devil's lake

have you read devil's lake? it's wicked! ha, ha, ha, ha.

ok, seriously: it's a fine online journal.

they've only published one issue, but it's a wonderful issue. i'm fond of this poem, and this poem, and this poem.

and the mini-interviews are full of stunning sentences: I think war is an erasure of personal experience. It is an erasure of the importance of the individual. I meant there to be a kind of terrible irony in that line. War does make the individual unimportant. It is a reduction of individual life to an absurdity.

and guess what? the devil is accepting submissions!

3 bits

i got a poem picked up by salt hill!
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The film Howl is structured in three parts: a reenactment of the trial (the weakest aspect of the film, due in large part to the distracting star quality of Jon Hamm as the defense attorney), scenes of Ginsberg talking to a reporter (which sketch out his basic biography), and the poem itself.
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chickens!

good stuff

have you read the review review?

it's pretty cool.

it features reviews of lit magazines and interviews with editors.

and tips!

i like tops. oops! i mean: i like tips. yes, that's what i like. tips! tips! tips!

bits

the yurt master lives!
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october is almost here. i have an application to finish before the week is over. which means i have to revamp my CV, and to finish a project abstract. yikes.
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i think norman dubie would write an amazing yurt master poem.
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love: cold war by janelle monáe.
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i hate revamping my CV.
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the snow, the snow, the snow: i miss winter.
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i've written two new drafts this week. not bad. well, not bad for me. i'm a slow writer so two new drafts is something special in my little world.
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my right ear hurts a bit.
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love: helicopter by deerhunter.
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kiss me, i'm an illegal alien!

INHERITANCE: OIL ON LINEN: ROSS BLECKNER: 2003

More work here.

Ray McDaniel on Valerie Martínez

...careful, minimalist approach characterizes all of Each and Her. Martínez employs several methodologies, but embraces none fully; she steps away from completion repeatedly.

love this

from Stephanie Kartalopoulos over at the 32 Poems blog:

So, dear readers, navigate this year with me as I schlep my stuff to contests, spend money on my manuscript, and think about the glories and pitfalls of this whole process.

good advice

I retype my poems from scratch several times throughout my writing process now. It helps me shake off any unnecessary words or phrases, like how transplanting a potted plant allows you to shake loose the old, unhealthy soil.

73 Poems for 73 Years

from Tayari Jones:

On Tuesday, September 21, hundred of people gathered in Harrisonburg, Virginia to celebrate the life of Lucille Clifton. It was one of those experiences that made me remember why I love my life.

More pics here.

Matthew Zapruder

...poems can be a process of unfolding, one that might welcome us, or maybe grudgingly allow us, to be inside it. Poems do not have to be all about the revelation, the learning at the end. They aren't necessarily goal-oriented. If anything they are more like a conversation with a friend. You start talking, you learn something, you double back, you get confused, you misunderstand, you laugh, you have some different feelings, you drift off...

American Amen

"...maybe Gary L. McDowell didn’t set out to write a big fat hymn to the human condition. But he did. The brilliant American Amen wrestles, body and spirit, with our belligerent world."
- Amy Newman

order a copy here

manuscript blues

i printed out my manuscript last night. five sections. around 50 pages. good lord, that number really depresses me. i've spent the last 6 years of my life working on this collection and all i have is 50 pages! granted, i've written about 30 more pages of work, but i don't want those poems in my first collecton. why? those poems now bore me or they don't belong in the manuscript. and i have been ruthless, dead reader. i have exiled poems that have been published in good places like the nation or quarterly west.

okay, eduardo, calm down. inhale. think of cats and rainbows. think of flowers and oranges. inhale deeply...

don't you love freshly printed manuscript pages? i do! the pages are so crisp and white. i love the smell of the ink. the way the font (new times roman) seems to leap from the white of the page. i love the slight heft of the manuscript. oh i love freshly printed manuscipt pages!

okay, now the really bad news:

i could only see the gaps in the order as i flipped through the manuscript. there should be a short lyric here. there should be a funny moment here.

but i'm not going to let those nagging doubts get me this time. we all have those doubts, right? i'm going to work through those doubts. i'm going to remind myself: a collection is made up of valleys and peaks.

dear reader, i promise this to you: i'm going to submit! i will send the manuscript out this fall. i have to let these poems go. i'm sure they will find a home. well, let's hope they find a home!

i will post pics next month: of me slipping maunscripts into large envelopes, of me sending off those large envelopes.

you will be my witness, dear reader.

look at this!

Larry Levis Documentary Trailer from Virginia Commonwealth University

Click here.

