I'm a little sick today, but that's not going to stop me! I feel better than I did yesterday and am going to trust that a good night's sleep tonight will fix me right up.

Tomorrow my super-talented friend Crystal Hoffman and I will be heading to New York City to perform at the Dada Poetry Salon at the Cornelia Street Cafe. Crystal is my partner in crime for the TypewriterGirls, and is an amazing poet to boot. (You can read her poetry in Weave issue 01 - only 7 copies left!, FRiGG, and soon in A cappella Zoo's sure-to-be-fabulous 4th issue! I do love A cappella Zoo. If you order issue 4 by March 20th you can get a free copy of issue 1, and, lo and behold, that's the one I'm in! It's the TypewriterGirls Special!)

In less than a month the AWP will be upon us. Weave and the TypewriterGirls will both be heading to this writer party to end all writer parties. Weave will be sharing a table with Open Thread, Caketrain, Pear Noir!, and a couple other Pittsburgh literary lovelies and I will be speaking on the panel The In Sound from Way Out: From Submission to Publication along with editors from Pank, Hobart, Lumberyard, and Bateau. It's way more fun and awesomeness than should be allowed on a Thursday morning, quite frankly.

That very same day Crystal and I will have to crash in some famous poet's hotel room for a nap (we're thinking Gary Snyder), because Thursday night the TypewriterGirls are performing at the Mercury Cafe along with an eclectic array of poets, including TypewriterGirls favorite, Sandra Beasley! Yay! Come witness TypewriterGirls Do Dead Poets - we promise to be entertaining. Also to give you whiskey.

Radio Silence

I've been a bit non-present again, I realize.

I was working pretty hard on an entry on mentorship that's gotten completely off track as I've been unable to get ahold of one of the subjects of the entry. It has made me a bit glum to look at an entry which is primarily about someone who hasn't emailed me back in two months.

I'm not dead, really. Weave issue 03 is ready to ship from the printer, the TypewriterGirls are heading to the Bowery Poetry Club in January and I wrote a draft of a new poem recently.

Mihnea and I will be heading out to Cook's Forest for three days after Christmas for some relaxation time in a cabin. Though, I wonder if it still counts as a cabin since it has a whirlpool tub. Tiny hotel, maybe? I've joked that it's our honeymoon/Christmas/Valentine's Day. We opted for no TV in the cabin. There will be lots of writing. Lots of snuggling. I'm using that whirlpool.

I have a bunch of submissions floating around out there right now. For some reason I'm on the edge of my seat about them over the past couple of days. I have one submission that's been out there for four months. I used to get upset about these things. Now I'm an editor.

Reading in 2009

I've seen a lot of people making lists of their favorite books of 2009 and I was trying to think of what my favorite books of 2009 might be when I realized something a little bit depressing -- I didn't really get to do all that much reading purely for pleasure in 2009.

I did make sure that I sat down and read At Night, the Dead by Lisa Ciccarello, and this weekend I plan to give The Spare Room by Dana Guthrie Martin my full attention, but maybe it would be better to just list the books I read for pleasure this year. period.

I did a lot of reading a poem here and a poem there from books, so I'll really only be listing books I actually read cover to cover. Not all of them were even published this year. I am made of book reading fail.

- The aforementioned At Night, the Dead by Lisa Ciccarello from Blood Pudding Press
- No Water by Renée Alberts from Speed and Briscoe
- The Ice Lizard by Judith Johnson (one of the best books of poetry I've ever read. Judy Johnson is fantastic.)
- Inside Bone There's Always Marrow by Rachel Mallino from Maverick Duck Press
- Buffalo Dance: the Journey of York by Frank X. Walker (one of my top 10 favorite poets of all time. I gushed at him at AWP last year. Yes, I totally fangirled.)
- Horrific Confection by Juliet Cook (get your copy to hold in your hands while you can! She's running out!)

Oh dear lord, those might be the only books that I chose to read this year and actually read cover to cover. That is extremely depressing. This is one of the problems with being an editor and review writer - I am constantly reading books and work that are not necessarily of my choosing, and there seems to be a constant influx of this. I've actually fallen woefully behind on some of my reviews due to all the other craziness of the past few months, and in addition, there are many people who have been waiting for a response from Weave for a lot longer than I would like. If you're out there reading this, we haven't forgotten you!

To be fair, if I wasn't a review writer, I would never have discovered Frank X. Walker and there would have been no AWP fangirling.

