This summer I wrote a poem that my workshop mates called a call to action! I was encouraged to publish it and since there was not time to send it to to any publishers, in the centuries old tradition of poets before me – I’ve self-published it. This being the age of the independent author, I went with a reputable indie publishing company. Only to be come up against technical obstacles. So the actual bound book and eBook files will be late. But thanks to a conversation with an old friend from high school, I’m sending the chapbook into the wild as a PDF. This particular version has a copyright notation that allows the PDF file to be shared. Share widely. Literal: Defining Moments.
Tag Archives: poetry
New Chap Book – Literal: Defining Moments
A new book is coming out very soon. LITERAL: Defining Moments is my first chap book. The poem Literal is a language poem, following the meaning of words and creating a trail for the reader to follow. How often do we use words without thought to actual meaning?
It’s a political poem, because poets have a responsibility to bring the forth what doesn’t work in our world and our society. A deeply personal work, it is one I could not fail to create and keep true to what is integral to the fabric of who I am, an individual of integrity.
The book will be out soon in all the usual distributors. As soon as pre-sale is open, I’ll post it and I do encourage you to at least go read the pre-sale page, that will help boost inventory before the book is on sale in the retail venues.
I wrote this poem while participating in the Napa Valley Writers Conference this summer.
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Bernadette Geyer Part 3
Bernadette Geyer: Writing life
VAH: More with Bernadette Geyer, this installment focusing on the writing life. Are you a full-time writer?
BG: I am a full-time freelance writer, editor, translator, and workshop instructor. All of the above are writing-related and from that I cobble together sustenance. My first love is writing poetry, but I do a lot of other things to pay the bills and buy groceries.
VAH: Would you say writing is a vocation, occupation, or profession?
BG: I consider poetry my “vocation” but for my “profession,” I write non-fiction, I provide editorial services, and I serve as a workshop instructor.
VAH: Writing for a living seems to always encompass so much beyond the creative journey. For you, when the page is blank, what gets you writing?
BG: I actually have a list of ideas for non-fiction articles I want to write and a journal full of jottings that can be developed into poems or essays. A blank page in front of me is never blank for very long. On the off chance I sit with a blank page in my journal, I sometimes just practice “observing” what’s around me. I will practice writing details, or description, or simile, or interpretation, or even just playing around with sound echoes, so that what I write builds on the sounds of the original word or observation. Sometimes, out of all that mess, will come a phrase that stands out as important and worth exploring further.
VAH: What you describe resonates with me as a means for practicing aspects of the craft. How would you describe your “process” when working on a new piece of writing?
BG: I am typically very slow in my process. When I get something onto a blank page and I think it’s promising, I will typically type it up and print it out for myself. I have a small desk in the house that I call my “editing” desk. No computer, just the desk and a chair and a lovely lamp. Most often, I will put the draft there for a while (a week or two, maybe a month, depending on what else is going on in my life at the moment) so that I can return to it with a fresh perspective. I walk past the desk very frequently because of its location and so I feel like the poem is always asserting its presence, even if subconsciously. I’ll look at it, and tweak a word. Or, I’ll scan it and have a sudden thought and then sit down and revise for an hour. Then I let it sit again. Type up a revision, print it out, let it sit some more. I usually have several poems in various stages of this process, so that it’s not usually more than a couple of months between finishing new poems. Sometimes I’ll finish a few in the course of one month! That always seems like a small miracle to me.
VAH: How about your typical writing day – what’s that like?
BG: This definitely depends on the kind of writing I am doing on a particular day. If it’s non-fiction, the day will involve a lot of research. I will sometimes forget to eat, but usually I try to tear myself away from my desk long enough to have a meal while not at the computer. I don’t typically devote a whole day to poetry, unless I am taking a workshop outside of my apartment. With my poetry, a 2-3 hour stretch is typically what I can do in a day. Sometimes the poem requires research, sometimes it requires that I get out of the apartment and wander while I think. Most poems are written in fits and starts over a long period and there is nothing “typical” about the process of writing them.
