I found Kristy Odelius’ chapbook Bee Spit at Dancing Girl Press and thoroughly enjoyed the read. This was published in 2007 and Kristy Odelius has her own web-site that conveniently features one of the poems I had “dog-eared.” Ms. Odelius is an Assistant Professor of English at North Park University in Chicago, Illinois and will soon have published a full length collection of poems at Shearsman Books titled Strange Trades in addition to being nominated for a Pushcart Prize for her poem “Vertigo to Eros.”
Now before I begin reviewing her poem “Third Grade,” please take a moment to read it using the link below:
http://www.kristyodelius.com/pthirdgrade.html
I love this poem because it takes quite a few ideas that were still voiced when I was a small child, such as “sit stare drop/(don’t talk) your eyes/under the table” and pieces it all together into a girl’s life. Then of course, I love the odds and ends Ms. Odelius pulls together for the way girls play: “Learn to mix paint/from spit and berries, write/your name on the sidewalk…” for these are things most kids do growing up. What is interesting is that she goes from a sense of innocence and moves towards the end to darker notions for women’s lives and uses contradictory comparisons. In the beginning there is the vague comparison of “birthday parties and funerals” which piques your interest but is easily passed over to the next few lines. Then it becomes more abrupt, especially in the third stanza “Acquaint yourself with death’s low/whistle, know it better than the rules/of Chinese jump rope.” That line had me thinking for quite a while and I’m still not sure what to make of it. I love that the title of the poem increases the discomfort of the final ending. How can a girl in the third grade have a life described in such a way? From starting out young and told to be quiet, listen, observe, to experimenting with odds and ends in a girl’s while growing up and then finally ending with a sinister sound. The very last line concludes with a somber tone but also hopeful with the words “glory, glory.” What do you think of a poem like this? I think of a girl who loses her innocence but it is hard to pinpoint exactly how. This poem got me thinking, and I hope it does the same for you.
Another poem I enjoyed was “I Called You Darling 7 Ways.” It is the winding down of a relationship told from the perspective of the woman who doesn’t want to let go. I love the odd imagery used for describing the relationship in lines like “You bent the lost skyscraper over my knee./With a lap of glass, I called you darling.” I especially love the lines “I called you, on the phone./I called you darling./The phone warned me.” How many people in relationships that you know who regret the phone calls they make as a relationship is ending? I know I’m in that boat, along with many others who have made the mistake of calling the one they love and realizing that the one they love may not feel that way anymore. There are lots of snapshot-like images in this poem that bring about the feel of the relationship without many words based on human emotion. “I harbored paint-smudge behind my knee./You called me “sad.”/” The word “sad” is one of the only words that names an emotion. The rest of the poem focuses on moments between the two people. At the end, the woman tries to hold on and earns the response of “baby, don’t make it harder than it is.” A trite remark. To which she responds with “I mocked you a little.” Then finally it ends with the man leaving for good, and her last line ends with “I called you darling.” The ending line clinches the whole poem for me because break-ups often feel one-side. One person is done and leaves, the other is still holding on, holding out hope and still in love. This poem is a refreshing change to the majority of break-up poems out there and if you have a chance to read it in this chapbook then you absolutely should find a copy or buy one.
As always, there are many fine poems in the collection, I am only providing a small taste. I hope you enjoy Kristy Odelius’ poems at her web-site (just poke around using the link above) and will pick up a collection of her poems when you stumble upon them.
Thanks for reading, please stop by tomorrow for more Poems Found by Poet Hound…
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
Monday, September 8, 2008
Dream Horse Press
Find full-length poetry collections and even their guidelines and open submissions dates at the site below:
http://home.comcast.net/~jpdancingbear/dhp.html
Thanks for clicking in, please stop by tomorrow for another featured poet…
http://home.comcast.net/~jpdancingbear/dhp.html
Thanks for clicking in, please stop by tomorrow for another featured poet…
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Sunday Edition 4 Answers
4th Edition answers:
1. Emily Dickinson
2. Rudyard Kipling
3. Li-Young Lee
4. Jubilat
5. Laurel Snyder
I’m not sure how many people were participating in the Sunday Search puzzles but I am going to call an end to it for now since I still have rather busy weekends. If you did enjoy it, let me know, and in the future I may try it again.
Thanks for dropping in, please stop by tomorrow for another featured site.
1. Emily Dickinson
2. Rudyard Kipling
3. Li-Young Lee
4. Jubilat
5. Laurel Snyder
I’m not sure how many people were participating in the Sunday Search puzzles but I am going to call an end to it for now since I still have rather busy weekends. If you did enjoy it, let me know, and in the future I may try it again.
Thanks for dropping in, please stop by tomorrow for another featured site.
Friday, September 5, 2008
Non-Holiday Poetry Card
This idea stems from Disney’s Alice In Wonderland in which they sing the “Very Merry Un-Birthday” song. My best friend and I will occasionally belt out this song to each other on the phone for fun and why not create a poem based on a Very Merry Un-Birthday theme or any non-holiday? You could create a poem based on the holiday-void month of August, you could wish someone a Merry Tax Season, Fiscal Year, something others would find strange or perhaps they think you are strange already? Or create a nonsensical holiday as they so often have on Activity Calendars for children or in nursing homes such as Happy Ice Cream Day, Happy Bingo Day, etc. May the creative muse and goddess of humor be with you for those who give it a try.
