Grounds for Sculpture is an enchantment. Go through an arbor and find yet another startling contemporary sculture. The garden itself is lush and don't forget to eat at Rats. Yes, Rats, one of the most romantic restaurant I've ever been to.
http://www.groundsforsculpture.org/
Friday, July 30, 2010
Sunday, July 18, 2010
Motivation to Send Out Your Work!!!
So, you send out your work, get it back published in a magazine, an anthology, possibly without pay. Is that the end of that? Never!!! Once your work is published, any good thing can happen with it at any time. I just got a Facebook request from an editor for permission to use my poem, Friends for Life, that had been published in an anthology at least five years ago, in a dramatic reading. The editor's last dramatic reading (the subject is a friend's bout with cancer) raised $1500 for cancer research. Who knows what this reading will raise? For all kinds of reasons, get your work out there.
Here's my poem that an actor will read for the fundraiser:
Friends for Life
You’re 34, a year younger than the age your doctor believed
a woman should be tested.
Like malicious gossip, the cancer spread
from your breast to your lymph nodes.
Instead of 2 pert breasts, your chest now sports a mediport
to pump chemo in. Every 4 weeks for 6 more months,
you’ll be filled like your SUV at Amoco.
Listless, cake-lipped, nauseated, you lie in bed,
resting for hours to have the strength to read
a few pages of Harry Potter to your daughters—5 and 7.
The oldest hears the scream beneath your soft voice,
pulls herself back as if she’s happened upon a wicked sorcerer.
Her friend’s mother died last year even though the “C” word
was never said in her house either.
The doorbell. A flood of friends and neighbors
bringing self-help tapes, macrobiotic cookbooks,
the names of shamans and Rolphers, a brochure from a healing spa
in Romania, a gift certificate for you to fax your prayers
to the Wailing Wall, a subscription to Prevention.
I see your eyes blaze.
After you make your excuses,
we go back to your room.
“It’s always the healthy,” you say,
“who are expert at getting well.”
The phone rings. It’s your husband.
“He’s staying late at the office again,” you tell me
as you have each night since you’ve been home.
I lie in your bed beside you, running my hand over your scalp.
You look naked without your long blonde hair.
What can I do? What can I do?
I get up and make you soup.
I run the water for your children’s’ bath.
(P.S. Lisa survived and her fifth year checkup turned out fine!)
Here's my poem that an actor will read for the fundraiser:
Friends for Life
You’re 34, a year younger than the age your doctor believed
a woman should be tested.
Like malicious gossip, the cancer spread
from your breast to your lymph nodes.
Instead of 2 pert breasts, your chest now sports a mediport
to pump chemo in. Every 4 weeks for 6 more months,
you’ll be filled like your SUV at Amoco.
Listless, cake-lipped, nauseated, you lie in bed,
resting for hours to have the strength to read
a few pages of Harry Potter to your daughters—5 and 7.
The oldest hears the scream beneath your soft voice,
pulls herself back as if she’s happened upon a wicked sorcerer.
Her friend’s mother died last year even though the “C” word
was never said in her house either.
The doorbell. A flood of friends and neighbors
bringing self-help tapes, macrobiotic cookbooks,
the names of shamans and Rolphers, a brochure from a healing spa
in Romania, a gift certificate for you to fax your prayers
to the Wailing Wall, a subscription to Prevention.
I see your eyes blaze.
After you make your excuses,
we go back to your room.
“It’s always the healthy,” you say,
“who are expert at getting well.”
The phone rings. It’s your husband.
“He’s staying late at the office again,” you tell me
as you have each night since you’ve been home.
I lie in your bed beside you, running my hand over your scalp.
You look naked without your long blonde hair.
What can I do? What can I do?
I get up and make you soup.
I run the water for your children’s’ bath.
(P.S. Lisa survived and her fifth year checkup turned out fine!)
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
Call for Submissions
Deadline:
8/1/2010
Submit to:
Ohio Childhood Poems. Send via DOC attachment AND pasted-in text. Email Address
Theme:
Ohio Childhood Poems. MUST HAVE spent at least five years of your childhood in Ohio.
