I have been neglectful!

I have been away.
I have been changing, settling down into this new place and skin, really.

Here are some poems, part of something I am calling, for now, The Janus Project:

Reverse Dog

Our love is pocked with
the deep rivets of unanswered silences.
You lean down into one of them.
The holes allow us to breathe.


Reverse Tide

Give me the keys.
I will color our exaustion.
I will release plumed ideas
into the world.


I'll be back. With more or less substance, more or less meaning. In the meantime, fill in the blank(s):


If the answer is ________
If the question is ________
If the fable is ________
If the corollary is ________
If the hand writing is _________
If the predator is ________
If the spot light is ________
If the certainty is ________
If the planet is ________
If the antidote is ________
If the circle is ________
If the excuse is ________
If the ritual is ________
If the crying is ________

Short Bouts of Compassion Towards Children

First off, American Empire Project is up and running.

Next, a few more things:

1. The 5th was Jeannine and my's 2 year anniversary. She is incredible. I feel like I am in a reciprocal relationship, one that suits me, with someone who loves me for who I am, not someone who could be smarter or less crass or one of a million other ways I could change. She lets me be, leaves me alone when I need to be alone and doesn't harangue me to death, wondering why I am in a mood. She just lets me be. I still want her like I wanted her 2 years ago, and in new ways too. Grown-up ways, not just lusty teenager ways.

2. Today is the one year anniversary of my surgery. It's weird to me that I remember that it hurt, but not how it hurt. This pain amnesia must be why the human race continues to have multi-child households. I could go on at length about my fear of the cancer coming back, or my anger of having to look at this scar and be reminded of my mortality everyday at age 30. Instead I'm just going to say that cancer gave me my life, I am healthier now than I have probably ever been, more active, eat better, don't drink, don't smoke, don't eat meat, and am near giving up sugar. My friend told me I was meant to have cancer and survive it. I believe him because I have to, because if I give it meaning I can make something out of it, something good.

3. I love my cats. They are patient with us humans.

4. I've started doing yoga more consistantly than I ever have in the past. It feels good.

5. I love my job. I have the opportunity to be honest with strangers, to have short bursts of meaningfulness that can ripple beyond our conversations.

6. I hope very much that you all are happy and have some things in your lives to be thanful for.

7. A poem:

It Is Enough to Be a Body for Someone Else to Rest Against

Gravity holds us in strong airy palms. We fight
Back against the specter of what it represents.
In the struggle we lose parts of ourselves, the universe
A collection of spinning things that become
Unfamiliar because unattached they no longer keep us
Alive. The truth is they were always foreign,
Our organs and memories are particles of stars
We borrow to see. When those pieces are taken
From us we don’t lack functioning, we just
Reorganize. At night the lake looks like black cement.
And it is when you are falling to it. Short bouts of
Compassion towards children compel us to lie, it is
A sunny day, the water is warm, we are in love.

ER

On This Day in History:

I have been reading Howard Zinn's "A People's History of American Empire" a sort of companion to his People's History. It is in graphic novel form. Jeannine got it for me for Christmas. It cronicles America's conquests and rise to global superpower via the massacre and destruction of all in its path. It starts, of course, with the beginning of the American Empire at home, the Massacre at Wounded Knee. Today was the day the battle happened, in 1890. I dare you to go here to learn more.


Also, check out americanempireproject.com for more information about the series this Zinn comic is a part of. For some reason (and try not to read too much into this) the site is down right now, But check back periodically to see if it's up and running.

An Eore Day

Sometimes, oh, say for the last week or so for example, I get a bit blue because I feel what could amount to as post "I went to a top five grad school for my discipline and I now work part time in a grocery store" depression. I feel like I'm not on the right track, like I'm a disappointment to my community, inferior to my peers, and generally not good enough to convert oxygen to carbon dioxide.