Thanks for dropping in, please stop by Sunday for the answers to Sunday Search Edition 4, I am canceling this feature to afford myself more free time on weekends…
Thanks for dropping in, please stop by Sunday for the answers to Sunday Search Edition 4, I am canceling this feature to afford myself more free time on weekends…
Thursday, September 4, 2008
Albatross Open Submissions
Hallelujah, you can submit via e-mail! Save some postage and send 3-5 poems (less than 200 lines each) to rsmyth@anabiaosispress.org. Copy and paste poems into the body of the e-mail, include your personal contact information and a brief biographical note. To get an idea of what they publish and any other details, use the link provided below and good luck on your submissions!
http://www.anabiosispress.org/guides.html
PS If you plan to mail the poems, be sure to include your Self-Addressed Stamped Envelope and send to:
Albatross Richard Smyth, Editor 2 South New Street Bradford, MA 01835
Thanks for reading, please stop by tomorrow for more Poetry Tips…
http://www.anabiosispress.org/guides.html
PS If you plan to mail the poems, be sure to include your Self-Addressed Stamped Envelope and send to:
Albatross Richard Smyth, Editor 2 South New Street Bradford, MA 01835
Thanks for reading, please stop by tomorrow for more Poetry Tips…
Wednesday, September 3, 2008
Poems Found by Poet Hound
http://poetryfoundation.org/archive/poem.html?id=181404
“Advertisement” by Wislawa Szymborska
http://www.jwhagins.com/HuffHickory.html
“Hickory Street Breakfast Blues” by Albert Huffstickler
Thanks for clicking in, please stop by for more Open Submissions…
“Advertisement” by Wislawa Szymborska
http://www.jwhagins.com/HuffHickory.html
“Hickory Street Breakfast Blues” by Albert Huffstickler
Thanks for clicking in, please stop by for more Open Submissions…
Tuesday, September 2, 2008
Mark Doty's Fire to Fire
Mark Doty was born in 1953 and has received numerous awards for his work including the Ambassador Book Award, Whiting Writers Award, and National Book Critics Award. He also has published several collections and nonfiction—Dog Years was a New York Times bestseller, and he is also a professor at the University of Houston, Texas and lives in New York City.
As always, I picked up his most recent volume Fire to Fire new and selected poems in my local library, published 2008 by way of HarperCollins Publishers. It is a thick volume of poems in which I will stick to my usual mention of just a couple of poems but let me assure you that it is a worthwhile volume to read. The newest poems are towards the front of the book and these are the ones I’ll focus on.
“Citizens” is a poem about a near-miss with a demolition truck as Mr. Doty is about to cross the street and jumps back and finds himself stewing over the whole scenario. How often do we find ourselves doing the same exact thing daily? How often have any of us turned the scenario into a poem? Mark Doty describes the incident in detail and I just love his vengeful lines: “If I carried a sharp instrument/I could scrape a long howl on his flaming paint job/(just under the gold and looming log: DEMOLITION)” after noticing that the driver seemed to enjoy nearly running him over. As Mr. Doty carries his burden of wrath he thinks of how he just needs to let go of the incident, but cannot. “and I’m carrying the devil/in his carbon chariot all the way to 23rd,…” until finally Mr. Doty gets to the bottom of why he is so upset: “but because he’s made me erasable,/a slip of a self, subject to.” Isn’t that the entirety of an experience such as this one? To know you came so very close to losing life and limb but no one seemed to notice or care? Finally, Mr. Doty rationalizes the experience with words we all use “I don’t care./If he’s one of those people miserable for lack/of what is found in poetry, fine.” I know we all use “I don’t care” once we finally get over an incident such as this one. I like the fact that Mr. Doty decides he is one of those “miserable” people and must be lacking something in life, and he names it poetry. Isn’t that just like a poet? Of course I present this poem to you because it’s a universal experience to have a near-miss accident but also because he goes through all the emotions you can go through when you are frightened. You have fear, vengeance, anger, rationalizing, then finally you feel calmer and can move on. These emotions are lived every day in various intensities and I am glad that I found a poem like this one which touches them all in a fleeting moment on a crosswalk. I hope you enjoy it, too, when you find this book on the shelf.
Then there is the poem “Theory of Multiplicity” which is about the idea of noticing someone else’s life. It starts out in a Laundromat in which Mark Doty does his laundry and he is recalling a garden someone had started. “look into the garden someone made next door/on the edge of the sidewalk, spilling onto the pavement,/surprisingly wild, with prairie grasses, a shrubby coneflower, strapping and frowsy black-eyed Susan, even a few bees” Mr. Doty describes sitting outside observing the passerby and the idea of others who may have noticed the same garden “What was/the garden but the sum of all that, studied or casual?/Perception carried, loved, considered, dis- or regarded.” I love that last line because there are so many ways to perceive something and think of all the passerby on the street who may have noticed the garden but either didn’t think much of it, or enjoyed seeing it every day on their way about their business. I think this is a romantic idea, something simple and possibly overlooked being seen daily the a large amount of people and who knows if the person who tended this garden even knew or cared what the passerby thought of it. “it took all of us/to make the garden known./No one could assemble/the entire vantage we made together.” These lines bring out a wonderful sense of community out of something so ordinary and doesn’t that make daily living extraordinary when you think about it? “The next summer the garden would be sparse,/not well tended, and offer no consolation…” Then we hear Mr. Doty’s lament of that magical garden not having the same quality the next year and remarks “though even its diminishment might be said/to be one of its nearly endless dimensions.” So even though we may lament change in our daily lives, even in something simple, it is still just another way of looking at the world, not the end of it. That’s what I take away from this poem, the idea that no matter how small, someone notices and that when something changes it is noticed and altered in our perception. Think of your neighbor letting their grass grow a little longer as they age and don’t have the ability to mow as often, or a child tending a wild garden of her own then making it cleaner and neater as she grows up. Or how about when a neighbor paints their house after a long period of time and how wonderful it looks. Think of the things you do in your daily life that you wonder if anyone notices and realize that someone might actually notice it after all. Maybe your co-workers know you’re the one washing up everyone’s coffee mugs or straightening up the conference room but haven’t thought to say “thank you.” Just imagine all the little things you and your neighbors, co-workers do daily that are noticed after all.