If your book is not on the above list and I purchased it this year, do not be sad. I probably read it in parts and stare at it longingly as I dash from room to room of my apartment, either chasing after my son or trying to locate something that has gone missing at just the moment I need it. Or it is currently in the possession of one of the Weave assistant editors, waiting to have a review of it written. Joel just absconded with I think three more books. For the most embarrassing life of me I cannot remember which ones. I do recall being very happy about one of them, thinking, oh but it would be lovely if he wrote a review of that one!

I did a bit of writing on Tuesday. Not much, but I've begun, at least, to get myself back in the poetic head space.

My just-before-the-new-year resolution is to read more just because I want to. I will start this weekend. I will let you know how it goes.

Whirlwind

It's a wonderful week and it's a crazy week at the same time.

First, the happiest of news - my husband got his green card yesterday!!! Hooray! This is the most wonderful of news and overshadows any bad news/feelings. Seriously. One of the bad things that happened on Tuesday, thought, was that my car got towed (a $45 lunch for two turned magically into a $200 lunch) and I couldn't even really get upset about it.

Other happy news - two TypewriterGirls performances this weekend! The first one is this Friday at Remedy in Lawrenceville - Karen Lillis and Laura Davis will be reading, and there will be various other TypewriterGirl shenanigans. Doors open at 9:30.

On Sunday it's TypewriterGirls Save the Libraries! Doors open at 5:30pm at the Carnegie Lecture Hall in Oakland. It's for a good cause. You should be there. Sandra Beasley and Nancy Krygowski will read, Phat Man Dee will sing, Christiane D. will perform, Dave Doyle will balance things on his face, Moquette Volante will perform, and Crystal and I will be up to our zany antics with guest appearances from Sean Collier and Franco Dok Harris. You for sure want to be at this one.

My friend Kevin is coming out to Pittsburgh this weekend to see the TypewriterGirls shows and hang out in the city. I don't get to see Kevin too often and it will be very nice to have him around!

I've actually taken off work tomorrow to get ready for the upcoming TypewriterGirls shows. This is not the first time I've taken off for a show, but it's the first time I've taken off for show rehearsal.

Very Good Things are, of course, happening elsewhere in the poetry world, too.

- The lovely Rachel Mallino has just had her next chapbook picked up by Dancing Girl Press! Hooray and congratulations, Rachel!!

- My Weave co-founder Laura Davis has a new blog. Check it out -- it's all poetry-related and stuff

- The New Yinzer Presents has a reading coming up! I'm in it with fellow Weave editor Joel Coggins, the always-amazing Renee Alberts, and much much more!

- Juliet Cook has a new chapbook coming out from Slash Pine Press called Fondant Pig Angst. I have ordered it. You should order it, too.

- Dana Guthrie Martin's chapbook The Spare Room is out right now from Juliet's press, Blood Pudding Press. It's another one that I demand you go purchase right now. Dana's work is absolutely stunning. Always.



I haven't been writing as much as I should, but I have ideas and after this weekend I'll have a little breather. And that will be good.

Also - my chapbook from Tilt Press, Barefoot and Listening, should be coming out soon!!

Catch up

My son will be spending the whole week in Cleveland and I have committed myself to doing some major catch up while he's away. There are many things to do;

• Get issue 03 of Weave finalized and sent out to the printer (!!!)
  
• Work on my 4 drafted poems
  
• Write up an evaluation for one of my interns (this really should be the first thing listed)
• Do some housework. The husband would be so pleased.
  
• Read! I have a book on Allen Ginsberg's Buddhist poetry that I'm really enjoying, that whole literary theory thing to plug away at, and more poetry than I can realistically shake a stick at.
• Do my best not to go overboard purchasing books this week. I can only read so many at a time.
• Obtain cover art for my chapbook. Very important.

There's also (conveniently) a poetry reading to go to on Wednesday, time to spend with my friends, and exercising that must be done now that I'm not constantly coughing.

It's good to know that even when I don't have a 4-year-old to worry about I can still run myself ragged.




Other Lovely Things

• If you haven't done so yet, you should head over to the Tilt Press website and purchase their 2009-2010 chapbook subscription -- and not just because my chapbook will be a part of it!
• GUD is having a pumpkin carving contest. Had I any skills at all I would enter this. You may have skills. You could enter. You could win books.
• There's a nice review of Weave issue 02 up on New Pages.
  

Subscription Drive over at Weave, SPF, publishing, etc.