During these times I have to remind myself that since the cancer I have had the realization that all that matters is that I make a difference in others' lives. That my day makes someone else's life better, easier, because life is generally so hard for most of us to bear is what should be the point of my life. This is true, I believe, since when I got the cancer all of a sudden little else mattered to me than making good in the world. Sometimes I get tangled in my post "iwtfgsmdinwptgs" depression and I forget what is important. I forget the world around me and become surrounded in my own pity. It is a deep well to trudge out of.

Poetry makes me happy. Making others happy or more comfortable makes me feel like I belong. Like I deserve to be here. Like converting oxygen to carbon dioxide is the least of my talents. Buddhism is a good avenue to walk down when trying to remember the important things in life: that this is all temporary, that everything you need is right here, in this moment, that to help others is the greatest achievement. We all live until one day we die. It sounds easy and sad but it's not: its hard to remember and so relieving when you believe it. I am here right now, if I, everyday, do something to make someone else's life easier to bear, happier, worth living, then everyday's passing is not something to mourn, it is a miracle, it is a place to exist in, the present, a place to be thankful for the recognition of. I spend too much time worrying about the future and regretting the past, those places don't exist. Just right now is real. It is the hardest thing to remember, to believe, especially when I live in the make-believe world of poetry. Maybe it isn't make-believe. If it isn't make-believe, what is it? I am asking you-my poets, what is it poetry to you? What is important and real?

This post is all loose ends and beginnings, don't try to tie it up, but I do wonder what you guys think of these things, of life and death and poetry and what makes waking up worth it to you.

Mr. Obama, What the Fuck?

I'm sure many of you by now have heard the rumblings about Obama's pick of Rick Warren to preform the invocation at the inaguration. Rick Warren isn't just the pastor at mega church Saddleback Church in southern California. He wrote the bestseller "The Purpose Driven Life." He's also a hateful prick.

Sure, it's very easy for me to be disappointed by Obama's choice, but I'm even more disappointed by his defense of his choice. Fisrt, for those of you uncertain of my problem with Rick Warren, some highlights of Warren's ideology and practice:

-Warren believes my marriage to Jeannine would be akin to my marriage to my father, or my 3 year old niece's marriage to my father.

-He claimed Prop 8 was important and good because if gays can get married Christians would have to endure hate speech and hate crimes.

-Saddleback Church prohibits gays from becoming members.

There are the obvious beefs:

--the irony of a Christian claiming hate crimes and speech against them by the very people the term was invented for. Boo fucking hoo, tell it to Matthew Shepard. However this presupposes that Warren is correct, that Christians would be attacked by wedded gays: are you out of your ever-loving mind? I would be too busy filing for joint health insurance and sending wedding invitations to Fred Phelp's website to set crosses on fire on Rick Warren's lawn.

--the lack of Christian compassion: aren't you supposed to welcome into the flock those who need you most, and in your estimation, Pastor Warren, wouldn't that be the godless gays?

--I'm not a fan of people who think I should burn in hell for all of eternity for loving my partner, who has the same genitals as me. No people in the history of civilization, nay, the history of bipedal existance have ever had so much gential interest as the gays. My vagina, I guarantee, looks very similar to straight women's vaginas. I should know, I've slept with straight women and the 'ginas look nearly identical, sans some hairstyle differences. I presume gay dudes would say the same. So can we stop talking about what's in my pants already. Christians are the perverts here, not the gays. I have never once discussed or been interested in or written pamphlets about or stated websites on or given public orations concerning Christian sex practices or genetalia.

But this isn't about the bigot Warren, this is about the savior of our people, the optimist, the sage, the one true and noble and mighty and fair and everything else his campaign overtly or covertly, explicitly or implicitly claimed: Obama is fair, sane, morally sound.

I do love Obama, but the pick of Warren is a slap in the face to the disenfranchised, the oppressed, the gay* minority who helped put him into office. I have to agree with Dan Savege here: you don't see an any anti-semites in Obama's cabinet, and there is no out and proud racist performing any function for him either. Why is it that the only people who are expected to "agree to disagree," to shut up and take it, to make nice with those who openly hate them, are the gays?