To find out more about Mark Doty and to read some of his poems available on-line, please click the link below:
http://poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/91
As always, thanks for reading, and please stop by tomorrow for more Poems Found by Poet Hound…
As always, I picked up his most recent volume Fire to Fire new and selected poems in my local library, published 2008 by way of HarperCollins Publishers. It is a thick volume of poems in which I will stick to my usual mention of just a couple of poems but let me assure you that it is a worthwhile volume to read. The newest poems are towards the front of the book and these are the ones I’ll focus on.
“Citizens” is a poem about a near-miss with a demolition truck as Mr. Doty is about to cross the street and jumps back and finds himself stewing over the whole scenario. How often do we find ourselves doing the same exact thing daily? How often have any of us turned the scenario into a poem? Mark Doty describes the incident in detail and I just love his vengeful lines: “If I carried a sharp instrument/I could scrape a long howl on his flaming paint job/(just under the gold and looming log: DEMOLITION)” after noticing that the driver seemed to enjoy nearly running him over. As Mr. Doty carries his burden of wrath he thinks of how he just needs to let go of the incident, but cannot. “and I’m carrying the devil/in his carbon chariot all the way to 23rd,…” until finally Mr. Doty gets to the bottom of why he is so upset: “but because he’s made me erasable,/a slip of a self, subject to.” Isn’t that the entirety of an experience such as this one? To know you came so very close to losing life and limb but no one seemed to notice or care? Finally, Mr. Doty rationalizes the experience with words we all use “I don’t care./If he’s one of those people miserable for lack/of what is found in poetry, fine.” I know we all use “I don’t care” once we finally get over an incident such as this one. I like the fact that Mr. Doty decides he is one of those “miserable” people and must be lacking something in life, and he names it poetry. Isn’t that just like a poet? Of course I present this poem to you because it’s a universal experience to have a near-miss accident but also because he goes through all the emotions you can go through when you are frightened. You have fear, vengeance, anger, rationalizing, then finally you feel calmer and can move on. These emotions are lived every day in various intensities and I am glad that I found a poem like this one which touches them all in a fleeting moment on a crosswalk. I hope you enjoy it, too, when you find this book on the shelf.
Then there is the poem “Theory of Multiplicity” which is about the idea of noticing someone else’s life. It starts out in a Laundromat in which Mark Doty does his laundry and he is recalling a garden someone had started. “look into the garden someone made next door/on the edge of the sidewalk, spilling onto the pavement,/surprisingly wild, with prairie grasses, a shrubby coneflower, strapping and frowsy black-eyed Susan, even a few bees” Mr. Doty describes sitting outside observing the passerby and the idea of others who may have noticed the same garden “What was/the garden but the sum of all that, studied or casual?/Perception carried, loved, considered, dis- or regarded.” I love that last line because there are so many ways to perceive something and think of all the passerby on the street who may have noticed the garden but either didn’t think much of it, or enjoyed seeing it every day on their way about their business. I think this is a romantic idea, something simple and possibly overlooked being seen daily the a large amount of people and who knows if the person who tended this garden even knew or cared what the passerby thought of it. “it took all of us/to make the garden known./No one could assemble/the entire vantage we made together.” These lines bring out a wonderful sense of community out of something so ordinary and doesn’t that make daily living extraordinary when you think about it? “The next summer the garden would be sparse,/not well tended, and offer no consolation…” Then we hear Mr. Doty’s lament of that magical garden not having the same quality the next year and remarks “though even its diminishment might be said/to be one of its nearly endless dimensions.” So even though we may lament change in our daily lives, even in something simple, it is still just another way of looking at the world, not the end of it. That’s what I take away from this poem, the idea that no matter how small, someone notices and that when something changes it is noticed and altered in our perception. Think of your neighbor letting their grass grow a little longer as they age and don’t have the ability to mow as often, or a child tending a wild garden of her own then making it cleaner and neater as she grows up. Or how about when a neighbor paints their house after a long period of time and how wonderful it looks. Think of the things you do in your daily life that you wonder if anyone notices and realize that someone might actually notice it after all. Maybe your co-workers know you’re the one washing up everyone’s coffee mugs or straightening up the conference room but haven’t thought to say “thank you.” Just imagine all the little things you and your neighbors, co-workers do daily that are noticed after all.
To find out more about Mark Doty and to read some of his poems available on-line, please click the link below:
http://poets.org/poet.php/prmPID/91
As always, thanks for reading, and please stop by tomorrow for more Poems Found by Poet Hound…
Monday, September 1, 2008
Paraverse Site
This site features translated poets and is a bit disconcerting when you first arrive but poke around a little to get to the “meat” of the site. There are books of translated verse for sale including translations of Issa, it’s well worth visiting at:
http://paraverse.org/
Thanks for dropping by, please stop in tomorrow for another featured poet…
http://paraverse.org/
Thanks for dropping by, please stop in tomorrow for another featured poet…
Sunday, August 31, 2008
Sunday Search Edition 4
Answers to 3rd Edition:
1. Tony Hoagland
2. Octavio Paz
3. Kim Barnes
4. Nerve Cowboy
5. Pictures of a cat were inserted for the week.
Sunday Search Edition 4:
1. Which poet was known as a recluse, born in Amherst, Massachussetts and did not have the bulk of her poems published until after she passed away?