First, if you have not yet checked it out, I would like to direct you to Weave Magazine's subscription drive. We're attempting to get 30 subscriptions in 30 days and we've fallen a couple subscriptions behind, so we'd really appreciate the purchase if you were to make one! Subscriptions are at a discounted price for the next 4 days only! $12.00 gets you two issues of Weave. $19.00 gets you issues 1-3. So go forth and purchase!

I'm also very excited to say that four of my poems are going to be published in an anthology edited by Naomi Shihab Nye titled Time You Let Me In: 25 Poets Under 25. I'm thrilled to get to be a part of this anthology and cannot wait to read the rest of the anthology. The book is to be published by Greenwillow Books, which is an imprint of HarperCollins. Exciting stuff.

In some local poetry news, Pittsburgh will be hosting a small press festival called SPF this upcoming July. The festival is being directed by and was conceptualized by the good people over at Open Thread. If you have a small press and are in the area you should consider getting a table before the July 1st deadline. There are a lot of presses already signed up and, of course, Weave is happily one of them.

I am so very thankful that it is Friday and I am no longer at work. It is a bit sad that I go through the entire week anticipating the weekend. Don't get me wrong - I am extraordinarily grateful for my job. I like my boss. The work isn't terrible. But auditing is certainly not something that makes me get up in the morning all excited. Ever. Maybe some day I'll be able to afford to go to graduate school and get my career redirected somewhat. Or perhaps it's just a grass-is-greener sort of thing and I should be happy with the work I am doing. I'm editing Weave with Laura, I'm running The TypewriterGirls with Crystal, I'm writing, and I'm publishing. Really, I've got nothing to complain about. I just get so despondent at work sometimes. This heavy feeling between my chest and my stomach. If only I could just get past it.

On a less depressing note, this weekend my friend Bill and I are sitting down to talk about the cover art for issue 03 of Weave. I've sent him a bit of the poetry we've accepted and he may be creating a response to the work as the cover. He also does portraits with the poet Huang Xiang that you can take a look at through the above link, and we're also talking about potentially using one of those. I'll also be heading to Windber this weekend for my friends' performance of A Midsummer Night's Dream, which is bound to be an interesting time.




I've noticed I'm terrible at titling my blog posts. Perhaps I should just abstain entirely.

Post-AWP wrap up

My third AWP was by far the best yet. Here are some highlights:

- I got to meet Frank X. Walker, perhaps my current favorite poet. He ranks up there, for sure. He signed my copy of When Winter Come and I got to tell him his book was the best I had read in a very long time. He also stopped by the Weave table and was very, very sweet.

- The whole Affrilachian poetry reading, in fact. Every one of those readers was fantastic. Patricia Smith read an absolutely amazing crown of sonnets. I got the chance to tell her this.

- The Weave table! I burned out a little by the end of each day, but I got to meet a few more of our contributors for the first and second issues there; Michael Ogletree, Karen Schubert, and Ahimsa Timoteo Bodhrán. Also, Weave sold fairly well (especially, I have been told, for our first AWP!) and we have some new subscriptions! Yay!

- Getting to escort Mary Biddinger on stage at the Anti/diode poetry reading.

- Meeting the absolutely lovely Dana Guthrie Martin (another issue 01 contributor) at the Anti/diode poetry reading.

- Talking to M. Bartley Seigel, the editor of Pank, whose third issue features two of my poems. He is also lovely. I'd gone to a panel he was on last year and recall completely agreeing with his editorial policies. Also, he gave me a free Pank tshirt! It has a typewriter on it!

- The one and only panel I was able to go to; Poet as Oracle. It was amazing. They talked about stepping out of the ego when writing poetry and poetry written during meditation (among other things, of course). The panel really spoke to me and reflected a lot of what I have been trying to do in my own poetry lately. It was wonderful.

- Starting up the dance party on Friday and Saturday night with Crystal. There were people who thought we had been paid to do so.

- Spending part of Saturday with my old friend Natalie who I literally had not seen in ten years. We worked at Girlscout camp together. It was wonderful to get to catch up with her.

- Hanging out with the lovely people of Akron; Mary Biddinger, Jay Robinson, Frank DePoole, and Eric Morris. Hopefully I will get to see all of them again very soon!

- Guerrilla poetry readings for Judy Johnson. Fantastic. Also lunch with Judy Johnson. Also being informed that the TypewriterGirls can now "officially" be affiliated with 13th Moon Press. Also planning a reading with Judy Johnson for April.