Consider for a moment, dear reader, someone who outwardly hated an intrinsic aspect of your identity, something immutible and ingrained. Who would that person be? Are they, and others like them, constantly given the benefit of the doubt by our leaders and society in general? Are they heralded for all their other good qualities, and is their hatred of you ignored or downplayed at every turn? What if they were then chosen by the president as someone to perform a sacred and historical ritual in front of the entire country, as an example of morality and good character?

Consistantly the hateful, bigoted, ignorant Christian pastors in America are praised by our political leaders for their intelligence, their kindness, their temperance, their good nature and will despite their open and proud hatred of a prominent minority group. On the same night the first black man was elected president of the United States, Prop 8 passed in California (Warren had a big hand in that, too). While that night will be remembered by many people as the night that equality finally prevailed in America, my memories of it will be very different. Where were all those equality-lovin' straight people who voted Obama in California when Prop 8 won? If you are straight, or god help you gay, and you voted for Obama and also for Prop 8, all I can muster at this moment is fuck you, equality for some is inherently unequal.

I know you're not perfect, Barack, and I'm not asking for it: I'm asking for follow through on that hope you banked on, that change you promised. I'm asking for some of that consistancy you're known for: if you're so smart, your plans and politics so transparent, why make such an ignorant and calculated choice as Warren? Mr. Obama you claim it was to bring people together, but you have only driven me further from you, and many of the other gays that fought so hard for you, believe in you, wrote four figure checks to you, further into the margins. It's the wrong foot to start on, it's a mistake, and for the first time you look like a politican to me. John Leo on the Huffington Post claims that "Prop. 8 and its aftermath are the first time in the four decades since Stonewall that the gay movement has started to look like an organized tantrum" and God willing he's right. Again, to reference Dan Savage, no more Mr. Nice Gay. We have had it, and are no longer interested in pretending bigotry is permissible, inequality is warranted, or that we're cool with you despite the fact that you wish we would just keep our mouths shut and play nice.


*I'm purposely ignoring the rest of the acronym, and just discussing the G and L in LGBT. I am not transgendered and therefore cannot speak to their needs or opinions. Nor am I bisexual, and the bisexuals can at least marry 50% of their dating pool. This issue is too complex to discuss all facets in one wee blog entry, so I have willingly chosen just the parts I am capable of discussing at least semi-coherently.

I've been busy

and surrounded myself with snakes and birds and all the things I missed about writing. I was on the train the other day and this really beautiful woman was sitting across from me. I couldn't stop looking at her, so before I got off at my stop I wrote a note to her, something to the effect of "you're beautiful, someone should tell you that today. So I will do it." I dropped it in her lap as I was leaving the train. I want to live in a world where strangers are honest and kind. Auden said "Before people complain of the obscurity of modern poetry, they should first examine their consciences and ask themselves with how many people and on how many occasions they have genuinely and profoundly shared some experience with another." Was my moment on the train profound? No. But it was genuine, and genuine is a start. We have to make our own magic, you know.



Public Transit

A pauper’s burial insures you never have to be alone again.
Is that what you want? To spend you life unfettered by the problems
Of others, only in death to be surrounded by the naked stranger,
One thousand strong and unflinching?

ER

I am coming back

I have been meaning to write on here for quite some time. I've had lots of ideas: I spend a lot of time on the train to work writing down bits of language I see that's evocative for me of one thing or another, strange connections we all make from a subway sign to something from a relationship we had years ago and then to the emotions that relationship brings up now, how it's different from then, how it reminds us of a season, or we wonder how that person is doing. A word misread opens up an idea for a poem, a reprise, something in an NPR podcast makes me think of how birds are all that matter, really.

I am done teaching and I am glad I am done. I will work at Trader Joe's four days a week, write the other three. Jeannine makes enough to support my habit.

