So, National Poetry Month is over, but I'm still waking up with poems in my head that I don't have time to write. I'm busy doing what most of us who completed the marathon are up to: shoveling out the refrigerator (amazing how it accumulated former food whilst I was on a creative spree), making the house look like feral twelve-year-olds raised by apes do not live in it, trying to figure out a reasonable balance between The Rest of My Life and Writing. Why is Writing frequently So Much More Fun?
In fact, if Actually Writing were all there were to Writing, wouldn't THAT be grand?
Le Sigh, as a young friend of mine likes to post on Facebook. And social media is certainly a source of many sighs. Necessary to anyone trying to promote anything these days, it is both an addictive time-suck and a joy. It's that unscheduled reinforcement that keeps us coming back for more. Maybe getting a whole bunch of LIKES isn't as good as beating your kid sister at mini-golf, but it does feel sort of sheepishly good. And I have to admit here that I don't actually know WHAT beating my kid sister at mini-golf feels like because I don't think I ever did. Beat her, that is.
Still, I have made a ton of connections to other people online: poets, editors, writers...and that's ALMOST made it worth watching Everyone Else In The World win contests, some of which I entered. Everyone Else also seems to publish in bigger, fancier magazines than I do. And to constantly have new books come out. Everyone Else could most likely kick my butt at mini-golf, too. Like I said in the caption, I'm a bit of a sore loser. I was just about ready to toss my darn club when The Literary Bohemian and Eclectica came through and saved my fragile self-esteem.
OK, I'm exaggerating just a bit. Poetic license, you know. I'm not really that upset--and Literary Bohemian and Eclectica are terrific publications. Clicky-click on the red links if you want to see some new work by me therein. I'm proud to be in both good online 'zines. It's just that old demon within that makes the silly comparisons between me and other writers. The old demon with braids and a squinched-up face.
So, it's the merry month of May, I have 30 new poems to revise (yikes), submissions to make, and a tougher hide to grow. Submissions, contest entries...these are part of the game. Such a peculiar thing it is to be a writer, always saying listen, listen, listen!