret, even when I know better, when a magazine doesn’t accept my work.

Lately, I’ve been thinking of rejection more in terms of the poems I’m reading for Poetry South. Our default decline letter states that: “We know there are many excellent poems that we won’t find a place for or that won’t fit our needs for this issue.” Truer words were never spoken, and yet we also want to publish the best poems we receive. Does that mean that all the poems we send back were somehow inferior to the other poems that we accept? Not really.

You could look at the math. Right now, I’m reading for one month with over 60 submissions, which means I’m reading 240 poems. We take submissions 12 months a year. Our annual deadline is July 15, but we start receiving submissions for the following year on July 16 as of 12:01 a.m. So that means that if the month I was readng for were an average month, we would read 720 submissions and 2880 poems. It is not an average month. May, June, and July are our busiest months, when we anticipate getting 200-300 submissions a month. We’ll probably have that many from July 1 – July 15, and we get quite a few in the second half of July, too. We read year-round, though we often take a break from reading in August – November while we concentrate on putting together the next issue. What that means is that of the 240 or so poems that I’m reading right now, I can probably accept ten or fewer, since we aim for about 100 pages of poetry in our annual issue. There are tons of really good poems that I won’t be able to accept simply because if I did, I would fill up the magazine in no time.

Do we pick the best? We try. We are also human, and we are also trying to select the best poems for our next issue. That means that some really good poems won’t be selected. Some of those might be better than what we select but might not be a good fit for Poetry South or might not be a good fit for the issue that is developing. Sometimes we might overlook a “better” poem simply because we are not the best reader for that poem. Sometimes we might overlook a “better” poem because we feel the way it is formatted won’t work well in the pages of our magazine. Sometimes we’re tired. Sometimes we’re feeling the pressure of the poems we haven’t read yet or the ones that we know will be submitted in the coming months. We do our best to pick the best, but that term is subjective and relative and unfair. Please remember that when we send your poems back to you.

We also want to support new writers or writers who’ve been around for awhile and who show promise. Sometimes we accept poems by writers who’ve been sending to us for awhile because we want to encourage them. Sometimes we accept a poem by a writer who is in high school or college that may not be objectively “the best” but that shows a lot of promise. We don’t accept poems that we don’t like or that we think won’t fit in with our journal, but we do appreciate a poem that’s a little rough around the edges at times. We’re not looking for uniformity. We are looking for variety and for poems that challenge us in new and intersting way, even if they may not be “the best.” They are all the best for us at that moment when we accept them.

I want to be excited by every poem that we publish, even if that means we overlook some really good poems by well-published poets in the process. Because we know we do. We read your bios and know where you’ve published. We try not to to be too impressed by past successes, and we try to concentrate on the poems you sent us, not who you are, but we do notice. Often after we’ve made our decision about the poems.

When I send my poems out into the world, I know they will face the same inscrutable process. I know they need to land in the right person’s hands at the right time in order to have a chance of acceptance. I celebrate when they do, and I try to get them into other people’s hands as soon as I can when they come back to me. I try to remember myself as an editor when I submit my work, and to be gracious to those editors who spend their time and energy reviewing my poems. And I try to remember myself as a submitter of poetry when I’m reading everyone else’s poems, to give them the diligence they deserve and to look for the poems that will be right for us this year. And I look for the best, whatever that might mean for me at the moment, which is always affected by all the poems I’ve been reading, accepting, returning, or holding onto so I can read again before I make a final decision.

I know I am imperfect. I know I try to do my best, and I’m proud of all the poems we’ve published in Poetry South. Whether you call it “reject,” “decline,” or “return,” I hope that all the poems that go back to their poets will find their best place to be published. There are many, many other great magazines out there, and this gives me comfort every time I hit “Deline.” Somewhere else there is a better home for that poem, and I hope that it finds its home soon.

Wordle Strategy Redux

Today’s Wordle threatened to break my 81 game streak, but I paused for a moment, used strategy, and defeated the deceptively simple game.

Without giving away the word, I can say that I got four correct letters on my first try, made a good guess and got them all in the right place, guessed another good word and didn’t get that pesky fifth letter. That’s when I stopped guessing the word, as you can see by my results.

