Wednesday 28 March 2007

a first time for everything

bc has been having a bit of a poetry push lately. most writers on the site are prose writers. most deal with short stories. a few brave souls give novels a bash. even fewer, braver sould have a bash at poetry. there has been some encouragement around recently for this, including poetry prompts, challenges, stuff like that...

i subbed some poetry - about six poems - to different places over the last month. i haven't written poetry since i was an angsty teen at school and uni, so to do it in my mid thirties was a bit of a gamble

and i have to say, i find it hard.

but it's fun, challenging, frustrating, a learning process.

you know, like writing is supposed to be.

and it got me out of my comfort zone.


anyway blah, blah, blah... today i got a poetry hit. my first published poem will be featured in the next issue of poetry monthly.

i have no idea how big a circulation this has - it's a print mag as well as a website - and i've no idea what the quality of the poetry in the mag is like, although i know a couple of other bcers have featured. but they're clearly selective (they only accepted one of my two submissions)

i'm looking forward to getting my free copy, and seeing my first published poem

that makes me a published poet, right?


of course, i also got a reject through for a story today as well, so everything balances out as usual. but it feels good to get a first-time poetry hit.

if anyone reads this and hasn't written a poem in a while, give it a go...somebody out there might like it.

1 comment:

The Boot Camp Diaries said...

yay, cool "als"

That takes us to 14 hits for the month, 40 for the year.

I think a bit of poetry changes the mind set and helps us as short-story-writers


alex