Bonus question –
VAH: Do you have a submission system or plan?
BG: My submissions are all tracked in a MSExcel file. I always note the date of the submission and how it was submitted (online, via email, post). On a separate page, I have a list of all the poems that I am actively submitting. Next to each poem I put a tic for each place to which I have submitted it. If a poem is currently under consideration at a place that does not accept sim subs, I make a special mark so that I know not to submit that poem elsewhere. I try to have poems submitted to 2-3 places at a time if those places accept sim subs. I am very methodical and persistent, albeit a little slower than many other poets I know. The Excel file is also where I track which litmags wrote encouraging personal notes on the rejection slips and specifically asked for me to submit again.
Bernadette Geyer Sampler:
Nonfiction:
“Kunstquartier Bethanien,” Slow Travel Berlin, December 2014
“The City behind the City of Berlin,” GoNOMAD, November 2014
“Fellowship Opportunities for Writers in Berlin,” Funds for Writers, September 19, 2014
“The Social Media Model,” The Los Angeles Review blog, September 4, 2010
“Making Every Word Count,” Absolute Write, July 27, 2006
“When Leaving Isn’t Easy,” Go World Travel Magazine, January 2006
Poetry:
32 Poems – Thumbelina’s Mother Speaks: To the Toad’s Mother
Heron Tree – Parable of the Great Outpouring
La Petite Zine — Contrary to Popular Belief
The Paris-American – Thanksgiving
Redux: A Literary Journal – Fire Ants Invade Hong Hock See Buddhist Temple; Remembering Is Short; Haunting
Verse Daily – Without Warning
Waccamaw – Pit
Bernadette Geyer’s first full-length collection, The Scabbard of Her Throat, was selected by Cornelius Eady as the 2013 Hilary Tham Capital Collection title, published by The Word Works in early 2013. In 2010, she received
a Strauss Fellowship from the Arts Council of Fairfax County. Geyer’s poems have appeared widely in journals including North American Review, Oxford American, The Paris-American, Poet Lore, and elsewhere.
In July 2013, Geyer relocated to Berlin, Germany, where she works as a freelance writer, editor, and translator. Her non-fiction has been published most recently in Slow Travel Berlin and GoNOMAD. Geyer also leads online creative writing and social media marketing workshops for writers.
Connect online with Bernadette Geyer: Website. Facebook Page. Twitter. Blog.
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Bernadette Geyer Parts I and 2
Poet and Nonfiction writer Bernadette Geyer is the August Three by Five highlighted author.
VAH: My favorite question and what Three by Five always begins with is – Why do you write?
BG: There are many reasons why I write. I write to get the words out of my head. Some days, I simply have to put down the phrases and narratives that appear in my head, and then other days, I return to those words to explore and fill in what feels necessary to it as a poem, or necessary to the completion of what I had begun. I also write as a way of thinking about and understanding (or trying to understand) the world around me, even if it is just understanding the importance of a pebble that a child is trying to put in her mouth.
VAH: Children explore by taste, we writers with finding the right word. Can you identify when you knew or felt like you were a writer and why?
BG: When I was in middle school, I loved Nancy Drew mysteries. I began to write my own little mystery stories during recess and some of my friends would pass around the pages as I finished them. I wrote poems in high school and then dreadful poems in college. It wasn’t until I was in my late-20s that I felt drawn back to poetry and took a community workshop. Since then, I haven’t stopped writing. Poetry is my focus, but I also write some non-fiction as well.
VAH: What would you say were your influences on your development as a writer?
