Monday, October 26, 2009

Being a Menace and Drinking My Juice Box

Very happy to report that The Greensboro Review took a sonnet the other day. It's my third try with them, so I'm excited they finally took one. It was the first literary magazine I ever held in my hands, the first place I ever saw my mentor, Kevin Boyle, have a poem show up. Needless to say, I'm very stoked to be appearing in the Spring 2010 issue. Happy, too, that some of these sonnets are getting taken. Another sonnet from the same sequence will be in the Fall 2009 issue of Tar River Poetry which should be hitting the shelf soon. I saw that Third Coast has come out with their Fall 2009 issue, too, which has my poem "Remembering the Old Testament While Walking the Dog" in there. Looking forward to getting my hands on the thing.


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The first round of the Caption Contest Throwdown has gone live. You could vote for the best caption. Or you could vote for me. It appears as though the judges are not fans of my caption...


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Killer first line of the moment:

"Black and yellow lichen-spotted limestone"

from Aaron Baker's "Above Kerowagi"
(Mission Work, Houghton-Mifflin, 2008)


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5 comments:

Keith Montesano said...

Glad to see the poems are getting picked off one by one. Keep it up!

In past and current experiences, getting work published makes you feel more confident also about the project you're working on, and in your case it seems that your first book seems to be coming together more and more as the days and weeks go on.

I'm quite sure you won't be waiting the so-called 5 years folks give first books to get snagged to get yours taken...

Liz said...

Congrats! I'm waiting to hear back from the Greensboro Review... I hope I get some good news, too!

JayTee said...

I was just coming here to comment about how you must feel great about your manuscript with all these poems getting picked up! And I love the Don't Be a Menace reference...that's my movie. lol

Luke Johnson said...

Thanks for all the happy words, guys!

Keith--I definitely feel you on the confidence thing. I wish I had more time to write new poems to see if they fit in the ms., but I'm certainly stoked that poems already in there are getting taken.

Liz--Good luck! Like I said, it took me three tries with them, so don't be discouraged whatever the response.

Jonterri-It's definitely helped me keep faith in the manuscript. And, I checked the imdb entry of "drinking your juice" and found the amazing tagline:

"Finally, the movie that proves that Justice isn't always Poetic, Jungle Fever isn't always pretty, and Higher Learning can be a waste of time."

varmint said...

hey mang. no hard feelings if you bail on the run. (not that we wouldn't love to see you... but i know it makes for a hard weekend.) i strained my calf yesterday doing something stupid, so my status for sunday is up in the air. i'm sitting here with a pack of frozen broccoli plastic-wrapped to my leg. i feel old. my girls are running states tomorrow, and i'm afraid i'm going to snap on them.