Looking for Distractions

End of second full week of school and I've only been able to work at the school two days because of a cold. It hasn't been bad, but our city has regulations that any sign of illness and you have to stay home, students and teachers. 

So I've been home since Wednesday and now I have three kids down with it. Luckily, they changed the rules about getting a negative Covid test before returning just on the day I was scheduled to get two of us tested. I cancelled, as I'm sure this is just a summer cold. Half of us are almost recovered, two are just starting and my last healthy child is lording it over us all, forgetting she always gets these things the worst of any of us. It's going to be a fun autumn. 

Writing-wise, I'm working on a new collection. Not that my short Scottish collection that's been scheduled to be published this year is anywhere near seeing the light of day, nor has my Finnish collection been picked up by anyone, but it's giving me something new to focus on. In spite of my recent posts about self-belief, I'm still struggling with mine. So I'm snuggling up with my daughter's crepes and writing poems about strong women, forgotten women on another wet Sunday. 

And reminding myself I am one. No word on the job I interviewed for, no word from my course supervisor. I'm going to get the kids' dad to come over and watch those still sick on Friday as he's working from home and distract myself with work. Everything feels like a slog at the moment. 

End of Summer Slump

Back to school this week, but I'm not sure how long I'm going to last among the germ-ridden first graders when the schools all have a strict policy of no attendance if you're ill. I took a girl to the nurse yesterday for a runny nose which was shared with me I'm sure as she wept over me to be sent home in the first week of school.  I'm sure I won't last long either. 

I had my interview and I'm not sure where I stand. I doubt I'll get it, they really want someone with different skill set than me. And I'm not really bothered if I don't get it because it's less editing and more managing which isn't really what I want to get into. Though earning real money would be nice for a change.

I've enjoyed working as a teaching assistant this week, much more than I was as a middle school teacher last year. I'm not sure if it's the age group or being able to actually work one on one with kids a bit more rather than trying to speak to the masses. We'll see how things go. I wish I knew what I want to be when I'm grown up. Substituting has been a good option to try things out though.

I'm struggling with motivation this week with my writing. I see so many writers being awarded this and that, publishers and art bodies offering opportunities I can't take advantage of because of where I live, so I feel I'm just spinning my wheels, wondering why am I bothering. I'm sure it's just a blip and I will get a burst of enthusiasm again. My writing group stayed up late chatting online last night and that helped. I'm happy to have their life line. 

It's raining today after several really hot days. I need an indoor day just to relax, but I really want to get out to my allotment and start sorting it for winter. I can see hints of autumn everywhere, heard the ghostly calls the Barnacle Geese flying overhead last night through a dark, opened window. That sound always makes me want to run away myself, but since I can't I want to prepare for what is coming. 

I've had a poem appear in ang(st) for their Distanced 2.0 issue. They've got a call out for Distanced 3.0 and their Hair issue, if you're looking for somewhere to submit. Their quick response and turn around time is a major plus. 

So if you want me I'll be curled up under a blanket on the couch with a cup of tea. Enjoy

Gearing up and Down Sizing

The schools have started back and we're in that transition period where the scheduling begins, the afternoons fill with hobbies and lessons and we shuffle them around until we can manage. My morning are quieter, but without a flow yet. I am still running around and catching up on errands, so haven't found a rhythm to fit my poetry in regularly. And being a substitute I'm always slightly on edge waiting for the phone to break into the silence. My interview is also coming up this week, so it's nipping at the edge of my mind as well. 

One thing I've started this week is reviewing my poems in consideration of an A5 page size. Suna Afshan at Poetry Birmingham Journal made an off-the-cuff remark on Twitter asking those  submitting to stop formatting poems in A4 docs. It caused a flurry of tweets of confusion, ah ha moments, discussion and it got me thinking. Print magazines and collections do mostly print in A5 or a similar size, so it makes sense. Though most also seem to ask for submissions in A4 (even PBJ), so maybe the industry needs to rethink things as well. 

I do often look at potential collections from that format, but I have never considered using that size to type my poems from the beginning. So it's thrown my work in disarray. I've changed all my potential collections and my rough draft files to A5 and am looking at how it changes the lay-out of the poems. I'm not rewriting many yet, but it is making me see things differently. 