BG: Reading. I read a lot. I know it sounds like a cliché but everything I read influences me. My newest “development” (if you can call it that) is a closer attention to sound in my poems. I moved to Germany in 2013 with a less-than-basic understanding of the language. My understanding of German has improved dramatically since being here, but the change made me much more attuned to sounds. Especially in the poems of a German poet I have gotten to know since moving here. She utilizes sound as a crucial part of her poem-crafting process and, though I don’t understand all of the words, I can appreciate the way the sounds echo and play off each other.
VAH: What do you remember about your first story or poem?
BG: The first poem I really remember writing was one about Dirty Windows (…stare back at you with your own eyes…). It was actually a very socially aware poem for me to write as a teen and it was published in a little local journal for high school students. I was very proud of that poem. I still remember much of it.
VAH: Is there a favorite piece you’ve written to date?
BG: That’s a very hard question to answer. There are poems that I love and that just seemed to come forth without much revision needed, and then there are poems that I love and that I invested a lot of energy in to get them where I wanted them. I think my favorite of the latter is my poem “Explaining Cremation to Our Daughter at the Dinner Table,” because it was one that I slaved over for many months and that brought in a lot of my thinking about when and how we teach our children difficult subjects that even we find hard to deal with ourselves.
VAH: That is a challenge, explaining difficult subjects that kids ask about in non-scary ways. A good well to draw from.
Let’s move on to part two of Three by Five – Writer reads.
Do you have a favorite author?
BG: I would say there is a four-way tie for my favorite author of fiction – Margaret Atwood, Jeanette Winterson, Italo Calvino, and Kurt Vonnegut. Although there are four of them, there is one reason why I appreciate them so much – imagination. Each of those authors has a very mind-expanding approach to literature and I encourage every writer to read works by them.
VAH: What is the most memorable book, story or poem you’ve read?
BG: The most memorable poem I have ever read was “Discovery” by Wisława Szymborska. The poem has a drive and suspense to it and, ultimately, a desperate terror at the potential of science and humanity. Yet the poem also conveys a sense of hope and a faith in the face of this terrible potential.
VAH: Do you have a favorite book, poem, or story?
BG: I have a favorite poem that I am always recommending to people – “A Brief for the Defense” by Jack Gilbert, from his collection Refusing Heaven. It is about the importance of finding beauty and happiness in life even in the face of all the ugliness and sorrow. Every time I hear some terrible news, I think of this poem and how important it is for us to cherish even the little pleasantries of life, and to put forth the good for people to see so that it’s not always the awfulness that gets all the attention.
VAH: Which reader are you – always finish what you started or put it down and move on if you don’t like it?
BG: As much as I would like to be a different kind of reader, I am a serial monogamist. I can only focus on one book at a time and must read all the way to the end, even if I do not enjoy the book. I always think – “maybe there’s something that will resonate on the next page!”, and for that potential, I must keep reading.
VAH: Sometimes there is something buried deep.
More Bernadette Geyer will post on the 23rd of the month. Until then, enjoy this sampler of work available online:
Poetry:
32 Poems – Thumbelina’s Mother Speaks: To the Toad’s Mother
Heron Tree – Parable of the Great Outpouring
La Petite Zine — Contrary to Popular Belief
The Paris-American – Thanksgiving
Redux: A Literary Journal – Fire Ants Invade Hong Hock See Buddhist Temple; Remembering Is Short; Haunting
Verse Daily – Without Warning
Waccamaw – Pit
Bernadette Geyer’s first full-length collection, The Scabbard of Her Throat, was selected by Cornelius Eady as the 2013 Hilary Tham Capital Collection title, published by The Word Works in early 2013. In 2010, she received a Strauss Fellowship from the Arts Council of Fairfax County. Geyer’s poems have appeared widely in journals including North American Review, Oxford American, The Paris-American, Poet Lore, and elsewhere.
In July 2013, Geyer relocated to Berlin, Germany, where she works as a freelance writer, editor, and translator. Her non-fiction has been published most recently in Slow Travel Berlin and GoNOMAD. Geyer also leads online creative writing and social media marketing workshops for writers.