And, of course

- Spending the week with my two favorite girls; Crystal and Laura

I know a lot of superlatives were used in this post, but it's because I had such an amazing time and got to meet and spend time with so many amazing people that I can't help but gush a little bit. Pictures to come.

Hope your AWP was fantastic, too!

A Lovely Poetry Day

Sunday was a very lovely poetry day. First, Laura and I hosted another poetry workshop through Weave where I got to meet some really cool local poets who I perhaps would never have met otherwise -- there was a great variety of styles and subjects. I love workshopping and it was wonderful to get to hang out and read some pretty awesome poems.

Also on the Weave front, Laura and I have begun working with one of our fiction readers and I am simply blown away by him. He is very serious and very skilled and clearly highly motivated. I can't wait to get the chance to work with him more.

When I got home from the workshop I had an acceptance from Hawk & Whippoorwill sitting in my inbox. I'd submitted about 5 months ago and it was very exciting to hear back from them. I write a lot of poems about woman in nature and am very glad they decided to pick one of them up. It was a lovely way to start off my evening!

No sooner had I sent out a couple of withdrawals for the poem Hawk and Whippoorwill picked up, than The Pedestal Magazine sent me an email accepting "Barefoot and Listening", the title poem to a chapbook I'm putting together.

I'd been feeling a little down about the submissions I've sent out lately - I've been trying to push myself and have gotten a lot of rejections of late. It's been a little demoralizing. To be honest, these acceptances have really lifted my spirits a lot and have shown me that pushing myself is what I need to do.

In other news, Juliet Cook over at Blood Pudding is putting together another multi-writer project. There are only about 7 slots left and I'd like to snag one of those, but I've been struggling with putting together my submission for her. I know I do have poems that would fit with her aesthetic, but the problem is finding and editing all of them.

Also! The Winter Issue of Arsenic Lobster is up! Hoorah!

Issue 01 of Weave - On sale now!

The first issue of Weave Magazine is on sale now! Click on the link or head over to http://www.weavemagazine.net to get your copy today!

Poetry Cheesecake

My dear friend and co-editor of Weave, Laura Davis, talked about a very interesting topic over on her blog, Laura Without Labels a few weeks ago at this point - women as both smart and sexy, and is it possible to effectively present yourself as both at the same time.

Laura wrote about this topic primarily as a member of the skeptical community, but her post got me to thinking about how, from my experience, I am perceived as a woman off the page in poetry.

As you may or may not be aware, I run and host a poetry cabaret with my darling friend Crystal called The TypewriterGirls, and I must say that we have had some pretty darn lovely ladies and gents at our shows. Crystal and I always find some kind of costume to wear for our shows, often ones that could arguably be described as "sexy".

Anyway, whereas Crystal and I often look oddly sexy at TypewriterGirls shows, we stopped short of doing a show about sex where we wouldn't mention herpes or necrophilia, but rather would try to actually be sexy. We (or maybe it was just I) even had an idea for a flier that would have involved strategically placed typewriters.


In the end, as I said, we opted not to do a show about sexiness, in part, I think, because Crystal writes very lewd, weird, semi-offensive comedy, and it probably wouldn't have worked out anyway, but mostly because we didn't want to reduce the TypewriterGirls to poetry girl cheesecake. I don't know if this is at all a common occurrence in the poetry world, this idea of pretty poet girl as primarily pretty girl and secondarily poet (I do recall the great Fence debacle of '05), but especially where readings are concerned I see where it could be problematic.

To be fair, we do, I think, get a somewhat larger audience in part because we're cute girls who (sometimes) dress cute, and in that way it works to our advantage. However, I know that Crystal and I both desire to be seen as poets first, cute girls second, and while most men don't have short skirts to take advantage of on stage, they do have an establishment that they still seem to have a majority stake in.

Men also seem (whether this is accurate or not) to either be more confident than women about their writing or have a greater desire to publish. Laura and I probably receive twice as many submissions from men and as from women for Weave. I have been told by a male editor that for every ten submissions from a man, he receives one from a woman. To that I say - DANG.

I know a lot of amazing female writers, but it's true that many of them just don't send their work out, and I'm not certain why that is because honestly, it's a problem I've never had. I've been submitting my work regularly since my senior year of college.

I would, of course, be interested to hear others weigh in on this -- is this disparity because men are encouraged to publish more than women? Is it because there are just more men writing than women (I seriously doubt this)? Is it because women do see publishing as male dominated? Or is it because Laura and I are just so cute that men want to be near us via their poetry?