This morning has been a morning of details first. I spent a bit of time recording rejections. Four different journals sent rejections in the last three days. I'm guessing they want to clear the decks before AWP, as all of them are participating in the conference. Several of the rejections included kind notes, so I'm not completely bereft. I'm just glad I sent out so many submissions this month, which helps me remember the whole thing is subjective and with longer odds than picking the winner of any given horse race.
After recording the rejections, I turned to a sweeter task. I'm being interviewed by a couple of different people/blogs/journals, and I received one set of questions last night. Wahoo. It's always an upper to realize that someone is genuinely interested in the work, that someone has taken the time to look at a poem or the book closely enough to formulate questions about them.
Answering these questions provides time for reflection that I don't normally take. I'm always struggling to slow down and breathe more deeply on so many levels. Much thanks to the people involved for the opportunity today.
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AWP is ONE WEEK away...wahoo!
10 comments:
Glad to hear about the good reflecting time, and do please post the links to the blog interviews when they are ready!
Thanks, Kathleen. I will!
Sandy -
As much as I am sorry to hear you received four rejections in three days, it does make me feel a bit less alone. :)
I'm awed by your determined spirit — and hope to emulate your poetic perseverance.
Thanks for sharing.
Thanks, Drew. Sometimes it feels less like perseverance and more like foolishness, but I keep at it. :)
I seem to go through spurts of submissions. I don't think I have sent anything out in the way of batches of poems in 4 months. I have sent my second manuscript out about four or five times in those months.
I think I write, send out, wait, write, send out, and wait again. I don't write a lot of poems at once unless I am in a manuscript frame of mind.
Right now, I am just starting to write a few more poems, and even though I have had just over a third of the poems published in my second manuscript, I think I am at the end of sending out those poems because they are so closely intertwined with each other they don't look like much out of context.
I may just have to scrounge up eight or ten poems and create a few batches, which will be sent out to 15-20 places for the first half of this year.
As for noting rejections, I have to create a new document, seeing it's been so long since I have sent anything out to the world.
Hey, Justin, thanks for the look inside your process. Good luck!
Hi Sandy,
I just got two rejections in the past couple days myself. I like how you describe the "longer odds" of submissions.
One of these journals set a new record for me -- from email submission to rejection in approximately 14 hours!
Hope to run into you at AWP!
Matt
I'm looking forward to reading the interviews. Sorry to hear about the rejections, but like Drew, I take heart in your perseverance and your willingness to share the truth of the writing life.
Matt, Thanks! It's definitely a numbers game at some level, although though super fast ones seem to cut a bit deeper, no?
Yes, to AWP. Feel free to send your cell phone # by email and I'll try to text you if we don't cross paths right away.
Thanks, Molly. So often, my very beginner students have no idea how much WORK goes into the writing life. One of the reasons I started the blog was to be truthful about that work. I'm glad it found a home with you.
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