Type:
Poetry (4 poems MAX)
URL:
Ohio Childhood Poems
Deadline:
8/1/2010
Submit to:
Pockets. Lynn W. Gilliam, Editor. PO Box 340004, Nashville, TN 37203-0004
Theme:
Jealousy. MUST BE appropriate for 8- to 12-year-old Christians.
Type:
Poetry (20 lines MAX), short stories (1,000 words MAX), and essays (1,000 words MAX)
URL:
Pockets
Deadline:
8/1/2010
Submit to:
Rattle. Send via email attachment (1 file) or pasted-in text. Email Address
Theme:
Mental Health Professionals
Type:
Poetry and essays (5,000 words MAX)
URL:
Rattle
Deadline:
8/1/2010
Submit to:
The First Line. Send via MS Word or WordPerfect attachment. Email Address
Theme:
Every story starts out the same: Three thousand habitable planets in the known universe, and I'm stuck on the only one without ______________. [Fill in the blank.]
Type:
Short stories (3,000 words MAX)
URL:
The First Line
Deadline:
8/6/2010
Submit to:
Creative Nonfiction, Attn: Immortality, 5501 Walnut Street, Suite 202, Pittsburgh, PA 15232
Theme:
Immortality
Type:
Essay (5,000 words MAX)
URL:
Immortality
Deadline:
1/31/2011
Submit to:
Dream of Things. Submission Link
Theme:
Various topics based on one of 15 themes. See http://dreamofthings.com/workshop-2 for more details.
Type:
Personal essays (500-5,000 words MAX)
URL:
Dream of Things
Deadline:
1/31/2011
Submit to:
Hunger Mountain, Vermont College of Fine Arts, 36 College Street, Montpelier, VT 05602
Theme:
Responses to stage and screen
Type:
Manuscripts (10,000 words MAX) or a video submission
URL:
Hunger Mountain
Deadline:
3/1/2011
Submit to:
Slipstream, Dept. W-1, Box 2071, Niagara Falls, NY 14301.
Theme:
Sex-Food-Death
Type:
Poetry
URL:
Slipstream
8/1/2010
Submit to:
Ohio Childhood Poems. Send via DOC attachment AND pasted-in text. Email Address
Theme:
Ohio Childhood Poems. MUST HAVE spent at least five years of your childhood in Ohio.
Type:
Poetry (4 poems MAX)
URL:
Ohio Childhood Poems
Deadline:
8/1/2010
Submit to:
Pockets. Lynn W. Gilliam, Editor. PO Box 340004, Nashville, TN 37203-0004
Theme:
Jealousy. MUST BE appropriate for 8- to 12-year-old Christians.
Type:
Poetry (20 lines MAX), short stories (1,000 words MAX), and essays (1,000 words MAX)
URL:
Pockets
Deadline:
8/1/2010
Submit to:
Rattle. Send via email attachment (1 file) or pasted-in text. Email Address
Theme:
Mental Health Professionals
Type:
Poetry and essays (5,000 words MAX)
URL:
Rattle
Deadline:
8/1/2010
Submit to:
The First Line. Send via MS Word or WordPerfect attachment. Email Address
Theme:
Every story starts out the same: Three thousand habitable planets in the known universe, and I'm stuck on the only one without ______________. [Fill in the blank.]
Type:
Short stories (3,000 words MAX)
URL:
The First Line
Deadline:
8/6/2010
Submit to:
Creative Nonfiction, Attn: Immortality, 5501 Walnut Street, Suite 202, Pittsburgh, PA 15232
Theme:
Immortality
Type:
Essay (5,000 words MAX)
URL:
Immortality
Deadline:
1/31/2011
Submit to:
Dream of Things. Submission Link
Theme:
Various topics based on one of 15 themes. See http://dreamofthings.com/workshop-2 for more details.
Type:
Personal essays (500-5,000 words MAX)
URL:
Dream of Things
Deadline:
1/31/2011
Submit to:
Hunger Mountain, Vermont College of Fine Arts, 36 College Street, Montpelier, VT 05602
Theme:
Responses to stage and screen
Type:
Manuscripts (10,000 words MAX) or a video submission
URL:
Hunger Mountain
Deadline:
3/1/2011
Submit to:
Slipstream, Dept. W-1, Box 2071, Niagara Falls, NY 14301.
