Here we are at the very last gasp of November and it feels like it — outside my office window the day is gray and the air swirls with snowflakes. Not unusual for the borderlands between Vermont and Quebec! We are keeping the wood stove cranked up.
On the poetry writing front, this month had its share of rejections of various kinds (and one waiting list) but also some publications and acceptances. Let’s focus on the positive!
An abecedarian from my manuscript, THE EARTH CLOCK, “November Ars Poetica,” is published in the current issue of Bear Review (←click to read the poem!). It’s kind of about a fox I saw almost daily running through our yard during our first year in Vermont, but of course, being an ars poetica—a poem about poetry itself—the poem explores on a writer’s intimate relationship with her readers.
The beautiful anthology, Birdbrains: A Lyrical Guide to Washington State Birds, edited by poet Susan Rich, with bird notes by Stephanie Delaney, is now available! Here’s a link to check it out on bookshop.org. My contribution to the anthology is another poem from THE EARTH CLOCK manuscript, titled “Song Sparrows in Winter,” which contemplates a painting by Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Four (!) Washington State Poet Laureates contributed poems to the anthology, as well as three Pulitzer Prize winners. 107 different species of birds are matched with poems, bird fact notes, and original pen and ink sumi-e paintings.
Hiroko Seki did the beautiful illustrations in the book—above is her sumi-e painting of a Song Sparrow that accompanies my poem in the anthology. I just love her work.
I will be sharing some forthcoming journal publications in future stacks—coming in the next six months or sooner—poems in Bennington Review, terrain.org, On the Seawall, and Plant-Human Quarterly. I am so grateful to the editors of these journals for their belief in my writing!
One nice surprise in November was notification that Tahoma Literary Review nominated my poem, “Poem Ending With a Line by Deborah Digges” for a Pushcart Prize! You can read the poem and listen to me read it in the link above. I know a lot of poems get nominated for Pushcarts; nevertheless, Tahoma Literary Review, only nominated two poems this year and I was proud that mine was one of them.
Well, I have a big birthday coming up, and it seemed like a good excuse to take a trip to Mexico City with my two long-time friends who are also big birthday-ing this fall! We had a fast, intense, senses-boggling mid-November adventure. One major highlight was a visit to the new Museo Casa Kahlo, which was the Kahlo family home for many years, which contains her father’s photography darkroom, and Frida’s basement atelier. The museum is charming, interactive, and less crowded than the other Frida Kahlo house in CDMX. We did not have time to go see Trotsky’s house! Next time!
I’m drafting another book! I think it’s a memoir-in-poems! More about that later.
We’re entering the dark time before the Winter Solstice. I’m sending good wishes to all of you—stay safe, fight the power, stay away from the trumpy retailers. Keep writing and submitting and holding your light high. xo Peace!