Received a personalized rejection this afternoon from Fairy Tale Review. It was a nice rejection though, so I don't feel too obliterated.
In other news, the issue of Assaracus that I've been published in is available for pre-sale NEXT WEEK! It can be ordered somewhere on this website sometime next week.
In other, other news, I'm back home for the holiday and the weekend. It's been fun being back in Florida but I know if I stayed an extra week I'd get sick of it all.
Today: Slept & will probably sleep again
Tomorrow: Meet with old friends, party with old friends.
Sunday: Tailgating & Dolphin's Football game & hopefully shopping in Miami
Monday: Fly to New Orleans (i almost wrote home) at 5 in the morning.
Friday, November 23, 2012
Thursday, November 15, 2012
If You Go Into Heather Christle You Will Find She Has A Trees
Ben Koppel came and read portions of VICTORY through H_NGM_N press.
Though Koppel's work is so very different from my own (very excited, a manic sort of depression, not naive but embracing of the shit we trudge through) his reading was inspiring.
And how young they all are! This whole clique of wonderful Louisianian writers. Kristin Sanders and Ben Koppel and Carolyn Mikulencak.
And then the other writers that I've connected with/met/fallen obsessively in love with through Kristin: Kate Durbin, Jennifer Tamayo, Kate Zambreno, Ariana Reines, Richard Siken, Arielle Greenberg, Paul Legault, Marie Calloway.
It's weird looking back to just one year ago. How I was anointing the feet of Anne Sexton and Sharon Olds.
Though Koppel's work is so very different from my own (very excited, a manic sort of depression, not naive but embracing of the shit we trudge through) his reading was inspiring.
And how young they all are! This whole clique of wonderful Louisianian writers. Kristin Sanders and Ben Koppel and Carolyn Mikulencak.
And then the other writers that I've connected with/met/fallen obsessively in love with through Kristin: Kate Durbin, Jennifer Tamayo, Kate Zambreno, Ariana Reines, Richard Siken, Arielle Greenberg, Paul Legault, Marie Calloway.
It's weird looking back to just one year ago. How I was anointing the feet of Anne Sexton and Sharon Olds.
Mid-Semester Check in
So it's more than halfway through the Fall Semester. Things have been carrying on.
What's really great is that my poems are appearing in Assaracus Issue 09 sometime this Spring!
Assaracus is this really cool journal dedicated to gay male poetry & voices. It's published through Sibling Rivalry Press, with editor and poet Bryan Borland at the masthead. What a great group of people. So talented. So exciting to have my work sitting alongside names like Ocean Vuong, Dustin Brookshire, Matthew Hittinger, et all.
What's really great is that my poems are appearing in Assaracus Issue 09 sometime this Spring!
Assaracus is this really cool journal dedicated to gay male poetry & voices. It's published through Sibling Rivalry Press, with editor and poet Bryan Borland at the masthead. What a great group of people. So talented. So exciting to have my work sitting alongside names like Ocean Vuong, Dustin Brookshire, Matthew Hittinger, et all.
Tuesday, July 24, 2012
I've been thinking a lot
mostly about the emergence of boyish sexuality in poetry. And mostly about how I always feel ashamed for my poetry being so sexual. I feel like that’s a cliche of male poetry. That there’s this confidence of expressing sex, that it’s this lifeblood expected of any half-baked writer with a cock.
And then I also feel like I always kind of walk on eggshells when talking about why I write about boysex in my poems, and why I’m really in support of this “Boyesque” ideal.
The only real acknowledgment of the Boyesque, that I’ve seen, was through this post on Montevidayo. And even then, I feel like this “Boyesque” is really limiting. Violence is an undeniable piece of sex. I’d argue that sex is just an acceptable(?) form of violence. I don’t think, though, that the Boyesque is just about being a monster. Which is the only part of Seth’s post that I find very problematic, and I think Lara Glenum, in her response, definitely has a different and really fucking cool desire for these “sassy male poets.” I think there’s something very sad about being a boy. Not even a Queer boy. I think being a boy sucks. Some Gurlesque poets want to be Monsters, or are Monsters. My Boyesque is a monster that does not want to be one. Or isn’t one but is expected to be one and doesn’t want to. Or isn’t one and wants to be but can’t.
Now before I get buttfucked by every Gurlesque poet this side of the equator, I guess I should preface the next part by saying that I, as a poet who is not Gurlesque, can obviously not speak for Gurlesque poets. I’m only speaking about the reactions on this Montevidayo post, and the thoughts I’ve come across when speaking to some of young glitter-bomb Gurlesque poets at my University. So if I offend or say something that is totally stupid or wrong about you or your craft please argue with me or tell me I’m a fucking moron.