Question: Isn't that Charles Wright narrating the beginning??

steve fellner

...there cannot be enough good things to say about Rigoberto Gonzalez. Much to his own detriment, he has tirelessly spent time promoting marginalized authors and small presses. Not only does he write so many reviews, he has during his tenure as a member of the National Critics Circle spotlighted so many worthy poets.

first book interview: jehanne dubrow

I know too many people who feel frozen as long as the first book is unable to find a home. As a result, they stop writing new poems. Then, once the first book finally finds a publisher, many of these poets have so lost the habit of writing that they have no idea what’s next. I know one poet who has been revising a first collection for 15+ years. This poet can’t move on to something new, because the first book remains a looming and oppressive presence.

early morning bits

it's 6:00 am and i'm blogging from a starbucks.
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The Baltic Writing Residency
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benjamin alire saenz has a blog!
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okay: just got a rejection from field magazine in my inbox. good morning! ha. this is the third time these two poems have been rejected by a journal. my poor babies.
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the world is full of apples.
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i just checked my account over at field's online submission manager. in bold red font next to my name it says: DECLINED. that's harsh.
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i don't work today. thank goodness. i need to revise and to read.
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my head is starting to ache. it might be all the caffeine in this big cup of coffe that i'm drinking.
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i haven't had a poem accepted in over 8 months! tough times. i am waiting to hear from one more journal.
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somedays you feel like a rock star. some days you feel like a rock.
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declined!

hottie of the week: mark sanchez

Jeannine Hall Gailey on Mary Ruefle

Her language is simple and direct, even when the poem itself is not; one of the enjoyable paradoxes of reading Ruefle’s work is how easy it is to read, but how many possible meanings you can make. Though sometimes described as an experimental or “post-avant” poet, I have always found Ruefle’s work intelligently accessible, charming and reader-friendly. Her poems tend to absurdism – a poem titled “Barbarians” describes a field of lounging cows, while “My Happiness” follows a meandering porcupine.

Salt Hill now accepts online submissions

Salt Hill is a literary and arts journal published twice a year. We publish outstanding new poetry, prose, translations, reviews, essays, interviews, and artwork. Submissions are accepted between August 1 and April 1 of each year.

The journal prefers online submissions but you can also send via snail mail.

Good to know!

Personals

Some nights I sleep with my dress on. My teeth
are small and even. I don't get headaches.
Since 1971 or before, I have hunted a bench
where I could eat my pimento cheese in peace.
If this were Tennessee and across that river, Arkansas,
I'd meet you in West Memphis tonight. We could
have a big time. Danger, shoulder soft.
Do not lie or lean on me. I'm still trying to find a job
for which a simple machine isn't better suited.
I've seen people die of money. Look at Admiral Benbow. I wish
like certain fishes, we came equipped with light organs.
Which reminds me of a little known fact:
if we were going the speed of light, this dome
would be shrinking while we were gaining weight.
Isn't the road crooked and steep.
In this humidity, I make repairs by night. I'm not one
among millions who saw Monroe's face
in the moon. I go blank looking at that face.
If I could afford it I'd live in hotels. I won awards
in spelling and the Australian crawl. Long long ago.
Grandmother married a man named Ivan. The men called him
Eve. Stranger, to tell the truth, in dog years I am up there.

c.d. wright

Porochista Khakpour: NY Times Op-Ed

A deep dark admission: lately — and by lately I mean this era I worked so hard for, when a liberal person of color, a man who resembles my own father, would be our president — I’ve found myself thinking secretly, were certain things better in the George W. Bush era? Was it easier to be Middle Eastern then?

Small Press Spotlight: Barbara Jane Reyes

I do think of Diwata as a feminist text and feminist project; in the most basic terms, each female figure is the native woman telling her own story, speaking her way out of dispossession, rather than succumbing others’ objectified versions of her

Johannes Göransson on MFA Rankings

I also disagree with Seth in his statement that “community” of peers is more important than faculty. Absolutely untrue. But a very Iowa Ideology way of putting it. You obviously learn very different things from peers and faculty. Iowa’s rhetoric has always been: this is just two years of funding for you to write an interact with other writers, the teachers don’t really do anything. But of course they do! This rhetoric – which Seth seems to have totally absorbed – is a way of dealing with the problem a lot of people have with the idea of teaching art: according to romantic ideals (which are on full display at U of Iowa), art cannot be taught, it must be just achieved based on “Talent” etc. To deal with the contradiction, Iowa always pumps out that rhetoric. But it’s of course false, students absorb a lot of rhetoric and aesthetics from their teachers (witness Abramson’s rhetoric). The problem with Iowa is not that they don’t teach, it’s that they pretend they are not teaching while teaching!

dig the title. dig the cover image.

Read some poems HERE.

Call for Submissions: ReBound Chapbook Series

The ReBound Series expands the mission of Seven Kitchens Press to bring new and/or underappreciated writers to a broader audience by reprinting out-of-print chapbooks in select new editions.

More info here.

Greatest Hits Vol. #1

holy mother of blurbs! i was skimming through my blog archives and i found some posts that made me cringe. i've said some crazy things, dear reader. don't believe me? here's a sample:

Someone keeps arriving at my blog by Googling "Ted Mathys." Is it you, Ted? I know we all Google ourselves but this is getting ridiculous. Stop it, Ted. You know what happens when you self-Google too much. Though I wouldn't say no to your hairy palms...


