Publishing Poetry

DEVELOPING AND SUBMITTING YOUR FIRST BOOK OF POETRY FOR PUBLICATION

Don’t think about submitting a book for publication until you have at least 8 poems in 5 or 6 journals, magazines, or ezines. It would be great to publish in LaGuardia’s The Lit, but a poem in that publication is tied to a college, so it doesn’t quite count as a professional publication. If you look at the publication credits on the acknowledgments page of most books of poetry that list previously published poems, there are rarely fewer than 8 poems listed, and some books only include the names of publications (not the poems), and, in the case of poets who had not published a book before, there are rarely fewer than 4 publications listed and often many more.

Assembling a first book of poetry is usually not dumping poems into a Word file/PDF as though putting ingredients in a stew. Often, the poets rigorously select poems that have no discernible weaknesses, even if it means creating a relatively short book of 48 pages rather than 64-75 pages, an average length for a first book and a decent length for any book. Secondly, you will want to see if there is a logical or associative order for the book based on major and minor themes or the balance of long and shorter poems and poetic series or sequences, or the variety of stylistic features, or bits of language that link one poem to another. To separate the different areas of content, theme, language, etc., you can divide the book by sections... or not. The sections can have titles or just be I, II, III, etc. If there doesn't seem to be a logical order, try to invent one out of thin air by playing around with different orders for poems. Don't get too crazy about it, because no order is objectively the "right" order; it's all pretty subjective, as we're dealing with aesthetics. It's instructive to take a good look at how a few other poets have organized their books--for example, the gifts that I distributed at the beginning of the semester when we were all physically together.

As for publishing opportunities, once you have at least 8 poems accepted for publication or published, one thing you can do is to look online and in the magazine Poets and Writers, to which you can subscribe or you can find it in some branches of the public library system or college/university libraries, for contests that offer a monetary prize and publication of the book by a particular press. Some contests indicate that they only publish first books. Contest fees are often expensive ($15-$30), so it’s very important to peruse some books published by the press—or at least various poems online written by 4-5 poets who are published by the press—and to read various poems written by the contest judge. If your poetic style and content are extremely different from either the kinds of work published by the press or what the contest judge would be likely to approve of, it’s not worth the money to submit your manuscript. For example, let's say that your poetry rhymes and has traditional iambic meter: if no one published by the press uses either technique and if the judge doesn't either, then don't submit to that contest. If there are 500 poets submitting, and if the preliminary judges choose 30 manuscripts for the final judge to read, and then that judge picks 1 manuscript, a rhyming iambic poet is not going to win. In some cases, judges like and support a kind of poetry that is very different from their own, and the way you would know that is by googling the judge's writings on other poets and briefly speed-reading those articles.

Another avenue to publication by a press is to go online and learn which presses have a submission period each year in order to consider new manuscripts without either a fee or a contest. Again, you should submit to those poetry presses only after checking out some of the work published by their authors and making sure that they might have an interest in your kind(s) of poetry, but you should ESPECIALLY notice the press editors' names and see if they are poets whose poems are online; if your work is completely different from theirs, there is no need to bother with submitting your book manuscript. If you submit, follow the submissions guidelines exactly, or you won’t receive serious consideration.

A third way to gain an opportunity to publish a book of poetry is through networking: you meet someone who is connected to a press, take a friendly interest in them and their creative writing and/or other literary activities, and after a while, show them your work and ask advice about publishing a book in the hope that that individual will invite you to submit a manuscript for their press’s consideration.

A fourth strategy occurs after substantial networking: you band together with several other poets to create a small press (and perhaps also—or beforehand—a journal or ezine) that publishes the books of the participants. This is frequently called a “collective,” because all of the poets share responsibility for running the press. Such a press can only get started and survive if the group of editors/poets finds a way either to get grants from organizations or money from individual financial contributors.

The fifth strategy of course is self-publication through a variety of online platforms. Walt Whitman self-published the first edition of Leaves of Grass.

INTERVIEW WITH TOM BECKETT

Brianna Hobson:  What was the inspiration behind "This Poem"? What was the writing process like?