Wordle 1,052 6/6

🟨🟨🟨⬜🟩
🟩🟩🟩⬜🟩
🟩🟩🟩⬜🟩
⬜⬜⬜⬜🟩
⬜⬜🟨🟨⬜
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

With onlhy three more guesses, I realized that I should see how many other possibilities there might be. I quickly found at least six words that used letters I hadn’t already used in the blank space. Unless I guessed the right one in three tries, I would lose. So I chose three of those letters (all consonants) and made a word with them. None of those letter were right, so I tried again with the remaining letters. As you can see, one of those letters matched, so I could fill in the word with my last guess.

I’ve found that you lose when you keep guessing the word and there are too many possible words. This happens more often if you guess a lot of letters correctly in your first tries because then you’re reusing those letters whenever you try to guess the word.

I should have stopped after my second guess when I had all the letters I needed in the right place. The urge to guess the word right in the fewest number of tries lured me into guessing the whole word again. I should have tried different letters at that point, and I might have guessed the right one sooner or at least had a better chance of not running out of guesses. Fortunately, my better instincts kicked in soon enough, and I did give myself enough guesses to make it through the possible letters that could be the right one.

If I hadn’t gotten it on my fifth try, then maybe there would have only been one possible letter that I hadn’t tried, or if there were two, I would have had 50/50 odds. By that point, I was running out of consonants that I hadn’t used, so I knew that if I could guess six in two tries I ought to know which one I needed to use on my last try. And that’s how I saved my streak.

Is there a lesson here beyond how to play a silly game? Sure. It’s not always best to try to risk it all for immediate success, even when success seems immanent. Sometimes it’s best pause and consider all of your options. You might avoid making a costly mistake.

How Do You Know When You’ve Written a Poem? — A Dream Answer

In a dream last night, I was at an event aswering questions, and someone asked, “How do you know when you’ve written a poem?” I had a pretty good answer, or at least so it seemed in the dream. So let’s see how much I can remember here.

The first part of my answer was that you know when you’ve written a poem when you’ve been moved by something you wrote. We are always our first audience, so if it doesn’t move you, then it’s not likely to do much for someone else, and conversely, if it does move you, you may not need anyone else’s approval.

When that’s not enough, and you want your poem to join in a conversation with others, then you read other poems and compare what you’ve written to what else is going on out there. I recommend reading both contemporary poets from literary magazines and recent books as well as classic poetry or poetry from around the world. Expand your reading, and you will expand your poetry. Know what magazines are publishing, and you’ll have a better sense of where to send your work. But just remember that there are so many kinds of poetry out there. You can find your own space.

If you really want to test your poetry against others, then take a class like the workshop I’m teaching this semester. We’ll read lots of poems and discuss how poetry works. You’ll get confused, but hopefully out of that confusion you’ll also distill a clearer sense of your own about what makes a poem. If you want to get really confused, then join an MFA program, and we’ll talk about poetry and about writing for a couple of years, you will write a ton, and you will really develop your own sense of craft. But ultimately, it will still always come back to your primary audience, yourself as your first reader, and the other audiences you now know you want to reach.

But I knew that wasn’t enough for my dream interlocutor, who would probably want a more specific answer for what makes a poem. For me, something is a poem when it says at least one thing clearly, yet also is open to multiple levels of meaning and interpretation. Not everyone would agree, but I tend to like poetry that can be understoond on first read, at least on some level, and I like poetry that rewards multiple readings. Something is a poem when it is said in a way that there may be no other way that can quite say it. And something is a poem when its sounds and rhythms add to the multiple layers of meaning, when it is beautiful enough to be memorable or is disturibingly beautiful enough to be haunting. Something is a poem when you can hear it one day, come back and read it the next, pick it up again years later, and still find something in it you didn’t see the first time, or that you return to it over and over, even if the meaning doesn’t shift but because that meaning is so solid and so useful or so beautiful.

And as you are writing, something is becoming a poem when you can return to it over and over, and in revision you can continue to explore it and discover new meanings, new fascinations, and new ways to refine it, until you are done with fiddling and ready to let it go into the world as it is, when you can continue as its first reader to find newness in it that you didn’t realize when you wrote it. A poem is a poem when you can revisit it afresh with every new reading, and it doesn’t grow tired, even when you’ve moved on to writing new poems.

There are many kinds of poetry and many poets who challenge my definitions of poetry in productive and provocative ways (including my students who do that every day). And all of that can be poetry or some of it may be bleeding into fiction or creative nonfiction or other forms in interesting ways. To come back to my original answer: as long as it moves the writer, then it is poetry to them, and if it finds readers who are moved by it as well, so much the better.