I am all ideas and no follow through. I talked to a friend today, she said maybe it's ok to just have beginnings right now. I think she's on to something. I have been beating myself up about not writing: I start a poem, never finish it, I can't, it's like I've forgotten how. I have written three poems in almost a year and only one of them is done. And that one is not very good. Please don't leave comments of encouragement. I am not looking for sympathy. I'm not looking to be reprimanded either.

Now that I have time to devote to writing, I will write something really great. I know it is still in me, to take myself seriously. I don't know that I took myself seriously in grad school. I think I wrote funny poems because I didn't believe I could write good ones, ones that deserved to be serious. I wanted to believe I could be serious and funny. I couldn't. Or at least I wasn't.

It's time for me to take my writing seriously again, as though my life depends on it. I think it does. I see now that it does. If I'm not a writer, which I am, then what am I? A fucking grocery store clerk? A payment to my loan company? I am an oxygen converter. A cat feeder. An energy consumer. I am something to worry about or be indifferent to. That can't be all, that's not what I thought when I started writing 15 years ago. I was a writer then, even when I didn't know shit. I knew I was a writer. If I can't do that, I'm nothing.

It feels self-involved and pretentious because I keep listening to everyone else. I am going to stop doing that. I have to write for myself again. When I do that, I love it. When I do that, I'm good at it. I am really fucking good at it.

I am going to go write now, but I am back, and will be on more frequently, like before my absence. Let me know how you are, if you drop by.

Fuck! George Saunders!

That's it! He's right! Palin is so familiar to me because she sounds like my students.

Things I am qualified to do because of my proximity to them:

1. Major metropolitan public transit planning: because I can see the red line from my house.
2. Multi-million dollar real estate development: I live in the same city as the Sears Tower.
3. NASA administration: Buzz Aldrin was in Chicago once, and I met him. Additionally, Chicago has both sky and stars.
4. Determine the best course of action for the growing global warming issue: I live on planet Earth, unlike Sarah Palin, who lives in Fraggle Rock. John McCain is one of those big ogres who lives above and stomps around scaring Sarah, which is why no one ever sees her unless McCain is nowhere to be found.
5. I also have oceanographic expertise because I can see Lake Michigan from my house.

Stellar references are available upon request.

What's that Word?

Some Stuff:

My initial problem with living here was largely encouraged by the alarming number of Ys being used as vowels at surrounding EL line stops: Berwyn, Bryn Mawr, Argyle all lead to feelings of instability and unfamiliarity when you're enveloped by them on your daily commute to anywhere.

I now hate the building I live in, only because my neighbors are inconsiderate assholes. Sure, I like The Cure and A Perfect Circle and Al Green, but I don't want to hear them loud as hell between the hours of 9am and 9pm every day of my life until I die. I look forward to moving a bit closer to the lake, a bit further south for a slightly shorter commute, and away from these fucking jerks.

I love working at Trader Joe's: the people are nice, the pay is reasonible, the benefits (when they kick in in a few months) are good, and I like manual labor. I pick up boxes, heavy ones, and walk quickly all day long. It is satisfying and the long bus ride home allows me to enjoy my exhaustion.

Teaching starts in a week or so. I am happy with my syllabus and look forward to being in the classroom again. I am super excited about their final: I'm having them write their own writing philosophy. I think it will be good for them to spend some time thinking deeply about what writing is to them, how it functions in their life, how they use it, and what about writing is good and bad to them, what it means for writing to exhibit subjective qualities. It will be good for them to argue their way into a position (and hopefully realize said position is inherently and necessarily malliable).

Dara (chair of my defense committee) sent me an email in response to an update I sent her in which I told her I had not been writing. And I quote, "And write more,
def. write more as soon as you can, you're a real poet with true work to do, do
it. I've felt most lucky to get to know you and your work."

She's the boss.

