a feature and a review

Neon Magazine was kind enough to review Keeping Me Still this week -- 

"These are accomplished poems, and their arrangement captures well the nature of loss. Not only that, but it manages to do so in a way that sets Keeping Me Still apart from the many existing chapbooks and poetry collections that speak of grief."

you can read the rest of the review :here:

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A Literature Navigator also featured one of my recently published poems, The Wandering Witch, writing "It has a great sense of place and touch, something you often find in ancient Chinese poetry [ie even that translated by Pound and other Modernists]. It's quite lovely, but there's an edge to it, as sweetly hidden as a thin knife blade under a cloth hem."

i love that last metaphor. 

on not selling books, not a single one

last Saturday i participated in a local author event at the local barnes and noble. a dozen of us, each with our little black wooden tables, plastic book props, and stacks of books were scattered around the store. i was the only poet. i didn’t sell a single book. 

possibly this was because I was in the back of the store not the front or by the coffee shop, but what is more likely is that my book is a poetry book and most people give poetry a wide berth.

at the signing, still smiling!

before publishing my book, my goal was publishing the book—sort of like the giddy bride planning all the flowers and dresses and colors upon colors—but then once the book was out, That was when real life kicked in, the Marriage.

And since entering into life-with-my-book, i’ve seen more and more that no matter how good your book is, poetry has a small, particular audience, so you have to sift, and search, and find them.

it’s a little more work to convince someone to pick up a book of poems, strange things they don’t think they’ll understand or relate to, rather than to convince them to pick up a novel or memoir, a straightforward story like they are used to.

it can be discouraging—some days I think why did I write this thing that no one wants to read—but that is when I remind myself of the value of a small life, the value of offering creative work to the world, even if the readers are few.

and i know, too, that my editor and press and other "winter geese" completely support and believe in me--i'm grateful to be part of that little literary community and to know that my work was plucked out of the stacks and stacks of submissions, and my editor thought, yes, this book is worth the time. even when not a single book sells at a certain signing.

i’d be lying if i didn’t say i was a little bit bummed about not selling any books; though i’d not expected to sell more than one or two, i had very much hoped to sell at least one. and the pitying eyes of other authors and the event coordinator, oh my.

but i would (and will) go again. it was nice to chat with other authors, particularly others who have published with small presses and know the same benefits and hurdles of doing so. i feel better connected to our small literary community and like i “raised awareness” of my book.

big book stores are perhaps not where the poets ARE--and when scheduling future events, i'd likely do well to focus on indie stores, universities, coffee shops, you get the idea--but how can i complain about a couple of hours spent sipping free coffee in a bookstore, talking to writers about writing? that is a couple hours well spent.

the larger poem

Over the past six months, I’ve been thinking on a theme for my next book. Keeping Me Still was constructed in the way of most first collections of poetry—I took my best poems, found the common threads, and wove it together into the whole, the “larger poem” (the entire book as a poem in itself). 

I’ve played around with different ideas—a book about the funeral home director’s daughter (I’ve written several poems on her), a book about Sarah and Abraham, one on Anne Bradstreet, one where every poem is derived from a title of a hymn. nothing has stuck. Though I love the idea of approaching the book in the manner of a novelist—writing it as a whole, on a common subject—I don’t seem to work that way. 

I’ve read so many collections that I love that Do work that way—Thomas and Beulah by Rita Dove, Lawrence Booth’s Book of Visions by Maurice Manning—and I have always had this secret longing to be a novelist. 

So I’m wondering now if it is that my writing process—so sporadic, rushed, squeezed into my life as a wife and mother and teacher—doesn’t work with that kind of book and that I should just abandon thinking along those lines, or if it is that I haven’t found the right topic yet.

Either way, a poetry book is written poem-by-poem.  I’m not sure if it truly matters for me to have a “topic” and theme for the next book chosen before the next time to sit down to write, or if I choose it a year from now, looking  at the (hopefully by then) dozen or so poems I’ve written since Keeping Me Still. 