2. Unscramble the letters to reveal the poet: DRUYARD KLPNGII
3. Which poet wrote the poetry book Rose?
4. What is the name of the well-known college literary journal also based in Massachussetts?
5. For regular readers: Who was the first poet ever interviewed by Poet Hound?
Thanks for playing, please drop by tomorrow, and be sure to get the answers and another round of questions next Sunday…
1. Tony Hoagland
2. Octavio Paz
3. Kim Barnes
4. Nerve Cowboy
5. Pictures of a cat were inserted for the week.
Sunday Search Edition 4:
1. Which poet was known as a recluse, born in Amherst, Massachussetts and did not have the bulk of her poems published until after she passed away?
2. Unscramble the letters to reveal the poet: DRUYARD KLPNGII
3. Which poet wrote the poetry book Rose?
4. What is the name of the well-known college literary journal also based in Massachussetts?
5. For regular readers: Who was the first poet ever interviewed by Poet Hound?
Thanks for playing, please drop by tomorrow, and be sure to get the answers and another round of questions next Sunday…
Friday, August 29, 2008
Poetry Tips: School Daze and a Link to a Cautionary Tale
Whether you are a student (young or old) or no longer one, you know that school is back in full swing for children and adults all over the world. Why not write a poem about the rotten school lunches, the broken crayons that scratch on the poster-board in irritating fashion for your school projects? How about a tribute to trigonometry tests, teachers that made you laugh or teachers that changed your life? What about your science lab partner who dissected the frog and said “This is WAY cool!” while you cringed in the corner? Yes, plenty of fond, or not so fond, memories of school should bring some poetic fruition don’t you think? Have fun and good luck!
Also, I stumbled onto this via another blog and think it is a great cautionary tale for all poets out there looking for publication. Stacy Lynn Brown was accepted for publication, then her contract was revoked. Both sides of the issue are presented at Stacy’s blog:
http://staceylynnbrown.blogspot.com/
Thanks for dropping in, please stop by Sunday with answers from this week’s puzzle and another new Sunday Search…
Also, I stumbled onto this via another blog and think it is a great cautionary tale for all poets out there looking for publication. Stacy Lynn Brown was accepted for publication, then her contract was revoked. Both sides of the issue are presented at Stacy’s blog:
http://staceylynnbrown.blogspot.com/
Thanks for dropping in, please stop by Sunday with answers from this week’s puzzle and another new Sunday Search…
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Coconut Open Submissions
Hurry, open reading for poems ends in September! Just three days away if you count today. Use the link below to find out more but essentially no simultaneous submissions, and you may send 3-8 poems in an e-mail titled with “submission” to submit(AT)coconutpoetry(DOT)org. Also, be sure to copy and paste your poems, do not create an attachment. Please also take a look at their site to see what kinds of poems they publish. Good luck to all those who submit!
http://www.coconutpoetry.org/submit13.html
Thanks for checking in, please stop by tomorrow for more Poetry Tips…
http://www.coconutpoetry.org/submit13.html
Thanks for checking in, please stop by tomorrow for more Poetry Tips…
Wednesday, August 27, 2008
Poems Found by Poet Hound
http://poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/20075
“Primogeniture” by Julie Agoos
http://www.boxcarpoetry.com/015/decarteret_mark_002.html
“Beddy-bye” by Mark Decarteret
Thanks for dropping in, please stop by tomorrow for another Open Submissions...
“Primogeniture” by Julie Agoos
http://www.boxcarpoetry.com/015/decarteret_mark_002.html
“Beddy-bye” by Mark Decarteret
Thanks for dropping in, please stop by tomorrow for another Open Submissions...
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
An Interview with Don Wentworth of Lilliput Review
1. When did the glimmer of the idea of putting together a journal come to you, and where were you at in life at the time?
It was so long ago I’m honestly not very sure. I was active in the small press scene as a poet during the 80’s, had a couple of collections of work published and had published in a number of small press mags. Regarding starting my own mag, two mags made a distinct impression on me: Pig in a Pamphlet (a tiny, small poem outlet for the parent magazine, Pig in a Poke) and an occasional tiny mag called This Is Important. When I saw these small mags, with my own predilection for the short poem, I thought this might be a gas to try. Little did I know it would become the primary focus of what I was to do creatively for nearly two decades and counting.
2. How did you decide on the name?
The original title was actually Lilliput Revue. It seemed like a natural, considering the magazine’s physical size. I’m a big fan of Jonathan Swift and it just came to me in a flash. My close friend, Bobo, who served as the house artist for a number of years, illustrated the cover of issue #2 (issue #1 was a test run, using my own poems and no art, to see if the layout “worked”) and spelled the title Lilliput Review and after much deliberation, I decided to stick with that. Sometimes I still regret not going with the original name, for a variety of reasons, but fate intervened.
3. Who helped you make the journal into reality?
Essentially, Lillie is a one person operation. When I was down on cash in the early going, the woman I was dating funded the run of an entire issue, probably about $50 at the time, which was a big help. I eventually married her; that help was certainly emblematic of her many loving qualities. In terms of getting up and going, other small presses distributed tiny fliers for me with their print runs, I listed the mag in Poet’s Market and the Small Press Review and I’ve never looked back. To this day, I will always support new mags just starting as best as I’m able because that kind of camaraderie is what makes the small press a vital institution. Bobo’s artwork was a great lift in giving the mag a certain look and tone.
4. How did you decide on the lines limitation and the design of the journal? (Each journal is very small, you can easily tuck it into a #10 envelope).
Actually, you can comfortably tuck 4 of them in a #10 envelope. In any case, when I started out it was pre-computer, pre-word processing, so I typed everything up on an old Royal manual typewriter and did cut and paste. The easiest most affordable way to go was to print on 8 x 11” paper. Using some of the smaller mags I’ve already mentioned as models, I decided to cut the paper twice horizontally, making for a roughly 3.5 x 5.5” page, for a total of 12 pages. I knew from the first I wanted to use color paper, I just like the visual variety, I guess. About the limit that could fit on that size page was 15 or so lines, so I just arbitrarily picked the 10 line limit. In truth I had, and to some degree still have, a low tolerance for work that goes on and on. I knew from the first that I wanted issues to be able to go out for a single first class stamp (25¢ at the time) and so that, too, was a factor.