Off I go. But before that, here's one from Dara:

Elegy

That one's wicked smile, this one's shaded eye,
too many vanishing points, that one's crooked nose,
another's complex hands, that one who laughed
so hard he cried when his wit outwitted him,
too many vanishing points, as it always did,
that one's love of the mischief of cats, too
many vanishing points, that blue shoelace,
the orange wall, a collection of wishbones,
a collection of hands, too many vanishing points,
a tone of voice with nothing left standing
in its path, how he put his fork down, where
she looked away toward when she daydreamed,
too many vanishing points, how he shambled
down the road into where sunlight intersected
shade, [. . . .] at the end of the road where meadows hide
old apple trees, bluebirds and bees, too many
vanishing points, where her hand went away from
one last time, how he looked into lies with just
the mildest rebuke, where she hid the tooth,
how he wrapped a piece of string around and around
a broken doorlatch to keep the burglars out,
too many vanishing points, the way she crossed
herself every time she spoke a wicked thought,
the way he thought he wanted to think like a trout,
too many vanishing points, this one's watchband,
another's dress hat, a blanket a child pulls
across its face.

Employment Update

Well, it's been quite the harrowing four weeks. There were moments when I thought myself an utter failure, and believed I had utterly wasted the better part of the last six years and tens of thousands of dollars in student loans. But yesterday, finally, I was offered two jobs in one day, good jobs, one of which will provide me with health insurance (Trader Joe's!). And the other will let me teach (North Central College in Naperville).

North Central was initially promising, the chair sent me an email telling me how impressive my CV was, but no interview materialized. Well, yesterday Dr. Jackson called me and left me a message (I couldn't answer her call because I was busy being administered tiny electrical shocks for the good of science and my bank account, courtsey of UIC's behaviorial science department) explaining that they had an adjunct position open and would love to have me join them if I was still available. So, great news! I was concerned about being out of academia for an entire semester, I need the experience if I'm to get a full time teaching gig down the road. But I'm not sure I want that, I might want to do workshops and college prep/GED courses in the prison system, Trader Joe's and PT teaching would allow me to do that. The thing is, there will always be people to teach kids in college, but maybe not always people who want to work in the prison system.

In other news, The Green Flash, an online/print journal out of Chicago specializing in flash fiction took one of my poems. It should be up on the site soon, but isn't up yet because the previous issue is still up. But still, go check them out, God knows I'm not the best writer on there.

I think of you often, and want to write more soon.
xoem

Abandon Concern, All Ye Who Enter Here:

No worries! I'm back! Jeannine and I have been settling in to our new digs on the North Side (Edgewater, for those of you interested and learned of Chicago neighborhoods) and trying not to spend any money, as neither of us have any jobs, yet. We both have leads, me a promising "your CV is a strong one, I hope to set up an interview soon" and Jeannine actually has an interview in August. But as of right now, we have enough to skim through next month, and that's it. But I am confident we will not perish. Some things that have happened in the city that make me happy:

1. I really love public transit. I know I'm seen as eccentric at best, deranged and socially mislead at worst for that comment, but it's true. I'm a big fan of sitting on the red line, listening to some Buddhist podcast, and looking at all the shops and sights along the way. I'm also a big fan of riding the express bus down Lake Shore Drive early Sunday morning: not many people are out and the lake is beautiful and it makes me feel good.

2. We were at a coffee shop a week ago and a pretty lady walked by the window and smiled at me.

3. Our apartment is big enough and affordable and has a courtyard. The windowsills are big enough for our cats to lounge on.

4. Our friends here have been really great: helping us move in in record time, inviting us for dinner and being willing to come here to hang out because we don't have any money to blow on entertainment. Thanks guys, it means a lot to us.


I'm not going to spend too much time going on about my trouble getting adjusted here: it centers around a new environment, no job, no routine. I am a creature of habit and change is hard for me, but I think I'm doing the best I can. Come fall, when I have a job and the leaves are changing and there's that great bite in the air I will be happy and not nearly as anxious as I am now. It's hard not to have the warm bosom of academia to nestle into after 6 years of its reassuring poverty. But once I get a teaching job, I'll be back!

Oh, and if you've made it this far, I have a poem in the new issue of Alba. Go check it out.