Tom Beckett: It has been quite a number of years since I wrote “This Poem.” I don’t remember the occasion. Probably it was the opening lines which speak to this poem’s erotic engagements which gave me the impetus to proceed.  It was written and rewritten slowly over the course of several days. 

My process is additive and subtractive.  I write, rewrite, delete, arrange and rearrange. 

Brianna Hobson:  Why did you choose to repeat the line, "This Poem" in the poem, "This Poem"? Is there a reason for that  particular use of repetition? Was it to elicit resonance?

Beckett:  It’s a rhythmic devise, a form of insistence, and a formal way of  returning to the creation of the text.  It is, after all, a poem that was written slowly over the course of several days.

 Milady Torres: Do you find writing poetry easy? Why or why not?

Beckett:  I find writing poetry to be challenging.  Recognize that a first thought may not be one’s best thought. Think, but think again.  It takes time, practice and commitment to write well. And one doesn’t always succeed in doing so. I certainly don’t.  Persistence sometimes matters most of all in the practice of any art.

I think a poem is most successful when it surprises me, when it takes a curve I didn’t see coming. 

Milady Torres: Who are 3 poets you’d recommend? 

Beckett:  Hard to limit myself to three, but here goes:

Gertrude Stein,

Charles Bernstein,

Lyn Hejinian.

But I also want to add three philosophers:

Ludwig Wittgenstein,

Graham Harman,

Michel Serres.

For me, poetry and philosophy are inseparable.  I think of poetry in epistemological terms – as a way, that is, of coming to know.  I think that each of the figures cited above exemplify the braidedness of poetry and philosophy in extraordinarily useful, but sometimes difficult ways.  

Milady Torres:  What advice would you give an aspiring poet? 

Beckett:  To read a lot of poetry ( not just the kinds that you think you’ll like) and to actively seek out other living poets to test your ideas against. Conversations, correspondence can help in developing  your poetics; but  if you can find it in yourself to start a little magazine or run a reading series you can broaden your reach and find  unexpected comrades who take your measure and perhaps help to make you a better poet.  When I edited a magazine I discovered that typing another person’s work taught me things about poetry that simply reading the poem wouldn’t have.  I became more attuned to the decisions being made within the piece.  Poetry doesn’t happen in a vacuum.  It is a form of engagement with the world.

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INTERVIEW WITH NATSUKO HIRATA

MILADY TORRES: Do you find writing poetry easy? Why or why not?

Natsuko Hirata:  I find to write poetry rather is not easy. When I wrote a poem the first time, I wrote my realization which was a good discovery to me, but my teacher suggested to delete it at the very beginning and he said you shouldn't write a life lesson, because the poem gives imagination to readers. Since then, it is a great hint to me. If I left such a phrase, the poem must have become rubbish. Therefore, before I start to write, I think carefully and not try to  write just noticed or feelings. It takes time, and not easy.

I think, having a good poetry master is the best way as well as every field.　My master always understands my world and word with great knowledge and experience and sense and generosity. He always inspires joy of poetry writing and tries to lead me to higher level even if I am lazy. 

Erika Perez: How do you go about writing personal poetry without being too specific? 

Hirata:  I made full use of five senses and feel sounds, smells, atmosphere surrounding my personal experience. 　Like static electricity, when my five senses are polished, friction between my heart and skin attracts essential words.　I try to extract these words instead of specific experience or existence.

Paradoxically, these words come from specific experience or existence.

Brianna Hobson:   How do you weave cultural themes into your poetry? In other words, how do you convert images of cultural significance into poetically sound images--as exemplified in the poem, "Asakusa"?

Hirata:  Because my poem is based on personal feeling, cultural significance is not always important for me.　On the other hand, if the place which I was at has cultural significance by chance, naturally it may give me subsidiary impact. Though Asakusa or Kabuki Cho is a typical Japanese cultural town, I don't feel a particular feeling usually. But if I feel something in individual there, I suddenly could see colors, feel smell and hear sounds there. As for fountain, I didn't see that at the time, but the image came up to me; I noticed there is a famous landmark fountain in Asakusa later. 　I often visit  Nepal.  As well, cultural significance of tourist industry there is not so important for me. However, if I experienced something, suddenly the mountain dew, trees, moon and star, sky, river, bars, local music make sense and, they made me write various poems.

