the eye of Nova's mind

Last year, I submitted some poems to a magazine. The editor wrote back, accepting two of my pieces but asking if he could do a huge edit on the longer. Basically, he wanted to gut the entire ending. I wrote back, stating why the portion was essential, & asked again that the piece be accepted as is or not at all. I never heard back from the editor, so I assumed that I'd been too forward, the pieces were not going to press, e&.

Imagine my surprise when I found a contributor's copy addressed to me.

Leafing through it, I saw that neither of the poems were edited. Huh, I thought. Maybe this turned out after all.

Then I flipped to the biographies. (It's funny--the bios are almost the first thing I check out in a contributor's copy; I think I want to know who my neighbors are.) The bios were in alphabetical order by first name--not a good sign. I read with interest an entry for the author of a poem I particularly liked; the entry noted other journals in which his work had featured--it was a standard bio, which was a good sign. In short order, I got to mine.

I share a last name with several celebrities, such as a basketball player (my high school government teacher used to call me by that male's first name to underscore that fact). I also share it with a well-known scientist. You may guess which one when you read the bio the magazine in question decided to give to me:

( not me )

Considering some of the spelling, it's obvious that this bio was in all probability lifted from somewhere else. God knows I didn't supply this biographical information.

I don't know what to do about this. Of course, I will write the editor & ask for a retraction. But, in many respects, the damage has been done: whomever hunts down a print copy of this magazine (say, in an attempt to authenticate my CV), that person will see that very wrong bio.

I've just never heard of such a problem in the publishing industry. Not saying that this is the first time something like this has happened--who knows--but it's not a common enough problem to have been identified & collated for advice gurus to tackle.

One of my LJ friends mentioned that she has again picked up the pen. This, of course, makes me smile.

I too have begun to write again, though the process is spotty. I should write what really is on my mind, but when I do that the word choices are humdrum and I am not pleased. I told my LJ friend that she was doing so good to let herself write crap, which is what I need to do. I'm such a perfectionist: my editor is always perched on my right shoulder, peering.

vylar_kaftan recently sent me a care package; included therein was The Observation Deck, a kit for breaking through writer's block and growing as a writer. I'm enjoying reading through the book (though I suspect I should probably be utilizing the deck). One of the pieces of advice stipulated that a writer should be producing much more than what comes out in the final draft. As in, at least ten times more. That rarely if ever happens with me. I'll write something, then administer word choice revisions or sometimes stanza relocations--but the content is almost always what comes upon the receipt of the first inspiration.

I need to let myself write crap. A lot of crap. All the time. Because, as I told my LJ friend, many beautiful flowers have sprung from piles of dung.

Significantly, I am not writing because of a New Year's resolution. I tried that before; when I went off my regimen, I felt I could give up on the rest of my resolutions. That's the main reason I'm resoluteless this season.

I wrote an entire poem on MS Word, something I rarely do, because I felt the bite of the poetry bug. It's important that I sense this bite, as it occurs rarely these days.

I'd just put on the finishing touches. I copied it to the clipboard, then pressed the window button for Firefox. Both windows minimized, then wouldn't open. Yes, I'm at the library.

The desk attendant moved me to an adjacent machine and, after I gave all indications that I didn't want the machine shut down, said they would work on retrieving the document, if possible.

This reminds me that I really should stick to my normal manner of producing poems: writing them longhand.

Update: The IT folks were able to retrieve the data and print the document. Yay! Still, I think I will take this as a cautionary tale.

The publisher of Journal of Truth and Consequence has nominated "Natural Escape" (along with three poems by other authors) for the Pushcart Prize XXXIV. Even a nomination was more than I'd dared hope.

The best of luck to all of the other nominees.

Markets that (1) demand that submissions sent to them be under their exclusive consideration and (2) then cease publication without notifying authors really tick me off.

A journal I submitted to yesterday requires that contributors send a bio along with their work. This is not a problem normally; I regularly include a bio. However, this journal wanted a 50-word bio only.

I had to cut many new credits as well as chop my info about my alma mater. I usually try to give props to the markets that recently accepted or will soon run my work. I did not like the process of whittling. There was much handwringing.

The next journal has a 100-word bio, much easier with which to comply.

Last year I participated in an offshoot of NaNoWriMo: insohaimo encouraged poets to write one formal poem every day of the month. It had been my intention all year to do so again in 2008, but somehow November snuck up on me.

Due to my seasonal job as an achievement test scorer, I haven't had a lot of free time to devote to the challenge, but I have scrounged up a few haiku in the interim. I have several days to make up, however.

( haiku )

During my last revision frenzy, some of my revisions encompassed nothing more than retitling a piece.

Usually, I'm pretty good at picking out apropros or odd/intriguing titles. However, some of my poems continue to labor under such bland names as "Adversity", "Definition", and "Solace".

One of these pieces, "Consolation of a Daughter", recently became "Instant Karma". Not a great improvement in terms of turning into something other than an abstract noun, but it's at least a bit zippier.

My best retitling went into rendering "Observation" (which was a perfectly appropriate name) into "Jellied Cake". Isn't that much more, well, appetizing?

It's Post-a-Rejection-Letter Friday! I thank vylar_kaftan for letting me know.

I've posted a couple of rejection letters on my LJ behind a friends lock over the last six or so months. I got a really in-depth rejection/acceptance letter from Möbius when I was 16, but I don't know if I still have that or not.

Here's a rejection I got from The Quirk this week:

J,

We really dug your stuff, but you were just shy of an acceptance. Please send us more of your work.

Cheers,
K

(or, "Sexuality: My Problem Child")

The initial print run for Micropleasure was a small number of copies, a gift from my editor. I gave a copy to sarahmichigan, and then I didn't know what to do with them. Ultimately, I decided to give a few copies to family members and send the rest off for review.

( back history of how I learned that some poems some family members should not read )

I gave a copy to my mother, my brother and my sister. ( their reactions )

( an explanation of themes )

( ordering information )