Over and out.

March of the Summer Comic-Book Movies:

There're so many comic-inspired movies coming out this summer, I need to sort them out. Let's start with a list, chronologically by release date:

1. We have a new, potentially improved, and the potential is huge here, since Ang Lee's version stunk to high hell, Hulk movie. (The Ice Storm? Sense and Sensibility? Tortilla Soup? Lee is obviously a great fit for a movie about a fucking comic book character.) The new trailer:


Release date: June 13th

2. We have Wanted, INCREDIBLY-LOOSELY based on this comic of the same name:


Release date: June 27th

3. Next is the totally stellar comic, Hellboy. This is a sequel to the 2004 release:


Release date: June 28th

4. Hancock, a seemingly peripheral character in a handful of comics, will be released on July 2nd:




5. Lastly, we also have the new Batman movie, thankfully more Miller than Burton. Don't get me wrong, I like Tim Burton, I just like my Batman a bit more serious, his villains a bit more deranged and dangerous:


Release date July 18th.

And now I have a serious concern to address, in order to stay true to the comic book fans:

Q: Comic book movies usually suck (read: are grossly commercial, highly inaccurate), how can I defend being excited by some of these trailers?

A: Well, anonymous comic book fan, the answer to that is simple: I don't care. I know, the fact that they had to use some minor, 3rd tier character to make a superhero movie with a black lead is really telling, and yes, Wanted is totally off-base and going to be just a huge load of shit. Really, Angelina Jolie is going to stand around being Angelina and there's nothing we can do to stop it. I love comics as much as the next nerd, and yes, I also was out of my mind pissed off that Arnold Schwarzenegger played Mr. Freeze, really that he got anywhere near the whole Batman thing, but there's not much we can do about it now. Actually, the worse injustice was letting Joel "Dying Young--Phantom of the Opera--St. Elmo's Fire" Schumacher anywhere near Batman. "Dying Young" for God's sake! It's the aforementioned Ang Lee syndrome: you just don't let men who believe they are capable of writing their own subtext near comic book movies: they end up believing there is no subtext and write their own terrible underpinnings that end up undermining the whole project: Batman: great, careful, complex subtext! He embodies both hero and villain! He is the Joker! He is Two Face! Classic! Hulk: full of nuclear war responsibility/free will commentary! Use the subtext already written, assholes!

But I digress, the point is comics are fun and smart and interesting and I like coupling the joy I get from reading them with the effects Hollywood has to offer. Does that forgive casting misappropriations and directors taking too much digression with story lines and characters? No, of course not. Do those digressions ruin all the excitement and discussion and fun that come out of viewing the films? Again, of course not.

Really, potentially the most exciting comic book to movie release is the furthest away, with no trailers to link to and a release date of sometime in 2009. In the meantime we can entertain ourselves by wondering, who watches the watchmen?

Of course this has potential for being terrible all over it...but c'mon, the Comedian looks awesome! Aren't you a little excited? Shed those cynical layers and disdain for the popular appropriation of your previously shunned genre and bask in the acceptance of loosely-related, commercialized versions of your heroes! It's the only way you'll ever see Night Owl decked out like Batman ready to kick more ass than his comic-book incarnation ever could (you know his comic-self is a bit eh, well, lame: his costume made him out to be more super gay bird watcher than superhero). I'm sure I'll catch hell for that last bit: I know, I know, that was the point of Watchmen, that they were un-heroes, but I always rooted for Night Owl, both of them, and wanted them to be, well, stronger characters than they were portrayed. Here is my chance to see it. And that's what comics often are all about, isn't it? They strive for the potential to transcend limitations, the imagination to overcome the boundaries of a medium, be it that of a mild-mannered alter-ego or an underrated art form.

FUCK: The Big Strip Tease

I cannot read Plath and resist kneeling.

Lady Lazarus

I have done it again.
One year in every ten
I manage it--

A sort of walking miracle, my skin
Bright as a Nazi lampshade,
My right foot

A paperweight,
My face a featureless, fine
Jew linen.

