Return of the Chapbook Decisions, picking the right poem (and more)

This is my third-in-a-row posting on assembling a chapbook.

I had to set myself a faux deadline because though I was extended an offer of probably publication, I procrastinated, a problem. The deadline I set was last Monday. On Friday I met it head-on, was laughed at, and several hours later laughed at it as I pressed send.

Two of my last-minute decisions were contradictory. You see I had began to doubt I should include on particular poem, "Poetics of the Unemployed," which is jaunty/funny. Would it jar a reader or betray the other poems which are less funny but wonderful all the same?

I suspect I was less concerned with jarring readers than I was with assuaging the Critic, Critical Reader, the Evil Critic on my Shoulder. Judging myself as I fear others judge me, I shied away from telltale wit or cleverness. That's so Sarah, and of course Sarah is so helplessly jokey.

Jokey is, in and of itself, an issue. I suspect that was part of the problem in my all female-faculty graduate program. Heck, it's a lifelong problem. At parties in the seventies, someone might be telling me a hugely sincere and tragic story of family break-ups and terminal illness along with bedside confessions of betrayal and tragedy and I'd hear a joke starting up in another room and head for the joke.

The men would laugh at my cleverness, but the women would appear lost, or many of them would. What they lacked in speed-of-light comebacks, they made up for in skinniness and, of hair, straightness and shininess. I was lost to my own ping ponging sexuality, which didn't help.

Back to the chapbook. I cut "Poetics of the ..." and added "Unreasonable" [to be posted tomorrow] and "No End Out of Mind" from The Future Is Happy. I wanted to give more air-time. Then I thought, Why would anyone want to read poems available in previous book? Wasn't the point of getting more new work out there, getting more new work out there? So I control-z-ed my way back to my original choice, tidied up that. 

The Collected Poems of Sarah Sarai, which could include some poems from Happy, is but a twinkle in this poet's eye. Best to keep writing, which I haven't done much of this year. Look Up, Up is full of new work. Yay.

More to reveal as revelation demands.

Artwork from: http://www.artknowledgenews.com/files2009b/Marshall_Dalek.jpg painting by James Marshall ("Dalek"))

Saga of the chappers: I select a title or two

I am pulling together poems for a chapbook. Let's past tense that. I assembled a chapbook of poems.  Please reference my previous posting and stay tuned to collect the whole set on me and my chapbook.

Not only did I pull together poems as if they were rambunctious six-graders at recess but I set them in some unconscious order by which I mean I let my instincts order the poems (should "A Scarlet Moss" be the sixth poem? or with its plea for healing would be a provocative final statement?) (should I include a humorous-to-Dada poem {{{"Poetics of the Unemployed" which I mentioned here, http://my3000lovingarms.blogspot.com/2011/03/ladies-proud-possessors-of-penis-dada.html}}}, or would that be seen as a bid for irony when in fact I am not even choosing to attend the irony auction). 

I could have selected up to twenty-five or so poems but choose to keep it short, small, something to be read in a sitting. I worry my poems are intense, and if that is the case, then shorter might fit the soul's span of attention.

The title.  Always an issue. At first I was going to name it after one of the poems.  Then thought, nah, how about calling it "Moss," a shortening (duh) of "A Scarlet Moss."  Not for a second am I saying that poem is my favorite (or isn't). It simply became pivotal in the moment.

But that title didn't feel right. While walking about Manhattan, I tried to remember how many poems I'd included and guessed (rightly, wrongly, I'm not sure) that I'd lassoed thirteen. Baker's dozen-type ideas came to me, the final being, We Use Real Butter.

For about fourteen hours, We Use Real Butter was the title of my prospective chapper. A last-minute save (Oh Hail Mary) as I approached the end zone was in a different direction. Still toward completion but not silliness.  And it also came with risks.

Look Up, Up is the current title. The possibility of that title triggering thoughts of the delightful animation Up are okay with me. The risk, however, is those words are a line in one poem, "Our Pointillist Galaxy." That puts much stress or emphasis or burden on a single line.

Around 5 p.m. yesterday I emailed the chappers (Look Up, Up) to its prospective publisher.  As they say in Imagination's coven, more will be revealed.

Dark Night of the Unwritten Poem; I select poems for a chappers; would repent but there is no repentance

Sometime last week I felt poetry's preemptive joy, glowworm and firefly in a soft mellowing and I was going to write a few poems. I was sure of it.

Then I didn't. I had my weekend, went to a friend's reading, dealt with computer of the lap issues, drank decaf coffee with extra caffeine, stumbled through Sunday and then unto me the Lord presented Monday, so I said, Good-bye glow.

It's a sad thing to be conscious of, the trammeling over the soul by means of excuses. 

Some jobs create a little space now and then for a draft of a poem. Not this one. I'm down with working at work--no argument from me. They, the man, the boss are paying me and they'll get their money's worth, and then there are the bills and, well, you know that cycle of pay and pay more is more certain than the cycle of seasons, and with nary a crocus or red maple leaf for comfort.

Last night after I collapsed for a sufficient amount of post-work time, I did cut and paste already written poems for a chapbook that just might be published.  I'd been mentally assembling poems for a small grant app and for reasons above (work and winter spring summer fall in checkbook form) missed the deadline.

They weren't the poems I'd first considered for this chappers, but I think they are the right choice.  Not the convenient one, but the best representation of glow and worm and Sarah Sarai in April 2011. When I get feedback from the publisher I'll tell you, share the process (as it were) and maybe in doing so offer penance to my still-lurking spirit. And please know that there is no, Well, maybe it was for the best, when a writer ignores her strong message that art wants out.

It's the bad thing to do. Don't do it. Write. You can write crap, that's not the issue, but write when the spirits haunt you. Okay?

***The ideogram is supposed to mean Soul Killer or something.