5. How many people do you have on staff and how many hours do all of you put in for each issue?
Ha! People on staff! One. That’s it. My life mate, who has been a professional proofreader in her day, proofs all the issues, so she puts in I’d say 3 hours every 3 months, so that would be 12 hours a year. Otherwise, it’s just me. Time-wise, I average an hour to 2 hours every weekday morning (I get up at 5 before work), plus about 12 hours every weekend. I read all the poems, write all the correspondence, do the layout, the mailing list, and print, cut, collate, fold and staple every issue.
Oh, and did I say I love nearly every minute?
6. You have some regular contributors (such as illustrator Wayne Hogan), how many have you gotten to meet in person or over the phone and can you tell us anything about them that you would like us to know about?
I’ve met less than a handful of folks and most of them would be local. Although it is very active, I have minimal contact in the local poetry scene, though that has been changing a bit over the last year or so. I’m not much for poetry readings, I find them intensely painful, usually. I guess I have an even lower tolerance for readings than I do long poems.
7. You make a point to individually address all those who submit poems which I think is a fantastic practice that most editors don’t necessarily have time for. May I ask what possesses you to do so?
Minimally, I try to establish human contact. As someone who has published poetry over the years, I know exactly how it feels to receive a form letter after hopefully waiting for 6 months or more. So it is important to acknowledge the person on the other end. I offer positive criticism only, particularly if a work is close for Lilliput or if I think there is something constructive that the poet can take away from it. My one regret is that my turnaround time for submissions is 90 days. I wish it could be faster, but with one person and nearly 1,000 snail mail submissions a year, it’s the very best I can do.
8. When and why did you decide to create a blog based off of Lilliput Review and has it helped increase the readership of your journal?
The first time I started blogging a few years back was in preparation for a lifelong learning class I was going to teach on poetry appreciation. I started to use the blog, which was strictly for me, as a sort of commonplace book, where I could record poems I was thinking of using and things that struck me as important. I had a Lilliput webpage for many years which had become kind of static. Blogging just seemed to be a kind of natural way to reach out to a different audience and allows me to continue the sort of dialogue with myself, and expand it to an audience, I’d begun with the course blog. And it has worked out well beyond my expectations in both cases. I’ve “met” a lot of people via the blog, done some things that were just not possible via the paper publication, and garnered material for the mag I would never have gotten before. And, yes, it has increased readership.
9. How important is feedback to your journal and how often have you made changes based on feedback?
It is very surprising how little feedback you get when you run a small press poetry magazine. A majority of poets are strictly focused on publication and, though they might sometimes subscribe if their material has been accepted, they generally don’t seem to care about the mag one way or the other. In the minority are people who are regulars, who react and have positive and constructive things to say. Sometimes, I think perhaps it’s not very different than lurkers you get reading a blog. It’s surprising how many people are out there reading and not commenting and that is true with mags also. Obviously, the best relationships you establish are those where there is a give and take between reader and editor and there are a number of those that have been going on for many years that I cherish.
10. What is one question you’ve always wanted to be asked and have never been asked about Lilliput Review? (And please answer the question).
For me, it isn’t so much the one question that I’ve wanted someone to ask as it is something that I’ve done since the very beginning that I’m not sure many people realize and, if they do, they have never commented on. And it is this: if you follow the guidelines for sending work, no matter if it is accepted or not, you will always get a free back issue. Literally, if you send no more than 3 pages of poems (on standard 8.5 x 11” paper) with a SASE for return, you will always receive a free issue with the return envelope. I’ve probably given away over a 1,000 free issues over the years, maybe more, I’ve no way of knowing. And, when I can, I try to make sure I don’t send something someone has previously seen.
Behind this is the fact that when I started out, I thought of Lilliput as a sort of exchange: you send poems, I send poems back (& not just yours!). Beside my interest in the short poem, that was part of the motivating feature behind producing a tiny magazine. It’s also why the price has never changed. It was a dollar in 1989 and it’s a dollar today in 2008, despite the fact that postage in 89 was 25¢ and today it’s 42¢.
11. Do you have time to read poetry outside of editing and who do you enjoy reading?
Yes, not only do I have time, I have to read poetry outside of editing. It is part of my constant education in what poetry is, how it works, and who I am. Poetry, reading, as well as writing, is how I speak to myself. All great poetry deals with the big issues: birth, death, love, loss and the process that is being human. Poetry is as close as I get to the spiritual, so it is life blood for me. It also puts what is published in Lilliput in perspective.
Who do I read? So many I can hardly name them. Whitman, Sexton, Olds, Ginsburg, Mary Oliver, James Wright, Franz Wright, Dickinson, Gerald Stern, Margaret Atwood, Wendell Berry and Charles Simic. I love Wordsworth, Shakespeare, Lawrence, and the Romantic Poets. My favorite poet is Issa and I’m strongly drawn to the Chinese and Japanese classic authors such as Yosano Akiko and Basho and Han-shan. Well, obviously I could go on and on. I am also a big reader of anthologies, which is a great way to discover new poets.
12. What poets inspire you past and present?
Inspire can be interpreted in so many ways. The poets closest to my heart are Issa and Whitman, Mary Oliver, William Wordsworth and James Wright. I find Yeats very inspiring and, oddly, Wallace Stevens. When I read the classic haiku and tanka writers I’m inspired spiritually and creatively to write. I can be very inspired, ironically, by bad poetry. It’s like I want to do the subject justice, I want to say to the poet, no, no, it’s like this. I’m also inspired by poets I intensely disagree with.