Peel off the napkin
O my enemy.
Do I terrify?--

The nose, the eye pits, the full set of teeth?
The sour breath
Will vanish in a day.

Soon, soon the flesh
The grave cave ate will be
At home on me

And I a smiling woman.
I am only thirty.
And like the cat I have nine times to die.

This is Number Three.
What a trash
To annihilate each decade.

What a million filaments.
The peanut-crunching crowd
Shoves in to see

Them unwrap me hand and foot--
The big strip tease.
Gentlemen, ladies

These are my hands
My knees.
I may be skin and bone,

Nevertheless, I am the same, identical woman.
The first time it happened I was ten.
It was an accident.

The second time I meant
To last it out and not come back at all.
I rocked shut

As a seashell.
They had to call and call
And pick the worms off me like sticky pearls.

Dying
Is an art, like everything else.
I do it exceptionally well.

I do it so it feels like hell.
I do it so it feels real.
I guess you could say I've a call.

It's easy enough to do it in a cell.
It's easy enough to do it and stay put.
It's the theatrical

Comeback in broad day
To the same place, the same face, the same brute
Amused shout:

'A miracle!'
That knocks me out.
There is a charge

For the eyeing of my scars, there is a charge
For the hearing of my heart--
It really goes.

And there is a charge, a very large charge
For a word or a touch
Or a bit of blood

Or a piece of my hair or my clothes.
So, so, Herr Doktor.
So, Herr Enemy.

I am your opus,
I am your valuable,
The pure gold baby

That melts to a shriek.
I turn and burn.
Do not think I underestimate your great concern.

Ash, ash--
You poke and stir.
Flesh, bone, there is nothing there--

A cake of soap,
A wedding ring,
A gold filling.

Herr God, Herr Lucifer
Beware
Beware.

Out of the ash
I rise with my red hair
And I eat men like air.



Does it not feel like the most satisfying middle finger you've ever been lucky enough to receive? I would lick her boots: she would be disgusted.

A Daydream Fulfilled:

Often times I find myself wondering, what would it look like if Jim Henson designed a chain of drag clubs in Ireland?


Ahhh. Now I know.

Because Looking for Teaching Jobs is Depressing:

I bring you a meme via the Seacoast:

1) Ten years ago I was:
Spending all my money on women and booze, spending all my time going to concerts and getting high.

2) Five things on tomorrow's to-do list:
1. price moving companies
2. revise my CV
3. enjoy my new haricut
4. go to the dentist
5. kiss Jeannine


3) Things I'd do if I were a billionaire:
I echo Emily: pay off debt, buy a house with room for a garden, donate tons to hungry people and liberals
and also: start a print journal, buy Jeannine stuff to make movies

4) Three bad habits:
1. biting my nails
2. procrastinating
3. writing in progressive tense


5) Five places I've lived:
1. Northampton, MA
2. Aurora, IL
3. Des Moines IA
4. Amherst, MA
5. North Aurora, IL


6) Six jobs I've had:
1. English Instructor
2. Writer for the Beacon News
3. Placement Exam Reader
4. Pizza Maker
5. Music Store Manager
6. Distribution Editor for a small press

Oh, and by the way:

Thank you so much to those of you who babysat me while Jeannine was gone. She is back now and we would love to see all of you as much as possible before we head back to the thick and humid Midwest. Especially those of you who I have just recently met and just hate leaving so soon into our friendship: Gabe, I'm looking in your direction...

Graduations:

It occurs to me that a lot of changes have been happening in my life lately. Some of them are listed below:

1. I am leaving Massachusetts in a month with a degree deeming me the "master" of something.

2. I have three years of teaching experience.

3. I have been receiving some pretty impressive rejection letters.

I would like to concentrate this post on #3.

