Just another writer
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Dropping off of social media has never seemed wiser
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Three poems in new anthology
I had three poems come out this week in the anthology, Rising Voices: Poems Toward a Social Justice Revolution. These are all part of my Chicago Sonnets series. Chicago Sonnet #4 has its origins in a research paper I wrote in high school where, somewhat enamored of my role on the school paper, I decided to focus…
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Writerly resolutions for 2022
My goals for the year: Goals are nice, but remember that they don’t really matter. I’ll get done what I’ll get done, acceptances are out of my control. Get We, the Rescued through the rewrite and revision stage and then get some people to read the whole damned thing. I’ve got eight stories that have been…
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Writerly resolutions for 2021–the post mortem
I set ambitious goals for 2021 and I failed at them all. Perhaps I should set less ambitious goals? Or perhaps I should remember that the goals don’t matter in the end and that creativity doesn’t follow schedules and spreadsheets. I had two goals for the year: Work on We, The Rescued daily until I’ve got it…
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2021 in rejections (and acceptances)
2021 was a pretty good year for me publication-wise. I’ve not been that good about getting stuff out the door, but what I have submitted has been well-received. In fiction, I managed to have fewer responses this year than last despite the fact that in 2020 I didn’t actually submit anything¹ and this year I…
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Things that delighted me in 2021 (that aren’t books)
I thought it might be a nice thing this year to add in some lists of the things that delighted me this year that aren’t books. I’ll start with White-haired Ted Danson. My least favorite thing about Cheers back in the day was Ted Danson, and that made me less inclined to pay much attention to…
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My favorite reads of 2021
I’m going to do something a bit different this year. Much less on the numbers other than the top line of 85¹ books read this year with 50.1% by women and 38.6% by non-white authors. I’ve been a bit better about finding time to read without my commute by “L” to give me the time…
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1000 rejections (poetry)
Today’s mail brought poetry rejections 999–1,001. It took a lot less time to hit 1,000 poetry rejections than fiction, not least of why being that poems are generally sent in packets of 3–5 and even an acceptance includes a handful of rejections. And then there’s the fact that I’m not that good of a poet…
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New poem in California Quarterly
I just got in the mail the latest issue of California Quarterly (Vol. 47, No. 3, which for some reason is not yet listed at their website) which includes my poem, Chicago Sonnet #19. The poem details my vague memories of the Beverly House restaurant in Chicago’s Beverly Hills neighborhood on the South Side, an…