Connect online with Bernadette Geyer: Website. Facebook Page. Twitter. Blog.
Filed under writing life
Introducing Bernadette Geyer
Bernadette Geyer’s first full-length collection, The Scabbard of Her Throat, was selected by Cornelius Eady as the 2013 Hilary Tham Capital Collection title, published by The Word Works in early 2013. In 2010, she received a Strauss Fellowship from the Arts Council of Fairfax County. Geyer’s poems have appeared widely in journals including North American Review, Oxford American, The Paris-American, Poet Lore, and elsewhere.
In July 2013, Geyer relocated to Berlin, Germany, where she works as a freelance writer, editor, and translator. Her non-fiction has been published most recently in Slow Travel Berlin and GoNOMAD. Geyer also leads online creative writing and social media marketing workshops for writers.
Connect online with Bernadette Geyer: Website. Facebook Page. Twitter. Blog.
Filed under writing life
Carol A. Stephen – Writing Life and Community
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Back with Carol A. Stephen with the writing life and writing community.
VAH: Are you a full time writer?
CAS: I am a retired small “a” accountant/credit professional, so I am free to write or not as I choose. Except, of course, for the compulsions!
VAH: Is writing vocation, occupation, or profession?
CAS: I’d say a vocation. I do it because I am compelled and because I have a love for language.
VAH: When the page is blank what gets you writing?
CAS: Reading other poets, finding a good writing prompt. Occasionally something will come from just brainstorming/wild-minding, but not very often. I have to read.
VAH: What is your “process” when working on a new piece of writing?
CAS: To start with, I usually have an “earworm” phrase demanding to be written down. If I have a list of words, I might just start writing in a word association kind of way and the poem may take off from there. I have a couple of projects in mind, but poems are more likely to come from specific phrases rather than just a more general theme.
VAH: Do you have a submission system or plan?
CAS: That is on my list of resolutions every year. I don’t know what holds me back, but I don’t submit regularly.
VAH: What does your typical writing day include?
CAS: Many distractions on the internet. Writing new poems takes precedence over polishing ones already written. The best poems are always the newest ones. That might be why I don’t submit as often as I think I should!
VAH: What words of wisdom do you have for the emerging writer?
CAS: Read, read, read. Try new techniques, especially those new forms that you think won’t work for you. And submit! (Yes, wisdom I should include in my own plans!)
VAH: What choices have you made regards to traditional or independent publishing?
CAS: Most of my individual published poems have been in online magazines where I’ve been successful submitting before. Of my three chapbooks, one I published myself, another was under a friend’s imprint, and the new one is published by a small press run by a poet I’ve “known” online for years. I’m a late bloomer, and not sure I want to wait the long times it takes for traditional publishing to take place. Online publishing also reaches a larger audience, even more quickly than self-publishing.
VAH: What part does social media play in your writing career?
CAS: I have a blog, where I write about literary events in and around Ottawa, Ontario, but also to showcase my poetry and my chapbooks. I’m on Facebook and Twitter and recently have become more active on Tumblr.
VAH: Do you belong to writing or author organizations?
CAS: I am a member of the League of Canadian Poets, The Ontario Poetry Society and I belong to a small poetry group, The Field Stones. I am rejoining the board of Arts Carleton Place, where I live, and I am a former member of Canadian Authors Association, National Capital Region.
VAH: Do you have any favorite online sites or blogs that you find useful or interesting?
CAS: Poetry Foundation, Academy of American Poets, Places for Writers, Winning Writers, Found Poetry Review, Ron Silliman’s blog, Bill Moyers.com, Writers Digest, and many others.
VAH:What was your writing education?
CAS: In high school we studied it as part of the English curriculum. Since 2006, I’ve taken an online course at Algonquin College, and a follow-up private course with the same instructor, as well as a 10-week Stanford course with James Arthur and later a week-long retreat with him in Lenox, Mass.