13. As a poet and editor who has “the easier job” and could you explain your choice?
I’m probably not the right person to ask this. I do not treat writing poetry as a job; for me, it’s purely inspirational. The business of being a poet is not something I’ve really engaged in much in recent years though I continue to write on a regular basis. I generally only send work out when someone requests it. My opinion, though, would be the poet has the harder job. It is so very hard to be objective about your own work. To send it out to a market that expects exclusivity and then replies 6 months later with a form letter can be devastating. That’s hard. Being an editor is generally hard as in digging-a-ditch hard. The creative part, the putting together an issue part is the closest it comes to pure inspiration and I do get a similar buzz in pulling an issue together as I do when writing a poem. One of the best highs there is … The day to day work can be a bit of a drag, can sometimes be a bit overwhelming, but the ultimate product, the magazine or the chapbooks in the Modest Proposal series, make it worthwhile.
14. I’ve noticed that your issues have related subject matter. Do you go out of your way to find a theme or do the poems that arrive tend to have a general theme in a “great-minds-think-alike” sense?
That is an excellent question because it actually goes right to the heart of why I get so jazzed when I’m putting together an issue. The simple answer is I don’t look for particular poems or themes when reading work. Each poem is judged by the scratch marks on the page, each stands or falls on its own. Very, very infrequently I might read a poem and say, ah, I’ve got something that will go nicely with that. The reason I don’t do that more often is I read so many poems there is no way I remember what I have on hand (generally, I’m working with a one year backlog). The process goes like this: when it’s time to put together the new issues, I sit down with the folder of accepted work. I begin chronologically with the oldest work first and begin to lay out the two issues together. If the first two poems have a similar feel, I’ll put them in the pile for one issue. If not, one for one issue, the other for the second. I then go through poem for poem and here is where the magic begins. Themes, relationships, counterpoint and all manner of connections begin to evince themselves. This has always happened, never fails, which brings us back to the heart of your question – why? Zeitgeist? Unconscious selection on my part? My predilection for particular themes and styles? Probably a subtle blend of all these things is the true answer. And here’s the kicker: when I look back on the issues over the years, in a certain way they represent a kind of lyrical journey of the magazine and its creators (i.e. the poets) and in another way it is something of a creative journal of myself. Sometimes this works marvelously, at others not so well. I do believe, however, the arc over the years has been one of constant improvement so the mag has just gotten better and better. Without that, there certainly is no way that I would be in a 20th year with a deep desire to continue.
15. Any advice for poets who want to publish their poems in general?
The traditional advice you read in all the guides, such as Poet’s Market, is true: get a sample copy, read the mag, follow the guidelines, etc. But the question poets should be asking is: what’s my goal, why am I doing this? Do I want to publish my poems? Do I want a chapbook of my work collected? Do I want large press publication? All of these questions are, of course, fine, yet there is a real danger in getting lost in the business of sending work, having it accepted or rejected, building curriculum vitae for the purpose of further publication. It becomes a goal in and of itself and, in my opinion, is the wrong approach. The answer to what’s my goal should be: be true to the work. To be true to your work, you must be true to yourself.
16. Finally, any advice you have for others who want to become an editor of their own journal or press?
That advice would be the same as for poets – know who you are and what you’re about. It’s all about the journey and not the destination. One thing I can guarantee – if you are really into it, it’ll be the ride of a lifetime.
Thanks so much for allowing me to interview you, Mr. Wentworth. It’s always a pleasure to correspond with you.
Thanks to all of you reading the interview, please be sure to visit Don Wentworth’s blog at:
http://lilliputreview.blogspot.com/
And see you tomorrow for more Poems Found by Poet Hound…
It was so long ago I’m honestly not very sure. I was active in the small press scene as a poet during the 80’s, had a couple of collections of work published and had published in a number of small press mags. Regarding starting my own mag, two mags made a distinct impression on me: Pig in a Pamphlet (a tiny, small poem outlet for the parent magazine, Pig in a Poke) and an occasional tiny mag called This Is Important. When I saw these small mags, with my own predilection for the short poem, I thought this might be a gas to try. Little did I know it would become the primary focus of what I was to do creatively for nearly two decades and counting.
2. How did you decide on the name?
The original title was actually Lilliput Revue. It seemed like a natural, considering the magazine’s physical size. I’m a big fan of Jonathan Swift and it just came to me in a flash. My close friend, Bobo, who served as the house artist for a number of years, illustrated the cover of issue #2 (issue #1 was a test run, using my own poems and no art, to see if the layout “worked”) and spelled the title Lilliput Review and after much deliberation, I decided to stick with that. Sometimes I still regret not going with the original name, for a variety of reasons, but fate intervened.
3. Who helped you make the journal into reality?
Essentially, Lillie is a one person operation. When I was down on cash in the early going, the woman I was dating funded the run of an entire issue, probably about $50 at the time, which was a big help. I eventually married her; that help was certainly emblematic of her many loving qualities. In terms of getting up and going, other small presses distributed tiny fliers for me with their print runs, I listed the mag in Poet’s Market and the Small Press Review and I’ve never looked back. To this day, I will always support new mags just starting as best as I’m able because that kind of camaraderie is what makes the small press a vital institution. Bobo’s artwork was a great lift in giving the mag a certain look and tone.
4. How did you decide on the lines limitation and the design of the journal? (Each journal is very small, you can easily tuck it into a #10 envelope).
