Ivy is here

A small annihilation

2009-12-30T10:39:00.003Z

Finished the second and hopefully final draft of my chapbook ms, 'The Everyday English Dictionary'. My first reader has given very positive feedback so it's given me some confidence mayhap it will soon find its home.

It's stopped raining and so I might go out for a jog in a couple of hours' time. Have been slowly increasing my running times, starting from mid-August when I was alternating one minute running, five minutes' walking [or something like that]. Man, that one minute felt like a small annihilation. But now, right before the New Year, I recently jogged 30 minutes non-stop. Woohoo! Yay, me!

Here's hoping it goes some way towards improving my health. Heaven knows, writing poetry isn't the most active of pursuits. But then again, I'm not in it for my health. Heehee!

My New Year's resolution: To be happy.

Wishing you a very Prosperous and Happy New Year! Prospero Año Felicidad!

Contrariwise

2009-12-22T13:31:00.000Z

Ivy's Activity Report
for 1 January 2009 - 17 December 2009

Batches* of poems sent, journals: 21
                 of which are solicited: 5
                                  anthologies: 2
                                  competition: 4
Poems accepted: 29 [yay!]
                 returned, journal: 52
                 returned, competition: 1
                 returned, anthology: 1
                 still under consideration, journal: 4
                 still under consideration, anthology: 9
                 still under consideration, competition: 4

Short plays sent: 2
                 returned: 2

Nudges** sent: 2

Readings: 9 [yay!]

Applications sent: 4
                 returned: 3

Chapbook sent out: 2
                 returned: 2

* Between 1-10 poems in a batch
** 'Hey now, where my poems at?'

I've seen an increase in solicitations from editors this year, which is a little unnerving, to be honest. I guess this has affected the numbers, though of course, just because an editor asks, does not oblige them to accept.

There's a little less franticness and hecticness this year and the ravenous drive to see publication has become more measured, or so it feels to me. Thank goodness for the publication of my first book! It's given me some perspective, to breathe and step back and see.

Perhaps contrariwise to what I've just said, I have two chapbook manuscripts [one being 'The Everyday English Dictionary'] completed and a full-length collection almost ready to go meet a press or few.

The poems, the poems, the poems. Fidelity to the poems. Remember the art.

Godrush

2009-12-23T11:33:00.001Z

The astonishing Rebecca Loudon [a.k.a Ms LEL] is interviewed here.

Auguries

2009-12-18T11:15:00.004Z

I am in the midst of arranging an interview date for a Visiting Lecturer position at a university. Strange, huh? It'll be for seven weeks or so and I'll be covering poetry and creative writing as well as doing some marking. That's if I get the job.

The job'll come in handy because, well, it looks good on a CV and I can apply for similar positions at other universities and, for another thing, it'll help pay for another trip back to Oz.

I wonder if I'll get it.

One of the other irons in the fire that I'm hoping will catch alight [do irons do that?] is a grant application I put in not so long ago. I don't find out 'til end of January/early February but this is one I've got my fingers crossed 'cos it's an awesome, exciting project, not least because I've included writing studio time in there. Whee, a writing studio!

Then there's Poetry on Tap, too, which I'd like to continue until the summer hiatus. And ~~a potential~~ current guest editorship for online journal Cordite.

A lot seems to be happening. Augurs well for the New Year.

Umber

2009-12-17T10:55:00.004Z

After wandering around in the desert of 'write, send out poems, busy myself with other things [like writing more poems] while waiting, get the email/envelope with acceptance or return, if acceptance then celebrate then repeat cycle, if return then repeat cycle', it seems a little strange to me than in the past year or so, my poems have started receiving small mentions on editorials.

Odd and strange. One so gets used to writing in the umber darkness of obscurity. But now, some poems seem to be getting their day in the sun ... which is nice.

Asleep in perfection

2009-12-10T22:02:00.000Z

Squeeze

2009-12-04T18:21:00.004Z

I've almost finished writing poems for The Everyday English Dictionary — only three more letters to go!

There's a theme going on here: micropoems leading towards macropoems.

Trying to get it complete so that it's finally done and dusted. I wonder where it's going to end up? I originally envisaged it as a chapbook. It's just over 30 pages. Hmm. It might be a squeeze.

Also sent in a grant application today. Very prompt for me. It was an online application, which might have helped. That I've applied for this project and so all the wordage and preparation was mostly done would've been another contributing factor, I'm sure. Hope I get past the first round and onto the next. It'd be nice to have some cashola coming in so I can write more poems.

