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Pindrop Press has a new website
Jo and I are pleased to announce our new website for Pindrop Press. We have news there about our line up of poets whose work we’ll be publishing during 2010. Please visit the site, where you can also read sample poems from the upcoming books and follow links to the poets’ blogs.
When I was just starting out I had wanted to be a magazine editor and publisher, but I ended up going into education and teaching. Thanks to Jo, who has been a huge motivating force, I’m actually involved in the kind of work I had envisioned for myself when I was young. Pindrop Press is a result of our love of poetry, our study of literature, and Jo’s experience in the publishing world.
We continue to read for our third issue of ouroboros review, and are receiving scores of submissions. Thanks to all of you who continue to read the magazine and take the time to send us your fabulous poems.
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Atlanta Poets at Agave
http://vimeo.com/moogaloop.swf?clip_id=4233807&server=vimeo.com&show_title=1&show_byline=1&show_portrait=0&color=ff0179&fullscreen=1
Atlanta Poets at Agave from christine swint on Vimeo.Attending were Collin Kelley, Cleo Creech (who made our chapbooks), Dustin Brookshire, Julie Bloemeke, Megan Volpert, Beth Gylys, and Rupert Fike.
Good Times in Atlanta. Thanks to Collin Kelley, I had another opportunity to meet with some fabulous poets, and I enjoyed a great meal to boot. My entrée was Crawfish Diablo Pasta, very spicy and delicious. I threw caution to the wind and had a margarita with José Cuervo reposado tequila. Yum!
Since I don’t get out of the ‘burbs too often, I was soaking up all the conversation and witty repartee. An all around fun evening.
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My ticker tape shows a lot of ups and downs
Today I wrote my seventeenth poem in seventeen days, and I’m not even sure if I want to post it! Maybe I’m stretching myself too thin. Maybe everyone doing this April poem challenge is. But, at the same time, it’s only a poem. So what, right? They aren’t all going to be good ones, or ones for the ages, just a record of a moment in time.
The following little poem came from Robert Lee Brewer’s idea to begin with “All I Want Is…,” and then fill in the blank with a word. Some people wrote very funny poems. One guy wrote that all he wanted was to have some hair on his head.
All I Want is a Pixie
She’ll have translucent skin
traced with a fan of blue veins.The jellied knuckles of her hands
will roll and wave as she rifflesthrough the stacks of papers on my desk,
filing and shredding during the longtunnel of my sleep, yet she is no dream.
Like the Shoemaker, in the morningI’ll find the laundry folded,
smelling of lavender and wind,a loaf of cinnamon bread on the counter
next to a pot of just-brewed coffee.She ‘ll want nothing for herself,
but she’ll take delight in the tinyspring dress I’ll make for her
out of dandelions and jasmine.***
That poem is code for “my house is a pig sty and I don’t want to clean it.” I grew up with a mother who was a clean freak, and my grandmother was even worse. I have stacks of paper all over my desk, and there’s dog hair on the blue comforter in my office/guest room. My dog sleeps on the bed while I sit at my desk. Why did I pick dark blue when I have a white dog? And why do I avoid cleaning?
Here’s a rondeau I wrote yesterday, as practice for one I wrote later. I’m posting it here just to have a record of my insanity progress. And also to give you a good laugh. Just don’t cringe, please.
Ticker tape
Bankers and poets are in the red,
each one living in dread
that the well has now run dry,
that today is the last high.
In the morning all betsare off, horoscopes remain unread,
writers and auditors stay in bed,
robbers only dream of heists,
because we’re all in the red.Hot tears have been shed,
divorce and panic widespread.
Some have sacrificed
fatted calves, or decried
the wisdom of talking heads,
just to deny they are in the red.
Balanced On the Edge 