Two Tiers of Pushcart Nominations

Did you know that there are two kinds of nominations for the Pushcart Anthology? I was looking through some old papers this morning and was reminded of the distinction.

The one most of us get is a nomination by the editors of a journal. Each editor of any literary magazine can send in up to six nominations each year. These can be any poem, story, or essay published in the year in question. If you think about it, this is quite an honor because an editor has selected your piece out of all the pieces that they have published in a year. I value every Pushcart nomination I’ve received because it tells me the magazine editors value my work enough to nominate it. Many magazines announce their nominees each year, which is a way to promote the magazine and to promote those writers. If there’s not a public announcement of nominees, I would hope that most magazines notify those nominated.

The other kind of nomination, though, is a little more impressive. That’s the letter I found when going through my files. I think at the time, I didn’t even realize there was a difference, but now that I’ve been a magazine editor and sent similar notifications to one or two of our nominees, I know the difference. This was a letter from The Literary Reveiw informing me that the Pushcart Prize editors had informed them that my poem “Persia” had been nominated for inclusion in the anthology. This means that the magazine had nominated me, and then the anthology editors had read my work and decided to send it on to the issue editor and judge of the contest. It’s like becoming a finalist or semi-finalist in a contest. My poem didn’t get the final nod from the editor for that issue, so I didn’t get in the anthology that year, but it did make it to that next round in the process.

Naturally, being selected for the Pushcart Anthology is the highest distinction. Getting nominated by a magazine initially is worth posting about and celebrating. Getting the nod to move on in the competition is an even bigger achievement. When I see people say in their bios that they are a Pushcart nominee, I always wonder which level they mean. For myself, I don’t make a big deal out of it anymore, though I was certainly proud and pleased when it happened. Finding that letter was a reminder that there’s a fair amount of confusion about what a Pushcart nomination means, so I thought I’d share my experience.

February Wrap-Up

February has been a busy, busy month. Even with the extra day that leap year afforded, it seemed to go faster than ever.

At Mississippi University for Women, our year began with the announcement of a new name: a name that went over like a lead balloon. So February started with a scramble to come up with another new name and to include more voices in that process. What was at issue? Many of our alums didn’t want a new name at all, but even those who recognized the necessity of a new name were not happy with the name that had been chosen, which took many of us by surprise. Alums wanted to keep the brand or nickname that the university has been known by for a long, long time: The W. Though that brand doesn’t say much to many people, for those who know us, that has been the name they knew for decades. So the new (new) name, which was announced early in the month needed to begin with a W. Ultimately, we landed on the name Wynbridge, since Wyn in Old English was the name of the character that stood for W (even though it didn’t look like the letter “w”), combined with “bridge” to emphasize a bridge from the past to the future, from current students to alumni, etc. Many didn’t like this created name much better, but the decision had been made that a historic name was too fraught with pitfalls.

Fortunately, I had a break from all of that when I went to AWP in Kansas City. Yes, we did talk about the name because I was with current students who wanted that conversation, and because people always bring it up even if they didn’t know about our attempts to change it. The controversy got us an article or two in Inside Higher Ed so some migth have actually known. But the conference was full of books, writers, publishers, panels, and lots and lots of interactions. I even got to hang out with some of my long-time friends from Knox. So in that sense, it was a break, even though it was both exhilerating and exhausting. I talked to two of my editors, met magazine editors, and even had a magazine write and ask me for poems. i didn’t have a lot of what they were looking for, so I even wrote a poem for them — or started it at the conference and finished when I got home.

I enjoyed meeting Eric from Fernwood Press and seeing their books with marvelous covers. I was also happy to be able to flip through several of their poetry books to see how they handled things like acknowledgements and bios. And meeting with my editor from Bloomsbury led to more serious discussions of a possible 2nd edition of A Writer’s Craft.

Coming back home meant catching up on all the things I didn’t do while I was away, along with a big push to support the new new name in the legislature, and then the news that the bill would never make it out of committee. Though that was disappointing after all the effort people had made (and I had been less active than others) in the end, it will probably be a good thing. Having more time will give the university a chance to build support for a name change, to let people get used to the new name or possibly come up with a better solution. Maybe the decision about historical names might also be revisited.