VAH: Writing conferences, retreats, seminars – any favorites and why?
CAS: The retreat [mentioned earlier] with James Arthur was a chance to work in group with some of the poets I’d met in the online Stanford class, as well as time to discuss my work one-on-one with James. I’ve participated in several weekend “master” workshops through Ottawa’s Tree Reading Series with prominent Canadian poets. These were amazing opportunities to work with some of Canada’s top poets in a small class (max 12 participants) I also attended a 5-day writing conference through Canadian Authors Association, which provided workshops across various genres, and opportunities to network that have been invaluable.
Thank you Carol A. Stephen for contributing your thoughts on writing and the writing life.
Sample Carol’s work:
Carol reading her work here.
Howe and Stephen (the light ekphrastic)
Stephen and Karkar (the light ekphrastic)
Imworld and Stephen (the light ekphrastic)
Learning to Dance (Silver Birch Press)
Waiting for Green Mornings (Silver Birch Press)
In a Moment She’ll Unfurl (the light ekphrastic)
Carol A. Stephen is a Canadian poet, poetry selector for Bywords Journal and a member of the League of Canadian Poets. She’s served on boards of Canadian Authors Association, National Capital Region (CAA-NCR), Arts Carleton Place and Tree Reading Series Ottawa. Carol coordinated CAA’s poetry circle 2008-2013.
Her poetry has appeared in Bywords Quarterly Journal, Tree Press/phaphours press chapbooks and online at The Light Ekphrastic and Silver Birch Press. Chapbooks: Above the Hum of Yellow Jackets, Bondi Studios, 2011 and Architectural Variations, Quillfyre Publishing, 2012. Ink Dogs in my Shoe, Dec. 2014 from Nose In Book Publishing, Castlegar B.C.
Awards: 3rd Prize CAA 2012 National Capital Writing Contest for Walking in Thomson’s Red Sumac. Honourable Mentions: VERSeFest, Poetry for the End of the World, 2012, Arborealis 2012 and 2008 Ontario Poetry Society, Double Your Pleasure 2013 Ontario Poetry Society and CAA’s 2008 and 2011 National Capital Writing Contest.
Recent publication: In December, 2014 her third chapbook, Ink Dogs in my Shoes, was published by Nose In Book Publishing, Castlegar, B.C. This is a chapbook of poems all containing some element of three in them. Subjects range from garden to writing process to nonsense rhymes, and some explore conceptual poetry or experiment with wordplay.
SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS: Twitter. Facebook. Blog
Three by Five posts on days that end in threes.
Filed under writing life
Carol A. Stephen – Writer Reads
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VAH: Who is your favorite literary character?
CAS: I can’t choose between Custard, the Cowardly Dragon and The Cheshire Cat.
VAH: Do you have a favorite author?
CAS: Perhaps Richard Wagamese, a Canadian First Nations author, who wrote Dream Wheels. It won the Canadian Authors Association award for fiction in 2007. I read a single line from the back cover and was hooked. Wagamese is a powerful storyteller, one of the best I’ve read. He weaves together both compelling story and First Nations customs which are fascinating. Many books I read and forget but not this one.
VAH: You’re stranded in a snowstorm, stuck on a deserted island. What books would you hope to have with you or find? Why these choices?
CAS: Poetry for sure, but not a single author. An anthology, a big one, with poets from the 20th and 21st century and a book of writing prompts, perhaps The Poet’s Companion, so that I am inspired to keep writing. Novels that have interesting older women, characters that get into odd situations but all’s well in the end. Romance optional. Humor essential!
VAH: What is the most memorable book, story or poem you’ve read? How so?
CAS: I started to say The Water Babies, by Charles Kingsley, something my parents read to me when I was a child. I always remember two characters: Mrs Doasyouwouldbedoneby and Mrs. Bedonebyasyoudid. I recall it as a morality tale for children, but I think even more influential would have to be A Child’s Garden of Verses, Robert Louis Stevenson. That book probably was my first acquaintance with poetry and some of the poems still stay with me today.
