Ingredients For Chapbook Contest

• Manuscript, reprinted in 1.5 space after the double-spaced copy turned out to break the page limit
  
• Check for $15
  
• Cover letter, short, sweet and signed
  
• Two title pages, one with contact info and one without
  
• Self-Addressed Stamped Envelope (SASE)
  
• Double servings of my made-from-scratch optimism and self-esteem
  
• Postmarked by Sept. 30
  

Now to wait a week! (mailed 9/26)

Sliiiiiide! Safe!

There are still minor edits to be made, and the exact order is by no means final, but here is the tentative final "tracklist" for this project:

Under Pressure

Life Lessons

Ripe

Weeding Is A Savage Affair

Daddy Cut Diamonds

Living Medicine

From Athens To Greece In Zero Seconds Flat

How Many Birminghams

Unearthing The Blue Bomber

Lights Out

Hold Your Applause

October

Ours Was An Easy Dish

Lullaby in Crisis

Idea of Happiness

Bus Ride Nostalgia

Rousing A Glow

Just To Hear The Tone

Your Only Shiny Thing

Home Stretch

Right now I have about 14 out of 20 poems prepared for completion -- 10 finished poems and 4 good ideas that need fleshing out. Fleshing out is often the fun part of forming a rough draft; getting the seed idea is what causes any irritation.

And 14/20 isn't a home stretch, that's a work in progress! But today I attended a poetry workshop and reading by Naomi Nye, and wow, now I have some five more solid ideas to round out the chapbook. She's a very kind, bright, and aware person, and deserves whatever positive reputation spread in her name. Her voice is as fitting for poetry as it is for song, and I'm jealous of her students.

Aracelis Girmay, a young, accomplished poem in her own right, performed as well. She's talented, but I'm less receptive to "social injustice and war crimes" poetry. However, she saved her stunner for last, a poem named "Loesfoeribari." It was the equivalent of being shown a plain white toaster and having its unremarkable features described, then ending with dropping a butter knife into the red-hot burners and watching the whole thing flash and explode. It was the stealthiest burst of joy I've ever heard in a poem, and added "Loesfoeribari" to my vocabulary.

My online order of Nye's book didn't arrive in time for her to sign it; I was forced to buy one of her books that's partially included in the ordered "Collected Poems." I didn't mind one bit.

Optional Robot Design

While I eagerly await whatever mechanical masterpiece my cousin sends here to use as a chapbook cover, I've found another robot candidate who looks lonely and like he is nobody's shiny thing:

This Is What A Rough Draft Looks Like

Below are the scraps of a poem yet to see even a rough completion. It's a cell rapidly dividing in the DNA of my imagination, but hasn't filled its petry dish. The concept and premise are clear: Lady and Robot go running, Robot has heart attack, Lady brings him home where he recovers, Lady hasn't learned a drop extra about compassion. The idea's in place for her to show the tiniest sign of coldness by leaving his shoes by the door instead of bringing them to him; this comes back as the nastiness it really is when he's still wheezing in bed and she leaves his medicine out of reach. 

In terms of poetic concept, I am dead-set on having the poem use iambic pentameter or tetrameter before and after the heart attack, and free verse during.

"
I left your shoes at the side of the door for you

to find. Tie them, and together we'll run

between patches of shade and ignore this heat,

ignore the steps softly falling behind,

your figure curling into the pebbled road.

My pace before your cry for help was swift,

but I lost [speed]

Your voice whistling

to be heard,

hands weakly reaching

to be felt,

my foot on the gas

to put you to bed.

Two aspirin wait on the side of the nightstand for you

to find. 
"

Now I just have to fill out the details of this miniature soap opera, which is always the trickiest part. Every element has to say something beyond the obvious, yet tell the basic story as well: where are they working out? How do they get home? What are his symptoms, what do they say to each other? The answers to all of these questions will tell the reader who these people are and their place in the world and each other's. 

One of my loftiest goals for this chapbook is to depict two people (one is possibly a robot; this is beside the point). There are other poems dedicated to their moments of happiness and calm, but this is one of the peak points of their incompatibility threatening the relationship's very existence. He must play the victim, but seem to be arrogant beforehand. She must seem heartless, yet sympathetic, even as she blithely tends to her sick partner. 

She sure as hell isn't going to cry or contemplate her mortality.

We'll see how recognizeable (and better? maybe?) this poem is in in its final stages.

The Object of My Poetic Desire: "That?"

A chapbook generally has two methods of assembly:

1) Go through your many poems written over the course of years and stick all the best ones together that have anything in common or relate to each other, either in similarities or opposites. All of the hardest work is already done by virtue of being a poet, with only edits and re-arranging to toil over.

2) Pick a major theme or story and write one from the ground up. Torture yourself over every poem in the sequence, whether you try to envision it from beginning to end, in random order, or even "signature pieces" with in-between space to be determined.

I chose the second one, and it is as rewarding as it is seemingly futile. Poetry is often about the unexpected and spontaneous, and crafting something with a deliberate story in mind can be treacherous. It's the difference between being nominated to an already-existing political party and starting your own: you'd better have goals you believe in and energy to chase down every last possible voter!

A little over a week ago, I had to choose between two paths for the chapbook to take: devote all of it to one perspective, or use two perspectives and let each have a half? Each comes with its own advantages and disadvantages, but I chose the mono-view and hope it doesn't get old with readers or myself. 

There is a poet whose stage name is Black Madonna, and she has the motto, "Don't write poetry because you can, write it because you can't not!" I whole-heartedly agree. I write poetry because I can't not, but I write these poems because they were assigned their places. It's like always having a passion for painting, then being commissioned to render the horizon over Chicago: "...that?"

**EDIT** The part about building from the ground up may turn out to be a bold-faced lie. I've just purged my old poetry folders for material that looks like it would fit in with the other poems already slotted for the chapbook, and there are 3-5 good picks. Of course, everything is up for aggressive editing and expansion as my two collaborators and I pick at their content, but regardless, there is some imported content involved. Now you know!