Meanwhile, I kept teaching my classes, got back to reading poems for Poetry South, and even applied for an artist fellowship from the Mississippi Arts Commission. And there’s a fair amount I’m leaving out because it’s the fairly mundane work of a department chair. Today, March 1, I was at the Mississippi Philological Association conference at the Mississippi School of Mathematics and Sciences (which is on our campus and held in our library), where I read seven poems on a panel with two other writers, and attended two other panels, all while trying to round up the last midterm grades in my department and taking part in a curriclum committee meeting by Zoom between sessions.

So my apologies for not getting a blog post out in awhile. I have been exploring Bluesky, Mastodon, and Substack, but haven’t been too active on my blog. Check me out there, especially on my Substack Newsletter if you’d like to see more about AWP or the latest developments on my books.

MFA Application Advice 2024

Now that it’s January, we’ve started to see some applications again for our low-residency MFA program for another year. This has me thinking about all the advice I’ve given to applicants over the years. If I could give one piece of advice on how to apply, I think it would be to just be you. Don’t stress too much about the process (I know that’s easier said than done), and do put your best effort into presenting yourself as the writer you are. A genuine application letter will always look better to me that one that seems to be someone trying too hard to be someone they are not.

A few years ago, I wrote a post on 15 Things to Do Before a Low-Res MFA (plus 5 bonus things). I meant this listicle to be somewhat tongue in cheek, since I don’t expect anyone to do all of those things. It was intended more as a way to think about when you might be ready to embark on an MFA than to judge whether someone is good enough. For instance, many successful applicants to our have never published in a literary magazine, but if they haven’t ever thought of doing that or don’t even know what a literary magazine is, then maybe they’re not ready to start their MFA. Or maybe they are, but they should know there’s a literary world out there that they will need to get to know.

Applicants may not have had time to revise their best work four times after graduating from college or after they wrote it, but they should be open and willing to revise, and they should be hungry for the kind of interaction they’ll get in an MFA program that can lead to revision. Applicants who want to be told that their writing is as good as it can possibly be should find other avenues for affirmation than an MFA. We don’t try to be cruel in our program (and some programs have that kind of reputation), but we are here to educate, and education means challenging students to grow and change. If that sounds exciting and invigorating, then an MFA is right for you. If it sounds debilitating, even when done in constructive and supportive ways, then maybe you should find another path.

When writing your letter of intent or statement of purpose, it’s great to mention some of the things on that list. It’s great to brag about your accomplishments, but if you don’t have many accomplishments, that’s not a deal breaker. Tell me your favorite magazine if you have one, tell me your favorite recent authors who have been publishing in magazines or books, tell me the styles or genres that float your boat, and describe who you are and where you’re from and/or where you hope to go with your writing. Don’t try to be the writer you think I want you to be, but instead write your best, well-crafted letter that shows me the kind of writer you are.

That’s my best advice for my program, and I expect it is good advice for just about any program. If you made yourself sound ‘better’ (and by that I mean different than you are, which is probably not really better after all), then you might get into a program you thought you wanted to get in, but it also might not really be the best program for you. It might be the best program for that ‘other you’ that you convinced them you were, but would you be happy becoming that writer? Maybe, maybe not. So relax, be yourself, and put your best foot forward. I’m confident that if you do that, things will work out for the best, especially if you do your research and apply to a number of programs that seem like they would be good for you.

In Praise of Traditional Small Press Publishers

First off, let me just say: I love books, even though I’ve long ago reached the age where I have way more books than my house and office can hold. That age came early for an academic, esp. an English professor who doesn’t like to get rid of books—and there are two of them, plus an avid reader offspring in our house, so we are surrounded by books, even when we do occasionally go through the painful process of culling.

This post is somewhat inspired by a Medium article on “New Ways of Bookselling.” I only read the title in the email roundup I get, since I haven’t been reading much on Medium, but this title reminded me of all the other articles I’ve seen lately about new ways of publishing. (Yes, I probably misread the title, scanning quickly, since the article is actually about “community building in art bookstores,” but it still sent me down this rabbit hole.)

People always seem to want to reinvent the wheel in publishing, and sometimes that leads potentially good opportunities for writers — serializing a book on Medium or Patreon or Substack, for instance, might make money for an author and not be that different than the 19th and early 20th century novels that were serialized in magazines. Magazines don’t do that anymore, as far as I am aware, though maybe we should.