Theme:
Sex-Food-Death
Type:
Poetry
URL:
Slipstream
Thursday, June 17, 2010
More audience craziness
Yesterday, I went to a matinee of the Tony-award winning play, Red, about the relationship between the abstract expressionist, Mark Rothko, and his apprentice. A woman three rows in front of me was crinkling a candy wrapper for twenty minutes. If I shushed her, I'd be disturbing everyone else, so I had to try to push her out of my consciousness during a play where every word felt key. Suddenly, the guy next to me stood up. He was wiry and at least 6/7." Bent at the waist, he leaned across the two rows ahead of us, his head moving side to side like a snake after a mouse. Then he got very still. His ears pricked. He'd located the candy wrap crinkler and said, "shhhh" in her ear, scaring the bejeezus out of her. I wished I could take him with me to every show.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
Places to send your work
Anthologies: Calls For Submission
| Deadline: | 6/30/2010 |
| Submit to: | Beltway Poetry Quarterly. Pasted-in e-mail submissions. Email Address |
| Theme: | Poems celebrating the legacy of Langston Hughes. Poet MUST live or work in DC, MD, VA, WV, or DE. |
| Type: | Poetry (5 poems MAX) |
| URL: |
Featured Listing
| Deadline: | 8/1/2010 |
| Submit to: | Rattle. Send via email attachment (1 file) or pasted-in text. Email Address |
| Theme: | Mental Health Professionals |
| Type: | Poetry and essays (5,000 words MAX) |
| URL: |
| Deadline: | 8/1/2010 |
| Submit to: | The First Line. Send via MS Word or WordPerfect attachment. Email Address |
| Theme: | Every story starts out the same: Three thousand habitable planets in the known universe, and I'm stuck on the only one without ______________. [Fill in the blank.] |
| Type: | Short stories (3,000 words MAX) |
| URL: | |
| Deadline: | 8/6/2010 |
| Submit to: | Creative Nonfiction, Attn: Immortality, 5501 Walnut Street, Suite 202, Pittsburgh, PA 15232 |
| Theme: | Immortality |
| Type: | Essay (5,000 words MAX) |
| URL: |
| Deadline: | 8/15/2010 |
| Submit to: | Ruminate Magazine. Submission Link |
| Theme: | Sounds and silence. MUST BE quality work that reveals the nature of Christ, in whatever form this may look like. |
| Type: | Poetry (3 poems, 40 lines MAX) and prose (6,000 words MAX) |
| URL: |
| Deadline: | 9/1/2010 |
| Submit to: | Workers Write! Blue Cubicle Press, PO Box 250382, Plano, TX 75025-0382, or send via email. Email Address |
| Theme: | Tales from the Courtroom. |
| Type: | Short stories (5,000 words MAX) |
| URL: |
| Deadline: | 1/31/2011 |
| Submit to: | Dream of Things. Submission Link |
| Theme: | Various topics based on one of 15 themes. See http://dreamofthings.com/workshop-2 for more details. |
| Type: | Personal essays (500-5,000 words MAX) |
| URL: |
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Wednesday, May 26, 2010
I went to see the play Collected Stories today
It's a play about writing and writers. Scene One was a writing teacher reading her grad student's story out loud to her, and stopping to critique. It was the best writing lesson. I saw myself in it, the older teacher harping: pluck out the adjectives and adverbs like you would pin feathers on a chicken. (My words, not the playwrite's.) The play also brings up the morality or immorality of appropriating someone else's life into your writing. Should the great poet, Sharon Olds, write about her son, Gabriel's penis? About her daughter, naked? Do we have the write to undress other's in our writing in mind, body, and spirit? I think that's for each of us to decide.
Here's a test to see where you stand.
Here's a test to see where you stand.
- Are you terrified to write anything negative about your mother?
- Are you terrified that if you write a sex scene readers will think you're one of the participants?
- Are you, on the other hand, able to reveal other people's secrets, their pecadillos, faults, but never you own?
If any of these answers are YES you must set yourself the task of writing about them immediately!
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