Revamp, Revamp

Once again, I'm revamping the manuscript. I thought I had been writing toward The Next Thing, but I've decided that all those poems were was actually still The Old Thing. I reread the manuscript after putting it away for three months and found four poems I wanted to cut, and I added 11 poems from the new set I'd been working on. So the book's longer now, which is fine, as it still only clocks in at 59 pages. I reordered it significantly, and retitled a lot of older poems to fit the newer poems. I feel good about it but it's still so new that I'm having a hard time looking at it objectively. Whenever I come across a new poem, I know it didn't used to be there so it feels very out of place even if it's not.

Sometimes I wish I could pay someone else could go through all my poems and find a manuscript. I've written about 250 poems for this book and have cut all but 53. Which is a good thing. But a different reader might have picked different poems, and I always wonder about some I've left behind.  I know, I know; if I didn't order it myself it wouldn't really be my book anymore...

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I got a copy of the Naked Muse calendar in the mail a few weeks ago, and I love it so much (but not too much). A great project and a beautiful product.

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One of my New Year's Resolutions was to do more urban homesteading, so I've been making more a lot of staples from scratch and trying to use less products that have ridiculous and terrifying ingredients. My first experiment was to make my own deodorant, using coconut oil, baking soda, cornstarch, vitamin E oil, and tea tree extract (as adapted from Bonzai Aphrodite). It works super well! No residue on my shirts, and I like the way it smells. Other items on the list: soy yogurt, lip balm, cologne...

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As of yesterday, I've been a vegetarian for 5 years. Couldn't be happier about that. By this time next year, I intend to be vegan.

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Life in Wisconsin this week (via Underground Weather): "feels like -13 degrees," "5-7 inches of snow accumulation," "bitterly cold," "ice pellets," etc., etc.

I somehow always forget how walking outside this time of year is like your face falling off.

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Speaking of Wisconsin: 1 million recall signatures were collected, twice more than were needed!

New Year's

Resolution season. There's the typical: weight (to gain it, in my case), exercise (ha!), read more, write more, work harder, like more people, drink more tea and less coffee, more time outside and less internet, more patience and less cynicism.

Looking back at 2011, I had a really good year. I read more translated poetry, saw more of the country, made more friends, began learning an instrument, and started this here blog.

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New Year's Eve always makes me a little sad.

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New issue of Devil's Lake is live! I'm particularly proud of this one. Some of my last editorial decisions as its poetry editor, a lot of work done from the editor-in-chief side of things. It's been awesome watching this journal grow over the last two years.

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Poet Lore asked me to write a blog post about "Shank," my poem they nominated for a Pushcart. Here's the link.