So, I have received a lot of rejection in my life. I'm not complaining; I think it's good for all parties included: rejection gives those dolling them out a chance to work out their qualms with hurting others' feelings and gives them practice at saying "no" in kind and quick ways. Receiving rejection allows me to work on using it as a way to better myself, my work, and gives my ego a healthy, hard slap in the face.

I've been rejected by women, by universities, by chapbook contests, and by journals of all shapes and sizes. I've been rejected by youth basketball organizations and for grant funding. I've been rejected by Buzz Aldrin.

But let's go back to the lit mags. I've been rejected by the big dogs: The Iowa Review, Lit, The Paris Review, Northwestern Review, Tarpaulin Sky, Ploughshares, Pleadies (twice!), 3rd Bed, Mid-American Review, and Quick Fiction (every month since the beginning of the year!), plus a slew of others. But I've noticed a really pleasant trend with the rejection letters lately: I'm getting better ones! Personalized ones!

When I got rejected from Tarpaulin Sky's chapbook contest the editors wrote a note on the bottom of it stating that they, "really enjoyed my work" and "wished I would continue to submit." Me! They wanted Emily R., specifically and by name, to submit again to their magazine. This is common, a suggestion to "please submit again" as though it is them and not you that is problematic, for lit mags to print in their rejection letters. But the fact that they are hand writing some nice little bit at the end is truly, and without sarcasim, encouraging to me. Previously the letter would be something along the lines of:

Dear Emily,

While we are unable to print your work at this time because we are fresh out of ink and just love your poems minus the large parts we hate, we STRONGLY suggest you consider continual rejection by us in the future.

Love,
Every journal I've submitted work to in the last 3 years

But recently there is this trend of rejection letters with personalized notes at the bottom. Take the one I received yesterday from Mid-American Review. It was typical in its content until I saw the little note at the bottom from their poetry editor which read, "I LOVE the ending of 'Let's Make a Difference, Marie.'" It seems to me that if I wasn't close to getting something accepted, at least closer than I have been in the past with only pre-printed rejections, they wouldn't waste their time telling me that in some way something about some little part of what I wrote tripped their trigger. I just don't envision the poetry editors of major American literary journals hand writing notes to every jackass who thinks they're a poet in America; there's just not enough ink in India for that.

It may seem desperate and sad to write an entire post about rejection from lit journals, as if it is they who determine my writing's worth. Of course they do not. But in the field I presently find myself, where I am post-graduate, I need to continue to publish to have a chance of teaching again in the future. Plus, I am a writer and we have insatiable egos, the kind whose thirst is only quenched by the satisfaction of other people seeing your name in print.

In honor of MAR's compliment and my mention of "fields" in the last paragraph, below you will find my poem, "Let's Make a Difference, Marie."


Let’s Make a Difference, Marie

I read you a poem. You read out loud to me
A letter from the bank. You raise your voice.
My voice was even, disaffected, disinterested,
And held the tone of a read out loud poem.

The cat bites his feet. His feet are garden tools.
I should be cleaning. You are ripping up
The bank letter the way race cars take off.
Later, your nose is on my face; your nose is a

Troubled rose petal. You walk out of the
Room and your nose is with you but your
Cheek is left behind and resting on my
Cheek. You punch holes in papers. You

Stack and I count. We are a team. We are
Together in all of this nose trouble. It smells
in here. Who is the culprit? The cats. The piss

On the tile floor. They should be cleaning
I should be dancing. But I hate dancing
But I like what it represents: freedom, joy,
Carelessness, popularity. I have never been
Popular with those whom I would like to

Be popular. Let’s shoot for that. Let’s be
Popular with highly motivated individuals.
Everyone likes to be the best in their field.
Let’s all purchase different fields.

I hear there’s plenty of room in North
Dakota and I hear there’s a reason there’s
Plenty of room there. We can make it better.
Dance parties. I’ll hate them and call the cops.

ER

Le Sigh

I am officially done with all my work, teaching and learning, for the University of Massachusetts. More on this at a later date when I have more time to consider all this event implies. But now, I'm going to New Haven to get Jeannine!