The Scrapper Poet

Warm temperatures and rain are melting the ice and snow away.  Although I’m sure we will be back to winter weather soon, I’m enjoying the thaw, watching the dirty mounds of snow melt, leaving behind road salt and patches of mushy, brown earth.

Since December 1, I’ve had a streak of publications, including works in Caesura, Spillway, Escape Into Life, Strange Horizons, The Country Dog Review, and most recently, Cold Mountain Review.  I will have to be satisfied with these for a while, because I haven’t been sending out a lot of work, and more importantly I have not written a new poem in 2013.  I have, however, been reading a lot!  And I’m really looking forward to the new poetry books and short story collections that will be out in the new few months.

I’ve also been working on a batch of short stories.  I have discovered that my writing process for attacking the short story is actually much like the way I work with poems.  I write a draft, go back, edit paragraphs and sometimes pages, rearrange, and then take a break, letting the work breathe for a few days before I read through the draft again.  Right now, I have four short stories in progress.  I would love to have at least one “finished” enough to send out in the next month or so.

Still, I’m not forgetting poetry!  Based on Diane’s recommendation, I recently purchased Wingbeats: Exercises & Practices in Poetry edited by Scott Wiggerman and David Meischen (It’s less than $10 on Kindle!).  I have already started reading some of the prompts and tips, and am sure they will help kickstart some new work soon!

I woke up this morning to December.  Where does the time go?  We got some snow a few days ago, but most of it is now gone.  The new week or so calls for very nice weather.

Last month I let my poems return home.  I haven’t sent them back out and indeed, I am letting my work roost a bit. Currently, I have 32 rejections for the year, so it doesn’t look like I am even going to come close to my 100 rejection mark.  That’s okay.  This goal has pushed me to be a more active submitter, and that is a good thing.  I However, I also got some acceptances.  The one I am the most excited about is the fact that Spitball accepted my poem “My Father Never Played Baseball.”  Spitball is a literary journal that focuses on baseball, and when I wrote my small set of baseball poems, I definitely felt out of my element.  Again, that is a good thing. 

I haven’t done a lot of poetry writing in the last few weeks.  Regular readers of the Scrapper Poet know that I am investigating the genre of the short story.  I sent one story out, and am eagerly awaiting a rejection!

This weekend is the calm before the storm.  Next week, the end of the semester papers and tests will come drifting in.  Then, December will really get interesting.