Sometimes, there are some cases of very exotic images that I never saw which appear in my poems. E.g.: In my poem, “Skyscraper’s Stonecrop" appeared "Sakura" and "Festival music from faraway Mycenae" at same time. Though they were just my imagination, my imagination could see and hear them at the rooftop of Skyscraper.

Brianna Hobson:  How do you conjure such ingenious ideas in regard to the structural form and shape of your stanza formats? Specifically in your stanzas in "Asakusa", "Moonless poolside" and "Supermoon", the lines resemble a fantastical, amorphous contraption.

Hirata: My master taught me how to make shape of stanzas by myself as well as how to write poems from the beginning. I did that very carefully every time. Thus, it become as important as the poem itself for me. "Moonless poolside"represented a wine glass.

"Asakusa" and "A hollow in afternoon's Kabukicho"--which is another of my poems--maybe represented walk with unsteady steps. "Super moon" represented "Super moon"-- maybe you understood.  Some of my poems sometimes represent a particular thing; some of them are just an abstraction.

The Lit

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HOW TO SUBMIT POETRY TO JOURNALS & ZINES

This is an elaboration of material that you’ll find in the Poetry Workshop Textbook. It has more specific details than in the textbook.

Most print journalsthat publish poetry have websites. If the websites have sample poems, you need to read them. If the print journal doesn’t have a website, then maybe it’s in a public or college library, or maybe it isn’t. As for bookstores, there are so few of them, and you’ll only be going to them after this pandemic is over: In a typical Borders or Barnes and Nobles, you won’t see journals or magazines with poetry, BUT there are some specialty bookstores for literature AND EVEN POETRY: 

Berl’s Brooklyn Poetry Shop in Dumbo, Brooklyn: 141 Front St., Brooklyn, NY 11201, 347-687-2375. Gee, I hope they are able to open after this pandemic. 

A famous bookstore where you can get remaindered books (and poetry magazines) is: 

Strand, 828 Broadway at 12^thSt. (East Village of Manhattan), 212.473.1452.

Online Journals, which are often just as high in quality as print journals, are also called zines or ezines. Zines are often free, so you can read the whole zine, including all the poems, but just reading 7 or 8 poems will be enough to give you a sense of what the editors are looking for.

If you like at least half of the poems in the journal, magazine, or ezine and think that some of the poems have something in common with your poetry—not everything but something important – then submit to the publication. Editors get a lot of poems, and if they see immediately that your poems have nothing in common with what they like, they may only read a few lines of the first poem you send them. 

Before submitting poetry, make sure that the journal, magazine, or zine accepts unsolicited poetry—poetry they didn’t ask to see. If they don’t, you will never hear from them. They’ll just throw away your submission if it’s by snail mail or delete your email.  And generally, publications will NOT want “simultaneous submissions”—that is, you should not submit a poem to more than one publication at one time (unless both pubs say that it is ok to do so).

Once you’ve determined where it seems good to send your poems, it will be helpful to do the following:

Make a list of 7 to 10 publications, 

      Follow the publication’s guidelines for submission EXACTLY: 

·     How to use an online submissions manager—often the one called Submittable

·     If no submissions manager, print submission via snail mail, or email 

·     the format such as Word file, PDF, or body of an email 

·     the number of poems to submit, 

·     the precise name of the editor to whom you will address your cover letter or if no name, just Dear Editors, 

·     limited or year-round reading period,

·     specifics in the cover letter—bio or no bio) and 

·     Have a schedule: submit 3 or 4 times a year at regular intervals (i.e. Sept. 1, Dec. 1, Mar. 1, and May 1), submit to a certain number of publications, depending on how much finished poetry you have.

Keep a careful record of all submissions: 

·      the name of the journal, magazine, or ezine, 

·      name and  email of the contact person there 

·      names of the poems sent

·      the date of the submission. 