VAH: Do you have a favorite book, poem, or story?
CAS: I have a lot of favorite poems, but I will share this one:
“The Hush of the Very Good” Todd Boss (c 2008)
I’m not sure how I first came to this poem, but I remember hearing Todd Boss read The Hush of the Very Good online. The poem describes a kiss, a particularly good kiss, while juxtaposing it with a metaphoric small boat. The images are so vividly drawn using simple language. But it isn’t just that. Visually, it’s the unusual way the lines break, short lines clinging to the right margins, then back to the left, like waves the wake of a boat makes.
The poem asks questions, draws the reader in. It’s a poem to be read aloud, to wrap your tongue around long ohhh sounds and soft sibilants, sounds are very reminiscent of ocean and waves, the whisper of reeds, and the poem slows down, then speeds up through short words and hard consonants, b, p, d. It’s just such a lush poem to read out loud.
Next installment – Carol A. Stephen shares about her writing community.
Sample her work:
Learning to Dance (Silver Birch Press)
Waiting for Green Mornings (Silver Birch Press)
In a Moment She’ll Unfurl (the light ekphrastic)
Carol A. Stephen is a Canadian poet, poetry selector for Bywords Journal and a member of the League of Canadian Poets. She’s served on boards of Canadian Authors Association, National Capital Region (CAA-NCR), Arts Carleton Place and Tree Reading Series Ottawa. Carol coordinated CAA’s poetry circle 2008-2013.
Her poetry has appeared in Bywords Quarterly Journal, Tree Press/phaphours press chapbooks and online at The Light Ekphrastic and Silver Birch Press. Chapbooks: Above the Hum of Yellow Jackets, Bondi Studios, 2011 and Architectural Variations, Quillfyre Publishing, 2012. Ink Dogs in my Shoe, Dec. 2014 from Nose In Book Publishing, Castlegar B.C.
Awards: 3rd Prize CAA 2012 National Capital Writing Contest for Walking in Thomson’s Red Sumac. Honourable Mentions: VERSeFest, Poetry for the End of the World, 2012, Arborealis 2012 and 2008 Ontario Poetry Society, Double Your Pleasure 2013 Ontario Poetry Society and CAA’s 2008 and 2011 National Capital Writing Contest.
Recent publication: In December, 2014 her third chapbook, Ink Dogs in my Shoes, was published by Nose In Book Publishing, Castlegar, B.C. This is a chapbook of poems all containing some element of three in them. Subjects range from garden to writing process to nonsense rhymes, and some explore conceptual poetry or experiment with wordplay.
SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS: Twitter. Facebook. Blog
Three by Five posts on days that end in threes.
Filed under writing life
Carol A. Stephen – Writer Beginnings
VAH: Welcome to Three by Five, Carol. Do tell, why do you write?
CAS: It seems to be a compulsion really. Words, phrases, ideas come to me, seemingly at random, but they won’t let go ‘til I put them into a poem.
VAH: Why did you become a writer and when did you know or feel like you were a writer?
CAS: I hadn’t written in 25 years, but after my husband died, I began to find the poetry coming again. I decided it was time to find out whether I was really a poet or a dabbler. I first felt like a poet when a workshop leader wanted to steal one of my lines.
VAH: Ah, that sounds validating. “A poet or a dabbler.” A good question for introspection. Is there someone or something that influenced your development as a writer?
CAS: Reading other poets is a big influence. When I am not reading, I am usually also not writing. Taking workshops, trying new techniques I didn’t like at first because I didn’t understand the process. Mentors have played a big role too. They include Canadian poets Brent Robillard, (that first workshop leader), Bernice Lever, Harold Rhenisch, Barry Dempster, Roo Borson, John Barton, Phil Hall, Stuart Ross. Canadian-American poet James Arthur. Al Filreis, who teaches Modern & Contemporary American Poetry at UPenn via Coursera online and Robert Pinsky.
