I’m the Book of the Day!

Today my publisher, Finishing Line Press, honors my poetry collection, Thistle and Brilliant, as their Book of the Day. How fun! This is a great opportunity for me to give more details about this book and its meaning to me.

A few years ago, chronic health problems I’d been living with got worse. I moved to California and focused on healing with great support from C.T. At some point I realized not only that my condition had affected my brain and made communication and concentration difficult, but that I hadn’t written a single poem in five years. With a few publishing credits to my name and a long career as a performance poet, this was a significant part of my identity as writer/educator.

Not knowing if I would improve my health, I decided to curate my old poems into a manuscript, in the hope of at least getting a book of my free verse published in my lifetime. I pulled my poems out of a discarded hard drive and posted them in a few online critiquing forums. I sculpted and shaped them and started submitting.

As acceptances and rejections came in, I even threw together a submission to Finishing Line Press’ 2017 New Women’s Voices Chapbook Competition. From that submission, FLP actually offered me a publication deal! I had to confess to them that I’d only entered in the hope of winning the $1000 prize, as we were struggling financially and could use the prize for rent. At the time, with my health still poor, and having recently moved from all my East Coast contacts, I didn’t feel I could promote the book as their contract requires. So, bizarrely, I turned them down!

I kept submitting batches of poems to literary journals. With time on my hands and loads of feedback from critiquing forums, I published over sixty poems in a single year.

I learned more about the writing community when I accepted a position as editor of an online journal. The office politics there inspired me to found my own literary magazine, Califragile.

Working with poems, mine and others’, is like doing puzzles. It has been fantastic for healing my brain. As I edited and critiqued, I started to stab at writing new poems. It was awkward and slow. But eventually, I got back on the horse!

When the call came again, I entered the 2018 New Women’s Voices Chapbook Competition. This time FLP accepted two of my manuscripts for publication, Thistle and Brilliant, a collection of older poems, and Skeptical Goats, all new California poems! What a personal triumph for me. Not only did I succeed in my goal of getting a collection of my old poems in print, but I got a bonus prize I didn’t expect when I started–I’m a poet again!

Thistle and Brilliant, Poems of Relationships in Motion

These are not love poems, waxing in adoration. These are portraits of moments, narrators noticing as relationships start, end, dim or brighten, become uneven, save the day or never stand a chance. The pronouns are, shall we say, flexible, as am I. Some of these started as autobiographical, some are fiction, exploring interesting ideas. There are repeating characters and imagery, such as Mika, the wise little raccoon, plus watches and clocks, the micro and macro, and no collection of mine would be complete without mammoths, raccoons, wrens and Americans.

Cultural influences include The Accidental Tourist, #MeToo, and the scientific relationship between scent and memory.

The Camp Fire Will Not Win

About the time I would have started scheduling interviews, readings, house parties and other promotions for Thistle and Brilliant, the Camp Fire happened, forcing us to evacuate our home, destroying my partner’s business, and decimating and area around our neighborhood the size of Chicago. Even with our modest finances, I had planned to tour the East Coast and my home state of Kentucky. Instead, I was shoved inside an RV in a stranger’s front yard, breathing through a gas mask for weeks.

I managed to reconnect with poet Marge Piercy on a borrowed laptop. She was reading Thistle and Brilliant at the time of the Camp Fire, and writing an endorsement blurb. I sent her dispatches from the evacuation zone, eager to share details not covered in the media. Marge got it right when she wrote, “It sounds like you’re safe, but you’re safe in Hell.” Yep.

As we returned to our surviving house, surrounded by miles of scorched neighborhoods, I returned to the job of preparing for my book’s two month promotional period, a time for me to actively solicit preorders for my book. FLP takes this time as a good indicator of how large a press run they should plan. (As a first time poet/author, I am paid in a percentage of that press run, free copies for me to sell, gift, and submit for prizes and awards.)

It seemed strange after the horror and shock of the Camp Fire to invite people to buy a book of “love” poems with a big purple flower on the cover. But I was realizing a life goal. I didn’t want the Camp Fire to take this away from me, along with everything else it had consumed.

Instead of the grand tour I’d planned, I simply stayed in Butte County and on Facebook. I managed several public readings, three radio interviews and a number of house parties. I messaged, emailed, texted, and called friends and family. It’s not the splash I’d geared up for, but I feel it’s a strong showing despite the cinders!

Just Four Days Left!

If you have not ordered your copy of Thistle and Brilliant, please click here or get in touch with me. I would love to sell about forty more, so if you can add extras as gifts or donate one to your local library, that would be shiny! Please share my link on social media and email it to friends you think might be interested. Know any fledgling poets? I will critique three poems for each copy of T&B they order! Thank you for joining me in my publishing adventure!

Samples from Thistle and Brilliant

Cornbread

Cotton takes care of me.
I mend and wonder where
a word went as Cotton hops
out of bed, feeds the herd,
showers. I’m late with his
coffee. I have one job as he
capers around, clipboards
and clients’ keys, leash
and a dog to walk.

My hours pass in turns of
whiplash and molasses.
I’m glad he’s at work,
not watching. We both recall
when I was brilliant.
He soldiers and I try.
Who takes care of Cotton?

He’s aged out of his market.
Once six figures, now Cotton
cleans houses. Five today,
done at six. Home at seven
with rags to wash and stories.
Spreadsheets and payroll.
Menu ideas and shopping lists.
Leash and a dog to walk.
Cotton cares into the void.
Tonight he’ll make cornbread.

(First published in The Cafe Review.)

Wicker Me

Wicker me.
Bend me.
Weave me into a rocker and I’ll
wait on your porch with your
faithful dog Bart.

Some August night is our blanket.
Park your clogs
and I’ll rock you,
creak next to your skin,
cushion you into your ease.

Wavy pool of cricket songs
and horns out on the interstate.
Wicker me into a painting of this.

(First published in Lavender Review.)

Specific as a Seed

Specific as a seed,
not an oak if it’s a holly,
my next poem will break
your heart. You will see
a sunrise for the first time
and be still with your coffee
and your breath, remember
the gloves you left
at Brenda’s. You’ll revisit
a poem on film
and your polemic
over my pet chicken.
You will see a sunrise
for the first time
as a canyon fire,
out of control,
and you will buy
a ticket home.

You, standing in my
yard, will be to me
as specific as a seed.

(First published in Avatar Review.)