I Woke Up This Morning In America
Today was just chock-full of "Yes, let's pretend we all give a shit about our jobs" energy. I knew whatever I wrote today wasn't going to be the greatest. I was too sad. Too angry. This poem was going to be a mulligan.
It turns out that I've been writing poems for 18 months—one or two (sometimes more)—every week. And like a person who craves convenience, I've only been sharing them on Instagram stories.
The reason for this was simple enough. Poetry journals don't like work which has previously appeared on the Internet. Some poetry journals take "uncurated" work—work that has appeared on the Internet, but not in a journal publication. Those are rare. You tend to remember those. Rattle—for example, is hot shit and hard to land. So you have to be careful about it, especially if you plan on sending your work out to journals, which I do.
I've hated this Instagram model for a long time. I loathe posting there, even though I've built a small community there. I've met poets I wouldn't otherwise meet. But the success is small and fleeting. This morning, I remembered I had this here website. So I pressed the hard reset button on the posts I've already written, and am starting over.
Get in loser, we're posting poems. Every week.
I encourage you to get other people to sign up for a free membership. Why? Because I can't have my poems on Al Gore's Open Internet. Maybe you know someone who likes poetry. Maybe you find someone going through their "process" interesting. I want to meet people! Talk about things. Process the end of the world and all that. Maybe you'll be at AWP this year, like me. The possibilities are endless—or, just more endless than Instagram.
Fuck, I could've been building community for 18 months. That's on me. My bad. Sorry. Not sure why it took November 5th, 2024 to suddenly dawn on me how important community is.
No time like the present, I guess.
Today's Poem
Today was just chock-full of "Yes, let's pretend we all give a shit about our jobs" energy. I knew whatever I wrote today wasn't going to be the greatest. I was too sad. Too angry. This poem was going to be a mulligan.
But I needed to write something. My weekly writing schedule is Wednesday to Wednesday. My yearly writing schedule is May to May. And today was Wednesday—a bad Wednesday, yes—but fuck. What are you going to do, Mr. Poet? You gotta write, bud.
So here's a little sonnet, with one of my favorite characters to use in a poem—O Death, you rascal—a poem to remind myself to not wallow. Sure. I don't want to live through what we're collectively going to live through. But we're here now. Imma poet through it.
A reminder: this is a first draft. If you ever see it again, in print or online, it will probably be quite changed. Unless I'm a genius, which I'm not.