Other ways of reinventing publishing seem to be aimed more at making money off of writers than providing a platform where writers can earn some income. The jury is out on Medium, Patreon, Substack and other platforms — will they work to the writer’s benefit or will they primarily enrich themselves on the labor of writers? It seems that if you work hard to make a name for yourself on these platforms, you can become successful, or at least some people can. That’s not the kind of author I want to be, so I don’t think I’ll use them as a publishing platform for anything more than a free newsletter (which I’m toying with on Substack—I mostly plan to use that to send news about my books, readings, etc., while I’ll keep this blog for other musings).

To me, Medium, Patreon, and Substack seem like a new take on self-publishing. Writers do all the marketing, all the editing, all the design, and all the production, what those platforms provide is the means to publish, and for that they do deserve a cut of the profits. What remains to be seen is how many writers can really make a go of it in that ecosystem and how many end up investing in the platform (on the platforms with fees) or investing a lot of their time and effort without much to show for it. These platforms may help writers make a name for themselves and earn some income, but they also don’t result in a physical book. I won’t be able to fill my shelves with Medium articles or even serialized novels. Libraries can’t lend them to their patrons, and used bookstores will have no value in them. I still love a hard copy book, in other words. But it is not just the book that I’m nostalgic for, it is the relationship with a publisher.

Over the years, really spanning my whole career as an author, there have been publishers that claimed to reinvent the traditional book publishing model, and they remind me why traditional publishing is so valuable, even today. When I first started trying to publish a book in the 1990s, there were four models, which are essentially the same today: vanity presses (where the writer pays a fee to print the book), self-publishing (which was still frowned upon), traditional publishing (small presses and the big houses), and co-op publishing, which at the time was a new model where the writer and the publisher both made an investment in the book.

Today, this model tends to go by the name “hybrid publishing,” rather than “co-op,” but the idea is really about the same, and I’ve seen more and more publishers who drop the “hybrid” and claim they are traditional publishers, though they tout innovative contracts that still leave more responsibility for the cost of the book in the hands of the writer. This may be in the form of pre-sales requirements rather than fees, or it may be in fees for editing or other “services.” Or it may mean a departure from the traditional royalty system. I would approach any of these publishers with a healthy dose of caution. If you’re willing to essentially self-publish and do all the work yourself, then you might gain something by publishing with a press like this, but you might also be just as well off publishing on your own.

The value of working with a traditional publisher comes primarily from the relationship you build. A publisher should be willing to invest in a book. They should design it, edit it (though editing isn’t as common as it once was, esp. in small presses), market it, send it to reviewers, distribute it to bookstores, and help the writer get out and sell the book at readings or other events. It has never been the case that the publisher does all the work after the writing, of course. Writers have always lined up blurbs for their covers, helped to find good reviewers, and promoted their work through readings. But a traditional publisher invests time and resources in taking the written manuscript and turning it into a book. It takes a team to do this well and to then ensure that the book is successful once it’s published. A publisher provides that team, makes that investment, and takes a healthy cut of the profits on the book sales as a result. The author’s cut is usually around 10% (my latest book contract is for 8% of the retail price, which is actually quite good compared to the royalty of 10% of the net price that I’ve seen in previous contracts—net price factors in the discount the retailer received when calculating the royalty, retail price is based on the cover price not the discount).

Why do I care so much about royalties when I know that my book of poetry will never earn me a ton of money? More than cash, it’s about respect. I want my poems to make money for the publisher. I want them to stay in business, and I want them to continue to sell my book. I respect the fact that they are investing time and money into my book, and I want a standard royalty that reflects the time and energy have put into the book and will put into promoting it. The “new,” “innovative,” or non-standard publishing models I’ve seen don’t seem to be based on the same level of respect.

When a publisher invests money and time in a book, they have an incentive to see it do well. The publisher is invested in selling the book as much as the writer is, maybe more so. When the writer pays fees or does all the leg-work to promote a book before it is even published, the publisher has little incentive to sell the book. Many of these publishers sell their books on their websites and maybe on Amazon or through Ingram. If they get them in bookstores, it is likely only due to the efforts of the writer or through special orders. The nontraditional publishing models I’ve seen seem set up so the publisher’s main incentive is to publish more books so they can generate more fees or get authors to drum up more sales. But since the publisher hasn’t invested in the book, they have little incentive to do the work of selling it. Sure, they’ll be happy with the sales generated by the author, but they are less likely to exert much effort themselves if they can find ways to get the author to do it.