Odd translation

2009-12-02T16:22:00.005Z

I bought a textbook on homicide investigation a few years ago because I thought it would help me with some aspects to do with the second book. At the time, I was thinking about ballistics and procedures and suchlike, details that could help inform the poem. Turns out very little of that has emerged in the poems, or so it seems to me, when I gave it a once-over.

Still, one never knows, really. It's probably in there.

While useful, I can't say I really like the textbook. It's got some quite horrific pictures. I think what's horrifying to me is the intent of murder being so manifest in the act, a body made ugly with hate, its perfect envelope rent and torn so coldly. The peaceful deaths, those where a body fell asleep in the snow, for instance, don't seem so bad.

During the once-over, after reading one of the main sections, I had my doubts: What was I thinking? This may need a lot more work!

I didn't go through the whole thing, just the second half, but I may have pinpointed some gaps in the ms, though I was also considering the idea of deliberately leaving gaps. Will it matter? Is it okay to leave an element of wonder?

That reminds me of the Wonder Issue at Holly Rose Review. [Hm, nice segue!]

My odd translation of a Welsh poem is in there. It kinda makes me laugh because I'm sure the poet wouldn't have recognised her own poem in my translation.

Warming up

2009-12-01T11:52:00.002Z

I have said I will set aside this month to finish the second book. So this is the first day and I am warming up my pen here. Let the ink flow and the brain not matter so much. Let the heart and hands take over. Let the tongue loose and the ears widen their scope, the hairs on the back of the scalp reach out their tender antennae and sing.

Excavating

2009-11-20T15:46:00.002Z

It got quite heated at the John Tripp Award for Spoken Poetry, in a sedate and literary kind of way, of course. Nothing ever voiced but always as an aside, for your ears only. Still, a very lively night, in more ways than one.

It's funny, I consider myself lucky to be an outsider. People feel at ease enough to confide in me, vent frustrations, let drip a tiny drop of bitter. And while it seems like I forget what I'm told, it is also the same everywhere, in a way.

Kinda schmaltzy but I just want to give a platform for poetry. Nothing wrong with that.

Working slowly through my notebook, excavating the dictionary poems and brushing away the dirt so I can see what it is I have. These ones are dated from December of last year. Enough distance, then, and I have gained perspective. Excise, keep, realign. Yes, that just might work.

One of the magical things about poems are that, in a way, they are outside of time. I might know I first drafted them a year ago but this does not necessarily reveal itself to another reader. I think that's pretty neat.

And I think I might have a potential title for the second ms. Frickin' finally! Hallelujah.

And shivering sweet to the touch

2009-11-19T16:30:00.002Z

I like to write when I'm not at home, when I'm ill-at-ease and still trying to make sense of my new environment. I wonder why that is.

Poetry on Tap, a regular poetry and spoken word event which I've started with a fellow Cardiffarian, went well on Sunday, methinks. Had lots of excellent feedback and most of the punters seemed happy. I think it is more necessary than ever to create, encourage and embiggen culture. We can be culturally rich, if not otherwise.

Received my contributor's copies of Best Oz Po 09.

Wow. I guess it's real.

Add to this the honour of a Pushcart nomination and I think I can honestly say my gob is well and truly smacked. [Thanks, CK and DM.]

Holy cats.

Oh yeah, it's not writer's block. I'm just not ready to write yet. But I will soon. I can feel it coming.

Clear the decks.

Holey

2009-11-06T16:44:00.003Z

My next Writing Poetry workshop series starts tomorrow. It's got kinda a catchy title, I think — The Three Rs: Revise, Rewrite and Redraft.

'Course, most writers will know that those three Rs are basically variations of the one R, write? I mean, right?

I'm repeating myself. I've been reading Plath's poetry today. There are a lot of repetitions in it.

I used to know 'Daddy' and 'Lady Lazarus' off by heart [mostly because I had to learn poems for Speech & Drama assessment] but now my memory is holey.

Hope the workshops go okay. Working on the lesson plan now. Hark at her.

A tip

2009-11-05T11:18:00.003Z

My writing desk looks like a rubbish tip today. Stacks of paper everywhere. How can anyone create in such a space? I can't. It's just my landing strip where I do my email and then flit off again.

I have so many things I want to do but there is a civil war inside me that paralyses thought and action.

The halogen light in the hallway blinks a warning.

Sometimes I am a snail, recoiling from a grain of salt.

