Thursday, April 01, 2010

Warmish

I'm behind on everything, again. But I do seem, after a fairly long fallow period, to be easing back into poetry. I thought it would come rushing back when it came back, but it's been more of a trickle. Still, I'm reading poems again - that's probably the most important part - and I'm writing a bit, and I'm sending stuff out again (nothing accepted yet on this go-round, but I did get a nice note with one rejection). Even got the first manuscript (not the rockstar one, which isn't speaking to me right now, but the one that's already racked up thirty rejection notes) out to a contest. And in the process I tinkered with it just a bit, mostly pulled out a few poems, and it feels tighter now. Still want to pull it all apart and do a big revision, but that takes time and breathing room. And I also need to get my taxes done... ahem.

Wishing, wishing, wishing that I could go to AWP. I had a lot of fun last year. Ah well.

Not doing NaNoPoPoNoMo this year, either - maybe I'm lazy, or maybe I just know better than to embark on something I know good and well I'm not up to completing. Maybe next year. Or maybe in October. October sounds nice. (Happy Poetry Month, though!)

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Very cool that Butler is in the Final Four! For those who don't know, Butler is a teeny little university on the north side of Indianapolis - I go to concerts and poetry readings there with some regularity; they have a very nice visiting writers series - and the Final Four is in Indianapolis this year, so they get to play at home. Definitely the Cinderella story of this year's tournament.

I turn into a mild basketball fan every couple years or so, just during tournament season. This way they don't kick me out of Indiana.

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Speaking of Indiana, the Indiana University Writers' Conference (June 6-11) is taking applications. This year's poetry workshops are led by Eileen Myles and Ed Pavlic. I'm not doing the conference this year, but I plan to attend at least some of the evening readings (Eileen Myles' for sure); if you're thinking of attending and have any questions about the conference or about Bloomington, feel free to drop me a note. Bloomington's really a lovely place to spend a week - lots of fantastic restaurants, lots of trees and green space, and the locals are relatively friendly. ;)

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81 degrees this afternoon, and lots of brilliant sunshine; forsythia and daffodils are in full bloom, & the flowering trees are starting to leap into life. I love this time of year in this town (though 81 degrees is a bit warmer than ideal). I love my job, but working in a beige-colored, windowless cubicle farm has its drawbacks when the outside world is as lovely as this.

Happy Easter, to those who celebrate! And a somewhat late Happy Passover to those who celebrate that. Spring, new life, resurrection, all that good stuff. Not to mention marshmallow peeps - and this year I found dark chocolate Cadbury mini eggs. Yum!

That right there is cause for celebration. :)

2 comments:

Jessie Carty said...

i am totally out of the loop on the college basketball this year. i think when i was working full-time i was more involved because it was fun to do brackets and see who would win their brackets. I pretty much came in last every year but it was still fun :)

We hit 90 degrees yesterday! what it is APRIL!

Lyle Daggett said...

Reached 80 degrees here one day this week. Appears it will be cooling slightly the next few days. Had a little rain today.

** No snow here in March. ** Zippo, none. First time Minneapolis has had zero snow in March since something like 1878. Normally there's a kind of local tradition that there's always a major snowfall or blizzard around the time of the state high school basketball tournament, but not this year.

I did the NaPoMoMo whatever last year, as a what-the-heck kind of thing. It was an interesting experiment, though not attempting it this year, too much else going on.

Word verification is "guingf", which I'm sure I've heard someone say at some party or other as the night was inexorably going to seed in the hours past midnight. Guingf it is, and guingf it'll be.