Actually, you can comfortably tuck 4 of them in a #10 envelope. In any case, when I started out it was pre-computer, pre-word processing, so I typed everything up on an old Royal manual typewriter and did cut and paste. The easiest most affordable way to go was to print on 8 x 11” paper. Using some of the smaller mags I’ve already mentioned as models, I decided to cut the paper twice horizontally, making for a roughly 3.5 x 5.5” page, for a total of 12 pages. I knew from the first I wanted to use color paper, I just like the visual variety, I guess. About the limit that could fit on that size page was 15 or so lines, so I just arbitrarily picked the 10 line limit. In truth I had, and to some degree still have, a low tolerance for work that goes on and on. I knew from the first that I wanted issues to be able to go out for a single first class stamp (25¢ at the time) and so that, too, was a factor.
5. How many people do you have on staff and how many hours do all of you put in for each issue?
Ha! People on staff! One. That’s it. My life mate, who has been a professional proofreader in her day, proofs all the issues, so she puts in I’d say 3 hours every 3 months, so that would be 12 hours a year. Otherwise, it’s just me. Time-wise, I average an hour to 2 hours every weekday morning (I get up at 5 before work), plus about 12 hours every weekend. I read all the poems, write all the correspondence, do the layout, the mailing list, and print, cut, collate, fold and staple every issue.
Oh, and did I say I love nearly every minute?
6. You have some regular contributors (such as illustrator Wayne Hogan), how many have you gotten to meet in person or over the phone and can you tell us anything about them that you would like us to know about?
I’ve met less than a handful of folks and most of them would be local. Although it is very active, I have minimal contact in the local poetry scene, though that has been changing a bit over the last year or so. I’m not much for poetry readings, I find them intensely painful, usually. I guess I have an even lower tolerance for readings than I do long poems.
7. You make a point to individually address all those who submit poems which I think is a fantastic practice that most editors don’t necessarily have time for. May I ask what possesses you to do so?
Minimally, I try to establish human contact. As someone who has published poetry over the years, I know exactly how it feels to receive a form letter after hopefully waiting for 6 months or more. So it is important to acknowledge the person on the other end. I offer positive criticism only, particularly if a work is close for Lilliput or if I think there is something constructive that the poet can take away from it. My one regret is that my turnaround time for submissions is 90 days. I wish it could be faster, but with one person and nearly 1,000 snail mail submissions a year, it’s the very best I can do.
8. When and why did you decide to create a blog based off of Lilliput Review and has it helped increase the readership of your journal?
The first time I started blogging a few years back was in preparation for a lifelong learning class I was going to teach on poetry appreciation. I started to use the blog, which was strictly for me, as a sort of commonplace book, where I could record poems I was thinking of using and things that struck me as important. I had a Lilliput webpage for many years which had become kind of static. Blogging just seemed to be a kind of natural way to reach out to a different audience and allows me to continue the sort of dialogue with myself, and expand it to an audience, I’d begun with the course blog. And it has worked out well beyond my expectations in both cases. I’ve “met” a lot of people via the blog, done some things that were just not possible via the paper publication, and garnered material for the mag I would never have gotten before. And, yes, it has increased readership.
9. How important is feedback to your journal and how often have you made changes based on feedback?
It is very surprising how little feedback you get when you run a small press poetry magazine. A majority of poets are strictly focused on publication and, though they might sometimes subscribe if their material has been accepted, they generally don’t seem to care about the mag one way or the other. In the minority are people who are regulars, who react and have positive and constructive things to say. Sometimes, I think perhaps it’s not very different than lurkers you get reading a blog. It’s surprising how many people are out there reading and not commenting and that is true with mags also. Obviously, the best relationships you establish are those where there is a give and take between reader and editor and there are a number of those that have been going on for many years that I cherish.
10. What is one question you’ve always wanted to be asked and have never been asked about Lilliput Review? (And please answer the question).
For me, it isn’t so much the one question that I’ve wanted someone to ask as it is something that I’ve done since the very beginning that I’m not sure many people realize and, if they do, they have never commented on. And it is this: if you follow the guidelines for sending work, no matter if it is accepted or not, you will always get a free back issue. Literally, if you send no more than 3 pages of poems (on standard 8.5 x 11” paper) with a SASE for return, you will always receive a free issue with the return envelope. I’ve probably given away over a 1,000 free issues over the years, maybe more, I’ve no way of knowing. And, when I can, I try to make sure I don’t send something someone has previously seen.
Behind this is the fact that when I started out, I thought of Lilliput as a sort of exchange: you send poems, I send poems back (& not just yours!). Beside my interest in the short poem, that was part of the motivating feature behind producing a tiny magazine. It’s also why the price has never changed. It was a dollar in 1989 and it’s a dollar today in 2008, despite the fact that postage in 89 was 25¢ and today it’s 42¢.
11. Do you have time to read poetry outside of editing and who do you enjoy reading?
Yes, not only do I have time, I have to read poetry outside of editing. It is part of my constant education in what poetry is, how it works, and who I am. Poetry, reading, as well as writing, is how I speak to myself. All great poetry deals with the big issues: birth, death, love, loss and the process that is being human. Poetry is as close as I get to the spiritual, so it is life blood for me. It also puts what is published in Lilliput in perspective.
Who do I read? So many I can hardly name them. Whitman, Sexton, Olds, Ginsburg, Mary Oliver, James Wright, Franz Wright, Dickinson, Gerald Stern, Margaret Atwood, Wendell Berry and Charles Simic. I love Wordsworth, Shakespeare, Lawrence, and the Romantic Poets. My favorite poet is Issa and I’m strongly drawn to the Chinese and Japanese classic authors such as Yosano Akiko and Basho and Han-shan. Well, obviously I could go on and on. I am also a big reader of anthologies, which is a great way to discover new poets.
12. What poets inspire you past and present?
Inspire can be interpreted in so many ways. The poets closest to my heart are Issa and Whitman, Mary Oliver, William Wordsworth and James Wright. I find Yeats very inspiring and, oddly, Wallace Stevens. When I read the classic haiku and tanka writers I’m inspired spiritually and creatively to write. I can be very inspired, ironically, by bad poetry. It’s like I want to do the subject justice, I want to say to the poet, no, no, it’s like this. I’m also inspired by poets I intensely disagree with.