Many of these publishers argue (I’ve read their literature) that publishing is moving in this direction anyway. It is true that even at the big presses writers end up doing more self-promotion than they used to. We are all on social media, we are all out there giving readings, visiting book clubs, publishing in magazines, and finding other ways to make ourselves known. There is less money from publishers for book tours, so more tours are self-funded (which has always been the case at small presses). And yet, I’ve never known a traditional publisher, even a small press, that didn’t do something to promote their books. If I’m going to have to do all the things for self-promotion, I’d rather have a committed partner with a traditional publisher who is also invested in making my book a success. I value the relationships I’ve built with traditional publishers, and I trust them to do right by my book. That’s what I’m looking for when I look for a press. For all its flaws, the traditional book publishing model has evolved in ways that make this respect possible.

2024 Writer’s Resolutions

Each year we make our resolutions and try to keep them. I’ve never been one to focus too much on losing the weight gained over the holiday (I trust I will as I get back to my morning walks and other routines and work my way through a few leftover treats). My resolutions tend to be about my writing life, and this year, I have a some built-in goals.

2023 was a very good year for my writing. I signed a contract with Fernwood Books to publish my fourth poetry collection, Tree Fall with Birdsong, and I had poems accepted for two anthologies: Southern Voices: The Power of Place and The Ecopoetry Anthology: Volume II. I also published poems in Peauxdunque Review and Birmingham Poetry Review.

The publication of a book comes with a number of built-in goals. By May, I’ll need to submit my final revision of the manuscript to the press and I’ll need to line up some poets to write blurbs for the cover and develop a list of places to send review copies. Those are three resolutions ready and waiting to be added to my list. A little less obvious, though, is the resolution to get out some targeted submissions of more poems from the manuscript to journals who I think could publish before the release date of may 2025. The anthology publications and a few well-placed poems will be a good way to get the word out about the new book.

Even more important, though a little less obvious, will be to continue to publish other poems, so my next resolution is to get even more serious about submitting new poems, especially those in my “Intergalactic Traveler” series. But since that series has now topped 20 poems is is finished or nearly finished, my next resolution is to focus more time on writing new poems. I have some ideas for poems, so we will see where this will lead. 2024 will be an exciting time as I gear up for the release of two anthologies and moy fourth collection of poem.

Ecopoetry Anthology: Volume II

Recently, I received news from Ann Fisher-Wirth and Laura-Gray Street that two of my poems “The intergalactic traveler tells it like it is” and “The intergalactic traveler in springtime” will be included in the new Ecopoetry Anthology from Trinity University Press, due out in 2025. Full disclosure: they accepted the first poem initially, which thrilling enough, then wrote back recently to see if the second poem was still available and if they could include it as well, to which, I of course said yes.

I’m very excited to see both of these poems published, especially in this anthology of Ecopoetry. The first volume really set the standard for defining ecopoetry, and this new volume brings that up to date with much more recent writing. I’m happy to be included, both because writing about the natural world has been an important aspect of my poetry since the beginnings in Landscapes and Architectures, and since my most recent poems have become more political, both on themes of ecology and climate change and on other social justice themes. That was one reason for taking on the persona of the intergalactic traveler: I felt a need to speak more openly about those issues and that perspective gave me license to do so.

I now have 21 Intergalactic traveler poems, which is nearly enough for a chapbook or a good amount for a cycle in fifth full-length collection, so I’ll have some decisions to make soon. I can only envision a couple more poems in this series since I’ve brought it to a good conclusion (or near one), though you never know. The poems I’ve been writing recently have taken a turn in another direction, though that’s one that would go well with these poems. It’s exciting to have a good start on a new project when Tree Fall with Birdsong is heading towards book publication.

More news on this anthology as publication nears!

My First Publication

Read the story of my very first publication, four translations of Paul Snoek in Pinchpenny in 1985, which I wrote about on my SubStack this morning.

I’m still looking for a good way to connect WordPress and SubStack, so in the meantime, I’m cross posting like this. I’ve connected WordPress to my Mastodon, Facebook, and LinkedIn accounts. Waiting for SubStack to make it easier, but for now, I’m trying to build some followers there and am linking to that from WordPress.