VAH: What do you remember about your first story or poem?
CAS: I actually have the first poem I wrote as a teenager in high school. It was written in March 1963, or so my file copy shows, has no title, and is a rhyming poem. I don’t remember whether it was written for class or just on a whim. But the second one seems to be a riff on The Daffodils by William Wordsworth.
VAH: And do you have a favorite piece you’ve written to date?
CAS: My favorite poem always seems to be among the most recent of my poems, although Jammin’ on the 16 is one I like because of its sound and the way it feels on the tongue. It’s an Ekphrastic poem, written to pair with a painting by Dina Karkar on The Light Ekphrastic, Nov. 2012:
Jammin’ on the 16
Fire foregrounds the hot yellow burn—
orange teases rouge, the blue rise
on red, these curves
letters shape, shift, notes lift—
a spider-weave ripple of sound riffles
ground-wave to octave
foreground to ground, form
re-form, each iteration:
music. the poem. the music.
Words stack, staccato: they wrap
rap, finger-snap, bebop, toe-tap tap tap
rebop, trombone, scatting a sax
A long hot lick—
the jazz. the jazz. fire-brick
crimson razzmatazz.
– Carol A. Stephen
Carol A. Stephen is a Canadian poet, poetry selector for Bywords Journal and a member of the League of Canadian Poets. She’s served on boards of Canadian Authors Association, National Capital Region (CAA-NCR), Arts Carleton Place and Tree Reading Series Ottawa. Carol coordinated CAA’s poetry circle 2008-2013.
Her poetry has appeared in Bywords Quarterly Journal, Tree Press/phaphours press chapbooks and online at The Light Ekphrastic and Silver Birch Press. Chapbooks: Above the Hum of Yellow Jackets, Bondi Studios, 2011 and Architectural Variations, Quillfyre Publishing, 2012. Ink Dogs in my Shoe, Dec. 2014 from Nose In Book Publishing, Castlegar B.C.
Awards: 3rd Prize CAA 2012 National Capital Writing Contest for Walking in Thomson’s Red Sumac. Honourable Mentions: VERSeFest, Poetry for the End of the World, 2012, Arborealis 2012 and 2008 Ontario Poetry Society, Double Your Pleasure 2013 Ontario Poetry Society and CAA’s 2008 and 2011 National Capital Writing Contest.
Recent publication: In December, 2014 her third chapbook, Ink Dogs in my Shoes, was published by Nose In Book Publishing, Castlegar, B.C. This is a chapbook of poems all containing some element of three in them. Subjects range from garden to writing process to nonsense rhymes, and some explore conceptual poetry or experiment with wordplay.
SOCIAL MEDIA LINKS: Twitter. Facebook. Blog
Three by Five posts on days that end in threes.
Filed under writing life
Introducing Carol A. Stephen – June’s Three by Five Featured Author
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Carol A. Stephen is a Canadian poet, poetry selector for Bywords Journal and a member of the League of Canadian Poets. She’s served on boards of Canadian Authors Association, National Capital Region (CAA-NCR), Arts Carleton Place and Tree Reading Series Ottawa. Carol coordinated CAA’s poetry circle 2008-2013.
Her poetry has appeared in Bywords Quarterly Journal, Tree Press/phaphours press chapbooks and online at The Light Ekphrastic and Silver Birch Press. Chapbooks: Above the Hum of Yellow Jackets, Bondi Studios, 2011 and Architectural Variations, Quillfyre Publishing, 2012. Ink Dogs in my Shoe, Dec. 2014 from Nose In Book Publishing, Castlegar B.C.