I also think there’s a level of complexity in the violence propagated by Seth and his Boyesque ideal that isn’t ever really explored. I think the reason Boyesque is mocked may lie in the long held archetypes of masculinity that even Gurlesque poets seem unable to let go. Gurlesque takes advantage of this sort of forced performative aspect of femininity. Gurlesque holds it beneath its wet thighs and fucks it raw and then licks her fingers. Gurlesque is defiant. And Gurlesque does not think there should be a Boyesque because, perhaps to Gurlesque, it is obvious and expected for a boy to want to rape and lick his dirty fingers.
I think Nick Demske is one of the few poets that lives up to my ideal of the Boyesque. It’s awkward and stilted and very frustrated and boyish and there’s just a lot going on. I obviously have to do more research, but Seth’s post, and Joyelle’s follow up have really stuck out at me and it’s making me wonder about the different ideals and prejudices surrounding boy/gurl privilege in art.
And then I also feel like I always kind of walk on eggshells when talking about why I write about boysex in my poems, and why I’m really in support of this “Boyesque” ideal.
The only real acknowledgment of the Boyesque, that I’ve seen, was through this post on Montevidayo. And even then, I feel like this “Boyesque” is really limiting. Violence is an undeniable piece of sex. I’d argue that sex is just an acceptable(?) form of violence. I don’t think, though, that the Boyesque is just about being a monster. Which is the only part of Seth’s post that I find very problematic, and I think Lara Glenum, in her response, definitely has a different and really fucking cool desire for these “sassy male poets.” I think there’s something very sad about being a boy. Not even a Queer boy. I think being a boy sucks. Some Gurlesque poets want to be Monsters, or are Monsters. My Boyesque is a monster that does not want to be one. Or isn’t one but is expected to be one and doesn’t want to. Or isn’t one and wants to be but can’t.
Now before I get buttfucked by every Gurlesque poet this side of the equator, I guess I should preface the next part by saying that I, as a poet who is not Gurlesque, can obviously not speak for Gurlesque poets. I’m only speaking about the reactions on this Montevidayo post, and the thoughts I’ve come across when speaking to some of young glitter-bomb Gurlesque poets at my University. So if I offend or say something that is totally stupid or wrong about you or your craft please argue with me or tell me I’m a fucking moron.
I also think there’s a level of complexity in the violence propagated by Seth and his Boyesque ideal that isn’t ever really explored. I think the reason Boyesque is mocked may lie in the long held archetypes of masculinity that even Gurlesque poets seem unable to let go. Gurlesque takes advantage of this sort of forced performative aspect of femininity. Gurlesque holds it beneath its wet thighs and fucks it raw and then licks her fingers. Gurlesque is defiant. And Gurlesque does not think there should be a Boyesque because, perhaps to Gurlesque, it is obvious and expected for a boy to want to rape and lick his dirty fingers.
I think Nick Demske is one of the few poets that lives up to my ideal of the Boyesque. It’s awkward and stilted and very frustrated and boyish and there’s just a lot going on. I obviously have to do more research, but Seth’s post, and Joyelle’s follow up have really stuck out at me and it’s making me wonder about the different ideals and prejudices surrounding boy/gurl privilege in art.
Saturday, July 7, 2012
Publication and Apologies.
So I've been published!
Sibling Rivalry Press has picked up 12 of my poems for publication in their literary journal Assaracus.
Still waiting to hear back from Fairy Tale review, but what happens happens.
Also, was recently cited in Dan Schneider's (from Cosmoetica) essay on Good Faith, Stupidity, And The Internet as an internet troll. To be perfectly fair to Dan, I did make those rude comments. Sent Dan an e-mail apologizing. There's no excuse other than I was, as he so aptly put: "a nasty queer with weight and acne issues." The post was also made while I was still a senior in high school, which isn't an excuse. Just a clarification of my immaturity.
So apologies to Dan and his lovely wife Jessica. Sincere and honest apologies.
Sibling Rivalry Press has picked up 12 of my poems for publication in their literary journal Assaracus.
Still waiting to hear back from Fairy Tale review, but what happens happens.
Also, was recently cited in Dan Schneider's (from Cosmoetica) essay on Good Faith, Stupidity, And The Internet as an internet troll. To be perfectly fair to Dan, I did make those rude comments. Sent Dan an e-mail apologizing. There's no excuse other than I was, as he so aptly put: "a nasty queer with weight and acne issues." The post was also made while I was still a senior in high school, which isn't an excuse. Just a clarification of my immaturity.
