poetically challenged

Since that time, the site has closed down and we’ve all moved on to other things.   Jason has come up with something that is very exciting.  He is one of the founders of a new online lit magazine, Sloth Jockey.  I am excited about the site, and expect to see some edgy, solid content there.

Stop by to submit, or at least read the work that will be appearing there soon.

For some time now, I have been intending to start writing literary essays (in English!) and submitting them for publication.  Somehow, it has eluded me, and I have always found myself writing poetry instead.  But since I have started taking my class, that has changed.  Somehow, the writing of essays seems to just be in my brain now, and it seems to have carried over from Chinese class into my creative writing space.

I think it is about organization.  An essay is organized very differently than a poem.  I think that putting my brain into gear for essays for class has made it so that I just see things that way at the moment.

What you write, when it comes down to it, depends on how you see the things around you.  For me, for now, I am seeing things as essays.  And that’s a new adventure for me in my writing.

Response time is usually 4-6 months.

After having posted last week about receving three rejections in one day, I was especially pleased to receive word yesterday that another of my poems has been accepted for publication in Scifaikuest, a top-notch magazine specifically focused on scifaiku and related genres (science fiction minimalist poetry).

I was all the more relieved because the editor mentioned in her email that I had overlooked the details listed in the magazine’s submission guidelines (ironic, in light of my comment earlier in the week at Terry’s blog post).  I am glad Teri (the editor) recognized my name and opened the email anyway.

My poem, a haibun entitled “Abandoned World,” will appear in Scifaikuest in August.

Part of what is so fun to me, as I watch, is thinking about the acting process.  I am not a stage person, not at all.  But it is fun to consider the connections between the acting process and the writing process.  The whole obsessing over a little detail, knowing that you’re being pedantic and knowing that it is ok to be so, the feeling that everything you say is not quite understood… that all comes through as part of the acting process in the show, and it seems to fit with my own feelings in the writing process from time to time (OK, much of the time).  But what I really love is the connection that it all brings between people once the task is done.  I don’t mean to say the work is perfect (we all know it never is), but that it is bonding, bringing the human experience to the foreground, and bringing humans together in the process.

So, for all that the acting or writing process is something of a lonely journey, it is also a very communal experience.  And that is kind of cool, when you think about it.

There are also other more unique contests, including one for writing about food.  Start preparing now for the 2008 deadlines.  All entries are considered for publication, even if they don’t win one of the cash prizes.

There’s a website, the Rejection Collection, that encourages poets and writers to “laugh in the face of rejection.”   Stop in — it is a great relief to those of us who regularly receive rejection letters.

Maybe I’ll see you there!

There are some updates there, so do keep checking back from time to time.