Have Words Will Travel

Yesterday I got my Fall/Winter 2008 copy of Nimrod in the mail, all glossy-covered, thick, smelling of paper and ink.  You know what I’m talking about.  Glorious.  It was even more glorious because it was the awards issue, where I expected to see my poem “Upon Cutting My Thumb While Reading Ariel,” which was a semi-finalist for the Pablo Naruda prize.  Plus, the poem had already been accepted by them for publication before I thought to enter it in the contest (which was their suggestion.)

So imagine my dismay when I eagerly scanned the table of contents to find nary a sign of my name.  It’s only two pages of contents, but I must have read those two pages seventeen times looking for my name.  Surely I’m just overlooking it, I thought, scanning more and more slowly.  As if I wouldn’t spot my own name, right?  My poem wasn’t anywhere in the book.  My stomach sank.

I was going to send a polite inquiry to the editor.  I sat down to type it up when it occurred to me that I should get my acceptance letter and make sure I was addressing the correct editor.  I dug it out of the file.  And right there, in paragraph three, it says, “Publication will be in the ‘Awards 30′ issue of October 2008, or, depending on space and appropriateness of material, one of our two 2009 issues.”

Oh.

While I’m relieved that my poem likely wasn’t lost or overlooked, I am disappointed.  I’ve been on pins and needles for months waiting for this one to arrive.  Now it’s another 6 or 12 months before I’ll see it in print.  Ah well.  The poet’s life is not one of immediate gratification, as this experience has so frustratingly reminded me.  You can bet, though, that even without the inclusion of my poem (ha) this issue of Nimrod will be a good one, and I’m looking quite forward to reading it.

It’s been a bit of a dry spell with my poetry since the end of the semester.  I think summer is a difficult time for me and poetry because of the kids.  They’re home and wanting to be entertained, and I have a hard time being in work mode when I’m doing the mommy thing all day.  Especially when there is so much to do outside.

Submissions, of course, are a little off that schedule because they vary so much in terms of response time and typically take months from the time the submission is sent.  However, I have ten-or-so submissions out there, several of which I should have heard from a month or two ago and haven’t yet.  I’ve been compulsively checking the mail every day, but no SASE’s to be found.  Dry spell, indeed.

Finally, last night I heard via email from Alehouse Press that one of the poems I entered in their Happy Hour Poetry Award contest was chosen for their 2009 issue (coming out in November 2008) and is in the group that will be judged for the finals.  The prize money is really good, so I’ve got my fingers crossed.  The poem was one of those magical ones that comes out almost perfect in the first draft (which hardly ever happens for me) so just maybe…

It seems that my little hiatus is over.  I woke up this morning raring to go, and the minute I got back from dropping my daughter at camp, I launched myself into preparing submissions.  I’ve been getting a lot of contest notifications, so I ended up preparing three contest submissions: one for single poems, one for a chapbook manuscript, and one for a full book-length manuscript.  I have several more to do.  The reading fees may kill me, though, which  I suppose is why so many poets object to the whole contest dealio.   Still, I’m encouraged by the Nimrod placement, and it seems like contests are the only way to get a book deal anymore, so as long as I have the lettuce, I’ll keep submitting.

The thing that is so hard to believe is that it took me two hours to prepare three submissions.  Obviously I need to streamline my process.

I reckon I’ll spend the afternoon doing some non-contest submissions, since I haven’t sent any since May, and then I’ve got poems to respond to for my fellow students.  It feels good to jump back in.

This morning, with his customary clatter, my mailman flung our post through the door slot and onto the floor of our entryway.  It consisted of a Macy’s bill and sale catalog, along with a letter from Nimrod.  Imagine my surprise when I opened it up to find I’d been named a semi-finalist for the 2008 Pablo Neruda Poetry Prize.  Wow!  They were already going to publish the poem I’d submitted (titled “Upon Cutting My Thumb While Reading Ariel“), but now I can tell my parents I’m a “prize-winning poet.”  Or maybe not, since I only made it to the semi-finals.  Hm.  Either way, it’s encouragement and validation, which in this business is priceless.

I haven’t posted in a few days, but not for lack of poetry. I’ve actually been super busy finishing up the semester. As of Friday, I will have completed all my requirements to graduate. Woooo! The thesis is actually done and on its way to my advisor, but that was the easy part. Not that it was actually, easy. I don’t mean to sound flip, because two years of intense work went into it, but I don’t find writing poems to be psychologically wrenching the way writing reviews and critical essays is. And there is a review between me and the end of the semester, so I’m pecking away at it this week. I have to pull out all my tricks to get it done without too much agony — such as writing a page, then rewarding myself with an hour of reading or something. I know, suck it up and write the thing already!

I will say that the book I chose to review is actually a great pleasure, so that’s positive. I’m reviewing Natasha Trethewey’s Native Guard, which won the Pulitzer, and it is a stunning book. I’m going to have a hard time finding anything critical to say. Actually, I take that back — I do have one suggestion that I think would have improved it, which has to do with the ordering of the poems and the division into sections, but you know it’s all so subjective anyway.

I must be off now to run a couple of miles on the treadmill (writing does involve a large amount of time sitting on one’s posterior, after all) but I’ve downloaded the first part of Whitman’s Leaves of Grass to listen to on my iPhone while I run. I’ll report back as to whether it helps or hinders.