So apologies to Dan and his lovely wife Jessica. Sincere and honest apologies.
Tuesday, May 29, 2012
Going back to NOLA
I've submitted my work to Sibling Rivalry Press, and after Kristin's advice I submitted a collection of poems to The Fairy Tale Review. I'm really excited to see what happens. Before yesterday, I hadn't really written very much in the past two weeks. I've been doing a lot of revising for my chapbook.
I'm also really excited that I'll be heading back to New Orleans on Thursday morning. Then again, I'm so exhausted from the past week that the 6 am flight back, and all the work that awaits me, doesn't always seem like fun. Still, I'm excited. I'll be working with some of my best friends, meeting all of these excited, frightened, and just NEW students. I remember what it was like when I came to Orientation. I loved the entire experience.
Thursday, May 17, 2012
Update
I'm so bad at blogging, I apologize for not updating this enough. Thankfully with this summer slowly creeping along, I think I'll have some more time to blog.
So here's my upd8. I finished off my second semester of Freshman year with a 3.67 cumulative GPA, and a 3.9 within my major. Grades aren't everything, but I'm happy that I've done well enough to keep my scholarships.
Poetry Workshop and Interpretive Approaches were brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. I think those two classes have taught me more about myself, art, and writing than any other class. Schaberg and Kristin are legendary.
Last night I had a really cool conversation with a friend about postmodernism and absurdist art in relation to third wave feminism and the gurlesque. He questioned the integrity of a philosophy which denies the existence of a self as "fiction." I rebutted that postmodernism and Butler's articles on feminism don't necessarily deny the existence of a self, but the importance. I then argued that the self is mostly fiction, an image or mask or persona or whatever and that this creation or projection or performance of the self IS the self, citing Gaga's manifesto of Little Monsters. We settled on the idea that there is, at some point, some semblance of a "self" and that our idea of the "self" is made up of the adornments we attach to this rudimentary mannequin of a "soul" or "identity." Basically, clothes need a mannequin. The "real self" is the mannequin, but our projected or idealized "self" is the outfit (or lack of) and all the preconceptions weighted within the fabric of this projection.
Also, I've just sent off parts of my Killing the Wolf chapbook (Oh! I should make a separate post about that) to Sibling Rivalry Press, a really cool emerging press lead by the wonderful Bryan Borland. Keep your fingers crossed!
At the moment I'm unpacking my life at Loyola out of three medium sized boxes while listening to some Madonna. Accidentally broke my Emerging Leaders' glass frame. Anyway, that's really the only news I've got for now. I'm making notes all over my calendar to check and update this blog every day (don't hold me to this... maybe once a week) for the rest of summer term. Hopefully by then, it'll become second nature and I'll keep up with it during the school year.
Poetry Workshop and Interpretive Approaches were brilliant. Absolutely brilliant. I think those two classes have taught me more about myself, art, and writing than any other class. Schaberg and Kristin are legendary.
Last night I had a really cool conversation with a friend about postmodernism and absurdist art in relation to third wave feminism and the gurlesque. He questioned the integrity of a philosophy which denies the existence of a self as "fiction." I rebutted that postmodernism and Butler's articles on feminism don't necessarily deny the existence of a self, but the importance. I then argued that the self is mostly fiction, an image or mask or persona or whatever and that this creation or projection or performance of the self IS the self, citing Gaga's manifesto of Little Monsters. We settled on the idea that there is, at some point, some semblance of a "self" and that our idea of the "self" is made up of the adornments we attach to this rudimentary mannequin of a "soul" or "identity." Basically, clothes need a mannequin. The "real self" is the mannequin, but our projected or idealized "self" is the outfit (or lack of) and all the preconceptions weighted within the fabric of this projection.
Also, I've just sent off parts of my Killing the Wolf chapbook (Oh! I should make a separate post about that) to Sibling Rivalry Press, a really cool emerging press lead by the wonderful Bryan Borland. Keep your fingers crossed!
At the moment I'm unpacking my life at Loyola out of three medium sized boxes while listening to some Madonna. Accidentally broke my Emerging Leaders' glass frame. Anyway, that's really the only news I've got for now. I'm making notes all over my calendar to check and update this blog every day (don't hold me to this... maybe once a week) for the rest of summer term. Hopefully by then, it'll become second nature and I'll keep up with it during the school year.
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