I haven't done my activity report here a little while. I think almost a whole year. It's been a strange year anyway. Even without active pursuit of publication, some poems managed to find homes.

I will do one at the end of the month.

It won't be 'til February next year when I hear about a bursary I applied for, for what I think is a pretty cool project. If I get it, well... I am hopeful.

Scrimshaw mask

2009-11-02T12:33:00.004Z

Okay, sometimes I can give a journal leeway of years before I give up on them and their unresponsive ways. I just a put a line through their name and say to myself, 'Self, it's not you, it's them.' Then, I amble along in my lackadaisical, meandering way until I see a tasty theme or irresistible journal that fans my smoulder to a spark, a flame to a bonfire and then I send off a carefully-worded cover letter, a minutely-selected clutch of poems for the editor to read.

But this! Come on. You, journal of artful dishevelment and James Dean devil-may-caredness, you are having me on, with your dark hair curled over one eye and that lifted hitch of a lip, you say to others, 'I have sent out my rejection notes! You should be getting one soon!' Oh, I wait and wait but I hear nothing. I, too, send you my nudges and winks [Dear Journal... dear journal, oh, dear journal...] but nary a note comes my way.

And so I retire, stare at your covers with longing, and sigh, and send curt what-is-the-status-of-my-recent-contribution emails that are only a scrimshaw mask to my ardour. When, oh when, can I expect to hear from you, dear journal?

Let the cream rise to the top

2009-10-30T13:48:00.003Z

Caption Contest Throwdown: Round 2 (click to view)

The judges have spoken, but your votes determine who continues on in hopes of winning the competition and who is OUT.

Who wrote the best caption in this Round?

View Results

All the Dead Dears

2009-10-27T18:20:00.002Z

Happy birthday, Sylvia Plath.

Finished the first draft of a bursary application! Another one where I leave 'til the last minute. Will I never learn? It's a false excitement, I tell you. False!

I don't think I'll be getting the UK residency I applied for. Their interview date is in the next couple of days and I would've heard something by now, like, 'Buy your train ticket! We want to meet you!'

Ah well, there's always next year.

Captions

2009-10-26T14:57:00.002Z

You might see a familiar name here.

Yay!

Midway through a course of antibiotics, which seems to be fending off the chest infection successfully. Hurray for penicillin!

However, this means I have a to-do list longer than I know what to do with.

Oh, yeah, I just remembered. I'm doing this [here's the blog].

Just trying to whip up a bit more live poetry in Cardiff. I'm glad that there seems to be more and more of an arty scene here.

Swooning over ink

2009-10-19T13:10:00.001Z

I thought fellow letterpress lovers would enjoy swooning over this blog post about a special unveiling of a recreated early press.

Autumn falls

2009-10-16T10:32:00.003Z

Going for a run this morning, the soft gold coin leaves falling slantwise, nudged by the wind, hither and thither, dancing.

The shush, shush, shush. Like a dozen stern librarians. And the trees sweeping the floor of heaven.

Artistic practice

2009-10-12T12:51:00.002Z

Have finished an application for a residency here in the UK. It actually has an interview component to it, so if I get to that stage... well, I don't know if it's going to be a sure thing. Guess I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.

There's also another application I have to write.

I've been pining a little for time to create, especially the last couple of months. Since when have I needed a residency to write, though? I think MacDowell has spoiled me. Hee! Anyway, I feel, intuitively [because one cannot quantify this... suppose I could say qualitatively, though that, too, is beset by the subjective], that I write better when I am away. Away from chores, obligations and interruptions, the warm, loveable, comfortable minutiae of the daily.

And I need to write better for this second book.

For individual poems, it's fine. But for this I need long stretches of concentration, of feeling obligated to finish because I have a finite amount of time.

I am so close.

Hallelujah. Four years later. Really, I knew it would take this long. Back when I first thought of it.

But still.

And then after? Who knows. That big adventure of the next book, the book-to-come.

Correspondence

2009-10-06T11:26:00.003Z

Some weeks, there's nothing. Then Oliver Sutton, there are many.

Dear Ivy,

Attached please find a copy of the proofed version of your work to be published in our anthology. Would you please check carefully and confirm back to us no later than 10th October 2009 that the file is correct and ready for printing. In most cases, there have been only very minor changes, mostly typographical, and in some cases, no changes at all. Also attached for you to check is the short biographical note which will be included in the Contributors section of the book.

Here's an editorial question:

hey Ivy,

Hope all is well.

