2008
31 Dec 2007 Leave a Comment
I wish you all success with your chosen goals, plenty of time for writing, the perfect writing space, banishment of writer’s block, and plenty of publications!
Happy New Year!
Stay tuned for more of my writing goals (I know you’re on the edge of your seat)!
resolved
29 Dec 2007 Leave a Comment
I’m working on my writing resolutions and goals for 2008. I got this idea from the writing group I’m a part of, and I always try to mix more abstract goals with very concrete ones. For example, I’ve got one article idea on my list, with the steps outlined that I want to take to try and flesh it out, but I also have, “Poetry is hard work.”
I got that quote from a passage in Alice Sebold’s Lucky, where she talks about taking a poetry workshop with Tess Gallagher. One day a student comes in and says he has no new poem because he simply wasn’t inspired to write one, and Gallagher looks at him severely over her glasses and says, “Poetry is hard work.” I also just finished rereading Anne Tyler’s Digging to America, and in the Q & A at the back she says she never waits for inspiration. She just goes into her writing room and starts to write and hopes that the routine of working will save her.
I think we all have this poetic idea about the muses who will visit us and shower us with divine inspiration, but even when that does happen– when you happen upon a scene or image or fragment of speech that you just know is the seed for something marvelous– actually fashioning that embryonic spark into a piece of writing? A piece that will transmit everything you mean to say, that will become indelible for your reader? That’s incredibly hard work, and we as writers should never forget that.
So that’s one of my resolutions for the New Year. Expect to see postings on this subject over the next few weeks. Once I’ve made my list, I expect to make them their own separate page along the bar up top there, so I can track my progress through the year and add and remove resolutions as I go along.
a gift for you
21 Dec 2007 Leave a Comment
in poetry
A poem to think about, while I take a holiday break:
Christmas Tree Lots
Christmas trees lined like war refugees,
a fallen army made to stand in their greens.
Cut down at the foot, on their last leg,
they pull themselves up, arms raised.
We drop them like wood;
tied, they are driven through the streets,
dragged through the door, cornered
in a room, given a single blanket,
only water to drink, surrounded by joy.
Forced to wear a gaudy gold star,
to surrender their pride,
they do their best to look alive.
Copyright © The Poetry Foundation
10 Dec 2007 2 Comments
in writing
I’ve been on Facebook a lot lately, partly because I’m teaching a course on it this spring (no, really) and partly just because it’s fun. My two favorite applications so far are Scrabulous, where you can play online Scrabble with your friends, and SuperPoke! where you can do things like throw elves at and spin dreidels with your friends.
I’ve been pleasantly surprised at the amount of other writers and literary types are on it. I’m assuming that it’s a factor of the collegial beginnings of the site (it was founded by a young Harvard student who’s still only 23, in case you didn’t know). But my indie writer friends are on it, and The National Council of Teachers of English are on it, and the Academy of American Poets are on it, and some of the lit theorists I studied in college and graduate school are on it. I think I just used it to network myself into a book review assignment, even.
Facebook: not just for posting drunk pictures of you and your college buddies, I guess.
progress
08 Dec 2007 Leave a Comment
When I first started teaching English this fall, I remember wondering (and perhaps blogging) if teaching poetry would be a mini-school for me as a poet. We’re reading such great authors this year–Whitman, Frost, Dickinson, Gwendolyn Brooks, Langston Hughes, John Donne and more–many of which I hadn’t read in years myself, and I figured that immersing myself in poetry, the craft and beauty of it, might be useful for me as a poet.
Well, so far I can say yes with a whole heart. I’ve written two new poems since the beginning of this school year and have revised several more, and I feel like it’s the best poetic work I’ve ever done. Part of that progress is due to the amazing help of my dear friend Alissa, who has been so helpful and kind, but I think also the hours I’ve spent choosing poems and discussing them with my students has really enhanced my eye for my own work.
The conundrum for writing teachers is that sometimes the work of teaching gets so overwhelming that writing gets put on the back burner, and I’m certainly behind on my grading as we speak! But I do believe that so far, it has been a great aid to my work as a poet.
movement
03 Dec 2007 4 Comments
in personal goals, poetry
I’ll answer my own question: my best tip for rejection so far is put it behind you, and keep writing. I did a minor polish on the rejected poem and am actively trying to think of where to send it next. Tip number two: start something new! I started a new poem this weekend which is already in it’s second draft. I feel better already.
I’m also trying to think of a more efficient way to track submissions. I know a spreadsheet might come in handy here– anyone use one they could share with me as a template? All I’ve ever done is keep a running list or chart in one of my many notebooks, which is probably the least effective method. Any tips would be great.
Finally, I also made myself a list of tasks to start working on a nonfiction piece I’ve been mulling over for months. That’s one of my tried-and-true methods for beginning work on a lengthy nonfiction piece, which can often seem overwhelming at the beginning. My tasks range from reading and annotating material I already know about to getting interviews with key players to thinking about scope and focus. I’m a big list-maker in my regular life, so it’s no surprise to me that it works well in my writing also.
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