Awards: 3rd Prize CAA 2012 National Capital Writing Contest for Walking in Thomson’s Red Sumac. Honourable Mentions: VERSeFest, Poetry for the End of the World, 2012, Arborealis 2012 and 2008 Ontario Poetry Society, Double Your Pleasure 2013 Ontario Poetry Society and CAA’s 2008 and 2011 National Capital Writing Contest.
Recent publication: In December, 2014 her third chapbook, Ink Dogs in my Shoes, was published by Nose In Book Publishing, Castlegar, B.C. This is a chapbook of poems all containing some element of three in them. Subjects range from garden to writing process to nonsense rhymes, and some explore conceptual poetry or experiment with wordplay.
Filed under writing life
Mariah E. Wilson Part 3 – Writing Life
Mariah E. Wilson and the writing life will complete this month’s Three by Five interview.
VAH: Are you a full time writer?
MEW: I’m working my way toward being a full time writer. Currently I have three school aged children, so they do take up a lot of my time. My husband works full time out of the house and I have the immense luxury of being a stay at home mom. If I wasn’t writing, I’d be a stay at home mom that doesn’t write.
VAH: When the page is blank what gets you writing?
MEW: Songs. Sometimes songs can inspire me to get the juices flowing. But often, if I find myself stuck with my fiction, I switch to poetry (or the other way around) and the change is usually enough to get my brain into gear.
VAH: What is your “process” when working on a new piece of writing?
MEW: When I have a new idea I’m consumed by it. I’ll sit down and make a few notes, but then I dive right in and start writing it. And I keep going until I can’t. Then I toss it aside for a while, in some cases years, and I rewrite it. Sometimes it take a rewrite or two or four but eventually I get a good handle on what it is I’m really trying to say.
VAH: What does your typical writing day include?
MEW: My typical writing day involves coffee. I like to get up before the kids and have some quiet time, though it’s not necessary, I can write in any situation almost. I get up, I make a coffee, I check my social media while I wake up, then I open my word processor and try to get a good thirty minutes in. Like I said, I’m a stay at home mom so my writing comes in fits and starts all day long whether or not my kids are at home. If they’re not here, as soon as I drop them off at school I try to get another two hours of writing and writing related activities in before I have to come back to the real world and do things like cook and clean. Once the kids are in bed I can usually sneak in another thirty minutes to an hour of writing.
VAH: What words of wisdom do you have for the emerging writer?
MEW: Finish what you start. This is the number one most important thing you will learn how to do. Finishing projects not only gives you a sense of accomplishment, which is important any writer, but it also give you something to revise and edit. Which brings me to my second bit of advice. Don’t edit it until you’ve finished it. If you want to change something, make a note and do it after you’ve got the story down. You can fix anything except a blank page.
VAH: Mariah thanks for taking part in the Three by Five Interview Series.
Mariah Wilson Sampler:
The Echo Remains in the 2014 Best New Poem Contest
Sinkholes of Emptiness in GERM Magazine
Talking to Strangers in The Literati Quarterly
Saudade in The Steel Chisel
Kummerspeck and Retired Jesus in The Lake
Jellybean Jealousy in Walking is Still Honest
Connecting….in Luciferous
Mariah Wilson Social Media: Twitter Facebook Tsu Website Blog Wattpad
Mariah E. Wilson’s contemporary romance, The Demon in Him will be released in 2015.
Harley Black is trapped in an impossible situation. Caught between love and family, between dreams and duty, Harley will have to decide if she’s willing to risk everything, including her father’s freedom, for the man she loves.
Mariah E. Wilson is a writer from beautiful British Columbia. She has been published in Thin Air Magazine, Every Day Poets, The Kitchen Poet, Literary Orphans and The Corner Club Press, for which she is also now the Poetry Editor. Her first poetry collection, We Walk Alone, was published by Writers AMuse Me Publishing. Her debut novel, The Demon in Him will be released in 2015.
Return next month on days that end in three for more featured authors and emerging writers.
Next month: Canadian poet Carol A. Stephen.
Filed under writing life
Vicki Hudson 