·      Have a separate record of accepted poems. If a poem is rejected, you can cross it off the entry and then put it in a new entry for another publication.

Do not expect to hear back immediately; it might take 6 months or more in extreme cases. There may be a high proportion of rejections without any reasons for it. Just keep submitting. Editors may have very specific tastes, including specific aesthetic prejudices, that aren’t obvious from reading the journal or the submissions guidelines, so don’t assume that rejection means weaknesses in your poem from the standpoint of what you’re trying to accomplish. I know a poet whose poem ended up in The Best American Poetry (Scribner’s), but it was rejected from 25 magazines before it was published. (She appeared in The Best American Poetry numerous times after that and was finally asked to edit one of the volumes.)
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And now here is a publishing opportunity from our College itself:

Subject: Lit submissions

The student interns at The Lit are eager to make the magazine happen online this term, but we need your help in gathering submissions. They've started a social media presence (Twitter & IG) to help with marketing. If you could please reach out to current and recently former CW students and ask them to submit, we'd really, really appreciate it. We are also offering gift certificate prizes for the top submissions. I've attached the flyer for the contest/call, and here's the link to the submissions info as well: 

http://thelitmag.com/submissions/

POETRY NETWORKING  (Expansion of what is in the Poetry Workshop Textbook)

If the Coronavirus crisis does not indefinitely postpone large public gatherings, a good way to network is to go to poetry readings, poetry workshops and panels at places like Poets House in lower Manhattan:  10 River Terrace, New York, NY 10282; 212-431-7920.

(At this point, Poets House is hosting online "events"; you can check out their website.)

If live poetry readings continue to exist, perhaps with everyone wearing masks and gloves and sitting and standing 3 feet apart, you should not only meet the poet(s) reading but schmooze with audience members, many of whom would tend to be either poets, or poetry enthusiasts, or even magazine, journal, or book publishers.

It makes sense to engage in online activities where poetry is the main subject or one of them. Google searches can bring you in touch with poetry activities in the New York area and throughout the globe. Poetry blogs were very big in the first decade of the twenty-first century. They're still quite useful and influential. Google "poetry blogs" to see a range of sites-- for example, Poetry magazine's "Poetry Foundation" blog. Some blogs are good for networking because you can get in touch with the bloggers who provide contact information, and if it's a collective blog, you might be able to join.  If you happen to go on a poetry blog and have a question about the etiquette of communication with bloggers or the kind of social maneuvering going on, shoot me an email. Note that blogs are reflective of the world that surrounds them, so a good deal of ugly, distressing behavior that you find in the world might also be found in the blog-sphere.

When you become friendly with unestablished, up and coming, and established poets, journal and ezine editors, and others who can help you as a poet, take a genuine interest in THEIR work, and if you can’t, don’t cultivate them.  Those who have some influence in the various poetry worlds and those who are looking to gain more publication credits and public readings will want at least 50% of the attention on themselves and their needs, and if they don’t get it, they will brush you off. Anyway, we should all be ethical people who help each other, right? Of course, if you find that you are showing sincere, proper interest in them and their work but they are not paying much attention to you and your work, run! 

If a poet you are interested in networking with appears in online zines, by all means acquaint yourself with their work. On the other hand, at times, you may have to buy someone's book or a magazine in which they appear, read it, and make more specific comments than "I like it! It's really great!" This is not to say that you need to speak a long analysis of someone's poem; some poets like that, and others recoil from it. Base your interaction with poets on your perception of their overall personality.

As soon as you can develop a small community of poets who care about and trust each other, the group can decide what to do to create greater visibility for the writing of its members. Obviously, the community will only work if everyone does a decent amount of helping each other rather than only themselves and if decisions are democratically reached and not imposed by one or two dominant personalities.

One way poets network is to get an MFA in Poetry after receiving a B.A. Getting this advanced degree can be expensive and is not very promising in terms of job prospects. You should consult with faculty who have been in an MFA program and other poets who have had the experience, and read online accounts of the advantages and disadvantages of entering such a program.