What are your thoughts, dear readers, on thematic poetry books verses “mixed tape” poetry books? Which do you prefer reading, if you do read poetry?

Excerpt from a letter from Beatrice, a friend of my Mawmaw’s

I lived right next door to your grandmother and grandfather, Sudie and Dutch, on Geurney in Memphis, we were young then and loved being neighbors. I have many happy memories of them and the children. Especially do I recall Martha Sue and her great taste for BLTs. . .
I quickly recognized your grandmother’s squirrel brooch in Rachel Sets Up House. I see in your work—family—so many phases—real pictures, real people, real happenings. Keep up your talent. The world today (in my late life) needs less TV, film, “excitement” (trash). More peaceful memories. Have I said too much? Bear in mind I’m 95 and I still love to write and read—thank you God! 

Thank you again,

Mrs. Beatrice Hill

***
 

an interview with Antler

Antler, the blog of author Dave Harrity (Making Manifest), posted an interview with me today! I share revision tips, a poem, hopes, dreams and more!

when you picture someone reading your poetry, how do you see them? what do they think about, wear, and do? or, maybe a better way to say it: who do you write for? and how do you see your writing nourishing others?

I picture my great-great-great granddaughter coming upon my dusty, well-worn poetry book in a box in the attic. Taking it down and thumbing through it while the babies are napping. Smudging it with greasy fingers because she’s reading while cooking dinner. Reading it as she would a diary or a long letter. I know it is a little romantic for this to be my ideal reader, her hair in a loose ponytail and wearing yesterday’s T-shirt, but she’s there behind every poem I write—this future daughter, who will never know me, reading my work and connecting with me through that long echo. I hope to write something worth telling her.

You can read the rest HERE

book release party

awkwardness

About a week and a half ago, my students (which are mostly literary magazine staff, and also English club staff, and also Sigma Tau Delta staff…what don’t they do??) were so kind as to throw a little book release party for me, in my favorite place of all, the library.

 A few of my students read some of their own poetry—it is amazing how talent runs rampant in the tiniest of Georgia towns—then I read a few poems too.

 
 We had about fifteen or so people show up. cake was eaten, books were signed.

Honestly, I had been a weepy and confused mess all day. Having my book in my hand was too much for me and I didn’t know how to react to it. as an introvert, going to a party was not my idea of “recovery” time.




But it did turn out to be just that. I love my student-writers—I feel like they are my poet-children—and I love celebrating poetry. I left the book release party having sold a few books (always nice) but more importantly, feeling warmly supported and encouraged.

So thank you for celebrating with me.

Keeping Me Still is officially released!

I first had the manuscript accepted about a year ago, and the set release date was a few weeks back, but now, here it is, physical, in my hands. 

hello lovelies!

It was an odd feeling yesterday. The only other time I can think of where I felt exactly that way was the day we decided to tell our friends and family that I was pregnant with our first baby. This sudden desire to keep it to myself—fear of being exposed, examined, revealed in some way.  

Many of the poems in KMS have been in journals and chapbooks before—but there was always this comfortable distance. I send poems to faceless editors who send unaccented emails with a yes or no. then comes journals who are read by no one I know. this assuring anonymity. 

I could give you all of the reasons I wrote this book and why I write—reasons having to do with philosophy of worship and work, noticing the world, relating to others—but the real reason I wrote this book? 

Writing brings me joy. and I want, so much, to write poetry my readers enjoy reading.  

my sister has a copy on her bedside table now, faraway, in a city I’ve never lived in. I think of her there, flipping through the pages, seeing where oh yes, that was the time that and yes, he said that but in another way. 