13. As a poet and editor who has “the easier job” and could you explain your choice?
I’m probably not the right person to ask this. I do not treat writing poetry as a job; for me, it’s purely inspirational. The business of being a poet is not something I’ve really engaged in much in recent years though I continue to write on a regular basis. I generally only send work out when someone requests it. My opinion, though, would be the poet has the harder job. It is so very hard to be objective about your own work. To send it out to a market that expects exclusivity and then replies 6 months later with a form letter can be devastating. That’s hard. Being an editor is generally hard as in digging-a-ditch hard. The creative part, the putting together an issue part is the closest it comes to pure inspiration and I do get a similar buzz in pulling an issue together as I do when writing a poem. One of the best highs there is … The day to day work can be a bit of a drag, can sometimes be a bit overwhelming, but the ultimate product, the magazine or the chapbooks in the Modest Proposal series, make it worthwhile.
14. I’ve noticed that your issues have related subject matter. Do you go out of your way to find a theme or do the poems that arrive tend to have a general theme in a “great-minds-think-alike” sense?
That is an excellent question because it actually goes right to the heart of why I get so jazzed when I’m putting together an issue. The simple answer is I don’t look for particular poems or themes when reading work. Each poem is judged by the scratch marks on the page, each stands or falls on its own. Very, very infrequently I might read a poem and say, ah, I’ve got something that will go nicely with that. The reason I don’t do that more often is I read so many poems there is no way I remember what I have on hand (generally, I’m working with a one year backlog). The process goes like this: when it’s time to put together the new issues, I sit down with the folder of accepted work. I begin chronologically with the oldest work first and begin to lay out the two issues together. If the first two poems have a similar feel, I’ll put them in the pile for one issue. If not, one for one issue, the other for the second. I then go through poem for poem and here is where the magic begins. Themes, relationships, counterpoint and all manner of connections begin to evince themselves. This has always happened, never fails, which brings us back to the heart of your question – why? Zeitgeist? Unconscious selection on my part? My predilection for particular themes and styles? Probably a subtle blend of all these things is the true answer. And here’s the kicker: when I look back on the issues over the years, in a certain way they represent a kind of lyrical journey of the magazine and its creators (i.e. the poets) and in another way it is something of a creative journal of myself. Sometimes this works marvelously, at others not so well. I do believe, however, the arc over the years has been one of constant improvement so the mag has just gotten better and better. Without that, there certainly is no way that I would be in a 20th year with a deep desire to continue.
15. Any advice for poets who want to publish their poems in general?
The traditional advice you read in all the guides, such as Poet’s Market, is true: get a sample copy, read the mag, follow the guidelines, etc. But the question poets should be asking is: what’s my goal, why am I doing this? Do I want to publish my poems? Do I want a chapbook of my work collected? Do I want large press publication? All of these questions are, of course, fine, yet there is a real danger in getting lost in the business of sending work, having it accepted or rejected, building curriculum vitae for the purpose of further publication. It becomes a goal in and of itself and, in my opinion, is the wrong approach. The answer to what’s my goal should be: be true to the work. To be true to your work, you must be true to yourself.
16. Finally, any advice you have for others who want to become an editor of their own journal or press?
That advice would be the same as for poets – know who you are and what you’re about. It’s all about the journey and not the destination. One thing I can guarantee – if you are really into it, it’ll be the ride of a lifetime.
Thanks so much for allowing me to interview you, Mr. Wentworth. It’s always a pleasure to correspond with you.
Thanks to all of you reading the interview, please be sure to visit Don Wentworth’s blog at:
http://lilliputreview.blogspot.com/
And see you tomorrow for more Poems Found by Poet Hound…
Monday, August 25, 2008
Mark Wallace's Blog
Mark Wallace has a blog that gets you thinking, exploring, it gets you to more actions than reactions. For that alone, I encourage you to read his blog at:
http://wallacethinksagain.blogspot.com/
Thanks for clicking in, please stop by tomorrow for an interview with Don Wentworth, editor of the Lilliput Review…
http://wallacethinksagain.blogspot.com/
Thanks for clicking in, please stop by tomorrow for an interview with Don Wentworth, editor of the Lilliput Review…
Sunday, August 24, 2008
Sunday Search Edition 3
2nd Edition answers:
1. Edgar Allen Poe
2. Sylvia Plath
3. Pablo Neruda
4. Lilliput Review
5. False
Sunday Search Edition 3:
1. Which poet wrote the book What Narcissism Means to Me?
2. Unscramble the letters to reveal the poet: VCOTIOA PZA
3. Which poet is the Poet Laureate of Idaho?
4. What small press journal is based out of Texas and on their website advertises that you can get a two-year subscription for $20 stating “that’s four freaking issues”?
5. For regular readers: What happened to the pictures of Poet Hound on April 1st?
Hope you have fun doing these and please visit again soon. Answers will be revealed next Sunday…
1. Edgar Allen Poe
2. Sylvia Plath
3. Pablo Neruda
4. Lilliput Review
5. False
Sunday Search Edition 3:
1. Which poet wrote the book What Narcissism Means to Me?
2. Unscramble the letters to reveal the poet: VCOTIOA PZA
3. Which poet is the Poet Laureate of Idaho?
4. What small press journal is based out of Texas and on their website advertises that you can get a two-year subscription for $20 stating “that’s four freaking issues”?
5. For regular readers: What happened to the pictures of Poet Hound on April 1st?
Hope you have fun doing these and please visit again soon. Answers will be revealed next Sunday…
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