I am currently working on the first proof of our journal (there's only 2!) and have an edit query to put to you regarding your poem:

The first line of the 2nd part (ask about Laura's room) reads ' My daughter's doll's dress's hem is dusty'.

I'm wondering if you would be able to re-phrase this line? It seems to twist the tongue in my mind somewhat... or, perhaps it's intentional?

Yes, it is. Teehee!

This one actually used ink! I'd forgotten what that was like...

Many thanks for sending your poems. Sorry for the delay in replying. I would like to publish three of your dictionary poems, which I like very much.

And I like that very much. Huzzah!

This lovely letter caps it all off:

Thank you so much for your wonderful reading on the 18th. It was particularly interesting to hear the poems that you have in the magazine. The feedback we have had from so many writers has mentioned your poems in particular as 'memorable', exciting' and 'excellent'. I have to agree with them.

Okay, I better stop. This is getting a bit much and I'm starting to blush.

Proof

2009-09-28T16:29:00.005Z

Just reading through the proof for my poem, which will be included in the Best Australian Poems 2009. The poem itself looks fine. [Should I mention the capitalisation thing to the editor? Yeah, probably will.]

I've also been given the publication details page, which has the alphabetical listing of poets in the anthology. There are some heavy hitters in there.

Wow.

This is kinda strange. And not a little surreal.

Luckily, a few of my friends are in there, too, so at least it also feels like a nice party and that we can go off in a corner of the book somewhere and dance to uncool music and sing bad karaoke. You know, have a laugh and that.

Yeah, that's how I'll think of it.

[Holy cats. What am I doing in the same book as Dorothy Porter? This is insane.]

As for the reading/arts event in London... it was a really groovy cultural evening, I'd have to say. My reading went well and I surely would love to do another one soon. A kind writer friend who let me stay at her and her partner's place in London came along and they seemed to have a good time, too, so it can't have been too bad. And they're still my friends! Yay!

While in London, I also took the opportunity to drop off the letter I that I knitted for the Poetry Society's Knit a Poem project. It was funny to see the huge table laden with knitted letters and yarn, knitters on all sides, needles flashing as wartime music poured from the radio. My friend and I felt transported and that we were there, knitting for the war! Bizarre... and yet strangely nostalgic and romantic at the same time.

These past few weeks, I have been retreating and I find myself not being on the computer so much. My writing is at a fallow period but I know the time is coming when I will be going to the final stage of the second ms.

I know I have a hard time letting go of the writing sometimes but it must have an ending. It must be finished.

Must let go.

To London!

2009-09-24T08:42:00.003Z

I will have my London debut tonight. That's rather exciting. I hope my mild cold won't get in the way. Here's the info:

Living in the UK we are used to the heavens opening up at any given moment. So at September’s Open Arts Café we are giving something back, by inviting our artists to open up to the heavens.

Please join us for ‘High Spirits: a lighter look at spirituality’ where we will glorify and sanctify the work of these artists as they explore alternative alters and subversive souls.

This will be the launch of Open Arts Café’s second year, so please come on down and do bring new people to share in the adventure.

The Café will be filled with…

Laughter from...
Tony Dunn

Music from…
Francesca Terberg
Farsa Monea

Drama from…
Steven Bloomer
Megan Ford

Poetry from…
[me!]

Video installation…
Miki Shaw

Art exhibited by…
Lindsey Yankey
Andy Wood

And the truly spiritual return of our resident poet…
James Hogg

~~~

High Spirits: A Lighter Look at Spirituality
Open Arts Café, 34 Upper Berkeley St,
London, W1H 5AU
Thu, 24 Sept 09, 7.15 pm
Entry by donation

Sounds rather neat. Yay, London!

Best Australian Poems 09?

2009-09-15T16:15:00.002Z

It seems I have a poem in it.

I really don't know how that happened...

Oh, Edinburgh! Take another piece of my heart, why don't you? The poetry reading went well, methinks, thanks in large part to host-with-the-most Rob Mackenzie. Really, really wonderful time there.

London poetry gig!

2009-09-11T16:22:00.002Z

I finally got my London poetry gig! Here are the details:

High Spirits: A Lighter Look at Spirituality
Open Arts Café, 34 Upper Berkeley St,
London, W1H 5AU
Thu, 24 Sept 09, 7.15pm (donation)

Wow, that's soon!

Also, I have poems included in the Poetry Society 100 Exhibition at the Forest Arts Centre, which runs until 17th October.

Apparently, people can vote on their favourite poem. Hmmm...