The po must go on: Mini-rant on po-biz

Usually, the words "poetry" and "ca-ching" don't belong in the same sentence, unless that sentence is about how they don't go together.

But I'm battling some poetry world displacement and have therefore been browsing conferences, residencies, retreats, contests, calls for submissions, etc., and I just gotta say, somebody somewhere is making some serious poetry coin.

And listen. I'm an editor. I've been a publisher. I don't buy into (ha) the starving artist thing. We all deserve to be paid for our important work of creating and distributing art blah blah.

But $30 reading fees have got to go.

It's National Poetry Month! Participate in my Twitter found poem project!

"It's the most wonderful tiiiiiime of the yeeeaaaar..."

Really. Poetry gets a whole month!

In the spirit of "giving is receiving," instead of being all self-promote-y and blogging ad nauseum about my own poems, I'm trying to get other people to write more.

Title poem from "antidote"

Antidote

for Jackson

Your name is a town I’ve never been to,

and I’ve never loved a Scorpio before.

Breath is a fish bone in my throat

when white-coated needles swarm you,

and I know I could fight venom

with my hands, but don’t.

When did this happen? When

was our constellation drawn?

TV appearance for my new chapbook

On Feb. 20, I went to the White Rose Community TV studio here in York and read poems into a camera for the first time.

I've been on the radio before, but never TV. I have to say, my nervousness was eclipsed by my excitement over what Carla Christopher, York's Poet Laureate, is doing to promote the arts in this area.

Like starting a TV show for them.

"The Next Big Thing" self-interview

Thanks to Matt Mauch for tagging me!

1. What is the working title of the book?

My third chapbook is titled antidote. I'm incredibly neurotic about titles, so 20 abysmal and discarded titles before landing on "antidote" is a safe estimate.

2. Where did the idea come from for the book?

I was writing poems for my son, Jax, who was born three months premature on 10/29/12, as a way of coping with the 87 days he spent in neonatal intensive care. I showed them--as I show all my poems and even some grocery lists--to Teneice Durrant Delgado, and she said, essentially, "Write your way through this, woman." So I did. When she'd seen a handful of them, she suggested I put together a chapbook that she'd publish through her Winged City Press. Um, have you seen their list of writers? Yes, please! We agreed that I should write/revise my little guts out until the last second, then release the chapbook the week of Jax's original due date, so I did, and we did. The Jax poems comprise half the chapbook; the other half are for Jax's father, Jon. 

Holy expletive, I'm actually blogging, with actual writer news

So, um, yeah.

Hi. Long time.

What can I say? I was busy:

www.caringbridge.org/visit/jacksonmoore102912

But look, I swear, I was writing the whole time:

http://www.yorkblog.com/smart/author/staciafleegal/

And listen, while this gig for Smart Magazine's blog started as a quirky prego column, then morphed into a journal slash now-you-know about the NICU experience, it's getting the words down that counts. I'm experimenting with this nonfiction thing, with writing it straight as opposed to my usual "telling it slant" MO.

And I'm not too bad at it. And it's fun. And maybe it helps people to connect, or hear about something positive coming from something scary.

Most importantly, perhaps, it did for me that great thing that making art does: gives you a purpose. Gets you through a hard time, helps you make sense, and make peace.

But I still need to get my literary on.

I got some 'splainin to do

Except there's no explaining a summer hiatus from one's blog, is there? Us blogger people don't like that. Either blog regularly or don't, but no excuses!

Instead, I'll give a little run-down of what I've been up to.