This year at AWP I will:

point at poets
refuse to make eye contact with people manning the tables of obscure journals
lick Tony Tost's belt buckle
pout in a bar
walk up to Bob Hicok and ask, "Aren't you SpongeBob?"
shout out brown-nosing is evil!
ask Nick Carbo for a hug
reveal that I'm carrying Christian Wiman's baby
not buy books out of pity for the author
ignore Sabrina Orah Mark
laugh
proclaim the death of poetry
pass myself off as Virgil Suárez
slip rejection slips into the pockets of editors
growl at Cole Swenson
kiss a fool
praise Reb Livingston's unibrow
walk up to Ben Lerner and ask, "Are you gay?"
pass myself off as "Latino"


I'm having a baby! Anthony Robinson got me pregnant. Or was it Jordan Davis? Adam Clay? Josh Corey? Liam Rector? James Galvin? Robert Bly? Oh boy. This calls for a DNA test.


Yesterday, I went to a reading celebrating the latest issue of Ninth Letter. Wine and stinky cheese were up for grabs afterwards. The graduate students freaking tore up the wine and cheese! I had to stand back from the cheese table because I feared one of them would bite off my fingers.


I don't like it when people say my poems are beautiful. Beautiful is easy. Any fool can write a beautiful poem


It's so easy to make young children laugh. I had my nephews and niece rolling on the floor each time I said, "I pooed a little pony!"


I'm currently reading the spring/ summer 2008 issue of Hayden's Ferry Review. And it doesn't suck. In fact, I like the art and the poems in the issue. Color me surprised.


I made a snow angel this morning. I threw myself onto the snow and did that wing-like motion a few times and presto: a chunky snow angel was born!


I'm seriously in love with James Allen Hall. Funny as fuck, sweet as fuck. I want to give birth to his baby. But he's also a bottom. Too bad, James. Maybe artificial insemination? And oh yeah, his book sold out at AWP. I bought two copies.


don't you love it when some bloggers claim they don't do colonies because they have no need for them? ha. we all know the real reason they have no need for them: they know they can't get in.

NEA Supported Residencies at the VCCA

Fellowships for Artists of Limited Economic Means
Fellowships for Artists of Minority Ethnic Heritage

Deadline: Deadline is September 15, 2010.

More info here.

Peter Balakian

Watching the Towers Go Down

bird ave bits

do you remember this song? i loved it back in the day!
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paula bohince: I think it is one narrative suggesting a larger one.
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brenda cárdenas: There is definitely an aesthetic, artistic stance behind my code switching
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javier o. huerta: ...I went to see Lorna Dee Cervantes read in the Heller Multicultural Lounge at UC Berkeley. She explained how she grew up in San Francisco on a street called Bird. It was actually an avenue so the street sign read “Bird Ave.” She thought it interesting, she said, that the street sign was bilingual.
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i don't add spanish to my poems to "spice" up the poem, or to bewilder non-spanish speakers. i only keep the spanish words/ phrases that come to me during the writing/ revision stages. the spanish is the next step in the narrative, in the music, etc. i don't italicize the spanish or "explain" it. if the reader doesn't read spanish, i am willing to lose the reader for a few words or a line or two. i trust the rest of the poem will catch the reader.
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richard rodriguez: The suburban grid belies America's disorder. Grandma's knockoff Louis Vuitton handbag is so full of meds it sounds like a snake rattle. Grandma shares a secret addiction with her drug-addled dude of a grandson, whose dad prowls the Home Depot parking lot in his Japanese pickup, looking to hire a couple of Mexicans to clear out some dry scrub.
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gertrude stein says: a rose is a rose is a rose.
josé montoya says: arroz is arroz is arroz.
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Report from the Temple of Confessions in Old Chicano English
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some might say i am interested in bewildering non-spanish speakers. not true. i'm interested in privileging spanish speakers. big difference, no?
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oh yeah! here's another jam from back in the day!

hey jotos! don't forget about this

Recognizing the critical need for Queer Chicano men to document their stories, break bread with one another and create artifacts for generations to come, this fall Kórima Press will be releasing its first anthology: joto (ho-toh) v.

Embodying a complex and ever-evolving identity, Queer Chicanos hold stories that emanate from the intersections that permeate, constitute and surround our bodies. This anthology seeks to live as a codex of such stories.

Kórima Press seeks poetry submissions from Queer Chicano men writing from and about the spaces of (un)documented desires, racialized nation-states, contested and reclaimed tongues, and overcrowded kitchen tables. Imagined as an amalgamation of Polaroid snapshots, all poetry written from, about, resisting and/or reacting to Queer Chicanismo are welcome. Submissions of any language and combination thereof are accepted.

Deadline: September 30, 2010

Full guidelines HERE

2010 AMANDA DAVIS HIGHWIRE FICTION AWARD

from McSweeneys

This memorial award is intended to aid a young woman writer of 32 years or younger who both embodies Amanda's personal strengths—warmth, generosity, a passion for community—and who needs some time to finish a book in progress. The book in progress needn't be thematically or stylistically close to Amanda's work, but we would be lying if we said we weren't looking to support another writer of Amanda's outrageous lyricism and heart.

full guidelines here

for steve fellner

WITNESS now accepts online submissions!