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Saturday, December 17, 2011

It's In the Mail This Week

I love it when I get mail that relates in some way to poetry. It always beats the electric bill or any other for that matter.

In the mail this week I received my Jan-Feb issue of Poets and Writers magazine. Yeah!!!  I also received a Holiday / New Years post card of sorts from a poet friend.

No rejection letters this week but then no acceptances either.

I've already alluded in an earlier post to the fact that the latest issue of Poets & Writers is awesome. If you don't subscribe to it, pick it up off the shelf. Barnes & Noble.

Thursday, December 15, 2011

Do Not Miss the Jan-Feb 2012 issue of Poets & Writers

I've had a peek a the Jan-Feb issue of Poets & Writers magazine and it looks like a wonderful issue. First of all it has the 7th Annual look at Debut Poets.  I always love his feature and have sometimes in he past known one o two of the poets. Even so, it's always fun to see things like their age, experience, time spent both writing and then finding a home for their book, advice, etc.

There is a special section in this issue that is on inspiration.  Several articles that deal with things like:
  • Clearing some of the stumbling blocks to creative thinking
  • Opening your writers mind
  • Inspired reading
  • Inspired revision
to name a few.  Some pretty interesting stuff to think about in this material.  Reading the fist one on stumbling blocks to creativity opened my eyes to some things and also reinforced some notions I've come to on my own in recent times.

I was particularly interested in the author's citation of some of the material from Psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi. For example his 5 stages of creativity:
  1. preparation
  2. incubation
  3. insight
  4. evaluation
  5. elaboration
Most of these really require some shield from the bombardment of simulation hat comes from outside interferences/influences like you would have while exposed to an Internet connection.  Csikszentmihalyi talks also about the 4 obstacles to creative accomplishment.
  1. Psychic exhaustion
  2. easy distraction
  3. inability to protect/channel creative energy
  4. not knowing what to do with energy
These articles would be a great read during the holiday beak in advance of the new year and (gulp) need I say resolutions?

Tuesday, December 13, 2011

Confession Tuesday - one click mistake edition


It’s Tuesday but feels to me like it should be Friday. Come with me to the confessional.

Dear reader:
When it’s Tuesday night and you feel like you’ve already endured a whole work week this is not a good thing, but I digress.  It’s been a week since my last confession. A week of coughing each morning and thinking that tomorrow I’ll be better. I confess that I thought I would be more on the mend by now.
I recently bought a poetry eBook by accident. I was on my Blackberry and from my Kindle app I was trying to download the preview. If I liked the preview I would likely buy the title as a real book. By accident I clicked the wrong link (they were next to each other and on the phone app it’s hard to tell which is highlighted).  I realized it immediately and contacted Amazon. I never opened the download and it remained in my archive until they did a refund. I decided with my Amazon account set on one click purchase I needed to change this. You ask, “Why are you telling me this?”  Ah yes, that would be my confession. I cannot see me buying poetry in eBook format.  Maybe a novel, maybe non-fiction, but poetry, no!
I like my poetry in print on a page. If I look at a poetry book and I like it, I’m probably going to read it over and over. Many of my copies are ultimately autographed by the author. Do that on your eBook reader!   So am I just a crazy old guy that refuses to change?  Don’t feel obligated to answer that.
In spite of the week feeling like it should be over I confess I have no idea how we got to the 13th of December already. I think I’ve missed a lot of opportunity this year.  I started out like gangbusters submitting work but cooled off late summer to a crawl.  A lot of my writing plans went by the wayside this fall but I don’t really want to lament – I’d prefer to think about next year since it will be here lickity split. Besides, 2010 was a dry year for publication and this year I did have successes. There is that to be thankful for.
What are you thankful for this year?

Monday, December 12, 2011

Thought for the day...

With me poetry has not been a purpose, but a passion.  ~ Edgar Allan Poe

Saturday, December 10, 2011

Little Butt Crack Showing...

I couldn't resist this. A picture I shot a while back with cell phone mid-day as I stretched my legs over lunch hour. Some days I actually have a humorous streak.



Thursday, December 08, 2011

Foxtrot - appearing in WestWard Quarterly Fall 2011

Earlier this fall my poem Foxtrot appeared in WestWard Quarterly.  Since this is a print publication there is not link to it but now that a little time has passed since the publication I have included now on the published poems page - see tab above or click here.

Magpie 94 / Poem: LUNCH



Lunch

Clock ticking
1800 seconds and ticking
rows of busy heads
bobbing and chewing
throats likes snakes
swallowing a rabbit
whole-

chatter
to a minimum-
like they each have some place
to go-
they do

half an hour for lunch
the the rest of their eight hour day

it's robotic-
circuitous               each day 
the same         each day
           the same



Michael A. Wells


Magpie 94


* photo credit - Lunch, George Tooker, 1964, Columbus Museum of Art