And I hope that she—representation of who I am really writing for, not academia or poets or literary magazine editors—but my true audience, my family and friends and loves—my hope is that she will read this book, connect with it, and enjoy it. 

and I hope that you will enjoy it too, reader.

delayed (book news)

so, my book is not quite out yet!

today was the official release day, but my publisher is still waiting for some corrections from the formatters. and bryan was going to take me out for a cupcake from my favorite bakery and everything! well i guess celebrations will have to be on hold.

in the meantime, my university wrote a nice little announcement about the book here:
Renee Emerson Publishes Book of Poems

one week!

Keeping Me Still comes out in one week! Oh the jitters….

I am so happy that it is coming out at the  beginning of poetry month. Poetry Month is a holiday for me. I put up my free poetry society poster (Whitman this year), I read a poem to my composition students at the beginning of each class, I carry a poem in my pocket.

I’ve read criticism of poetry month before, but I say why not have a month devoted to celebrating and promoting what you love? If there was a national cake month, I’d be all over that.  or a national Anthropologie month. or a national “You’ve Got Mail” month. 

so let us read poetry! and be completely silly about it, if need be. poetry is so serious and scholarly anyway; i think it could use some tom-cruise-esque displays of affection

cover reveal!

the cover art for keeping me still! check it out here

Numbers (a book update)

• 56 poems, total
• the earliest poem was from 2007
• the last poem was written last month
• 37 of the poems were previously published in literary journals
• 3 poems were written while I was in college
• 13 while I was in my MFA program
• the other 40 were written in the last four years, averaging about 10 from each year
• I typically write at least 20 poems a year (to give you an idea of how many of my poems are “keepers”)
• Favorite poem in the collection (right now, anyway): “Leah Separates” (it is new)
• Poem I’m most nervous about (right now, anyway): “Storm Front” (it is old)
• Number of times I sent out this manuscript before I was accepted: either about 12 times (how many times I sent out some form of that manuscript) or once (the current version is pretty different from what I had been sending out)
• Real people who end up in my poems: my husband, daughters, sisters, mother, great-grandmother on my mother’s side, both grandmothers, my in-laws. If you are related to me, you are fair game.
• The “you” or “we” in a poem more often than not is talking about Bryan (excluding the persona section)
• The baby is usually Zu, though June is in there a few times (you’ll know it when you read it)
• The settings: Tennessee, Georgia, Kentucky, Arkansas, and Boston
• The forms: free verse, prose poem, list poem
• Topics of interest: God, motherhood, sisters, marriage, relocation
• It is all autobiographical, except for when it isn’t.

Fears (a book update)

I took some students to hear Sandra Beasley read at another college in town (she was great, by the way), and, to research for the reading, I was perusing some of her work online and her blog. She has some great blogposts on how to promote your work when you have your first book coming out—so helpful!--but when I started reading through them, this thread of panic cinched in me. 

I am terrified that people won’t like it. won’t think it was good enough, will think it’s cliché, disrespectful, too revealing. oh all the things people could think. And not just people, in general, but people that I want to think well of me—mentors, friends, family, students. There will be, at some point, a negative review that I’ll have to face (or maybe I can just not read it?); and, despite years of workshop, I don’t know if my skin is quite so elephant-and-leathercouch thick that I can take, with a smile, a rejection of the entirety of my  life’s work as a poet. 

My book is not meadowlands (is anything meadowlands? Is meadowlands even meadowlands?), but I hope that, when my people read it, they like and understand most of it. I expect to get a few calls from family members asking what a poem means and if a poem is about them (likely, yes), and a few comments from friends that I probably got my theology wrong somewhere or other.  and I’m sure when I’m reading through the actual printed in-my-hands copy for the first time, I’ll bemoan the poem order at the end of section three I was so sure about or wish I’d taken something out or added something in or broken the line here instead of there. 

Revising is never finished—and the thing I am most excited and afraid of is letting this book finish. it was the right time for Keeping Me Still to stop being a manuscript and become a book—it’s complete in itself, and I’m ready to write new things.  I just need to be a little braver about letting go of this first work and giving it over to others—to you, dear readers.