I've noticed my newer poems do run shorter and fit in A5 comfortably for the most part, but my upcoming collection is mostly older poems and is sitting at over the page limit at the moment. I need to find out what size and style of font my publisher uses. I don't mind splitting a poem over two pages if necessary, but three or four lines dangling over looks wrong. I'm unsure what to do about those extra 5 pages I've suddenly gained.

Of course, for online magazines it's less of an issue. Magazines and competitions usually specify A4 and around a 40 line limit, but my lay-out is running about 28 lines to a page (2cm margins top and bottom, 11pt Arial font for text and a 16pt title.) One of the benefits of being trained in editing at a small magazine is I learned little tricks to make a poem fit on a page, how to lay out a book so it looks good, but I won't be able to do that with my collection being published.  

It's a small thing really, but I feel better using the A5 format from now on. I'll still write my poems first in my notebook, not caring about length or format, but it will be a consideration when editing and designing collections. And, of course, I'm definitely not suggesting that poets should write to please editors and to fit publications, but it helps to know how a poem will look on the page and if we're using A4 as our template the printed product may not look how we imagined. 

I'm also trying to get back into reviewing and reading poetry collections, so I read a few poems every night before bed, the one time I can be sure I have time. I have turned back to Fiona Benson's Vertigo and Ghost which I started last year. This is one of those collections I wish I had written, but not lived. Such beautiful writing that tears me apart emotionally. Even the more gentle ones about parenthood and the poet's fears connected with raising her girls in this difficult world when other mothers are leading their children through unimaginable dangers in the hope of finding safety and shelter dig into all my tender places. But Part One which is considers the mythology of Zeus in modern terms, as a serial rapist, is more of a punch to the throat. Benson plays with the words on the page, mixing modern language with ancient stories and uses a kind of interview format to give voices to the victims, Io, Callisto and others, as well as bragging, bravado-puffed Zeus. It goes much further than Yeats' 'Leda and the Swan'. Difficult to read as it doesn't shy from blunt emotion and descriptions, it is an important voice in these times when 'Me Too' is not a thing you wish to say, but it needs to be heard. 

I've been commissioned to write a review for a poetry collection late in the autumn, but more about that later. 

I'm off to edit and later enjoy some late summer sun. 

A Positive Voice

I can not get myself organised to write this regularly at the moment. Summer is coming to an end here, less than two weeks before the schools go back and we're trying to readjust to that life, but my body is resisting. I'm struggling to tread water when I just want to let the current pull me along. It doesn't help that I have this weird ear pressure problem that won't clear. 

I was speaking to my writing group about this question of self-belief in one's writing I discussed in my last post and they pointed out that I was lucky to have a positive first creative writing teacher, positive early role models in general. They felt, and I now agree, that the first voices you hear as a child or young person about your self-worth stick with you. If those people, parents, teachers, mentors, were over-critical or negative, that soundtrack will follow you throughout your life. If they were positive, it gives you a bolster of belief that could help support you when things are difficult. It's worrying as a parent and a teacher to understand how much weight the words we speak to children have throughout their lives. 

It is one of the reasons I love teaching creative writing and why I'm struggling with the idea of going into just regular teaching. As a special creative writing teacher, I could focus on just that, be the positive voice who loved their childish leaps into imagination amidst the classroom teacher's worries and critiques of handwriting and spelling. As a classroom teacher, I wouldn't have that time to focus on what I love because there's so many other things that I need to do just to get through the day. As a substitute I have even less time to get to know the students because I am usually just trying to get through the lesson and keep a semblance of control. I've had one or two sparks of it, but most of it feels again like just pushing against the weight of water to stay afloat.

I have an interview coming up for a new role, away from teaching. I'm walking that tightrope of trying to be positive and not get my hopes up. Everything is moving slowly as well which is difficult. It's 2 weeks before my interview. It could be a chance to move back towards supporting writers in a new way which would feel like a positive direction for myself as well. This summer has been heavy with a lot of doubt and questioning which hasn't helped with forward movement. 

I'm focusing on finishing my coursework and getting the kids ready to go back to school. And doing lots of editing, not many new poems are being written, but I'm finishing up a bunch of those poems I've written in my last few courses. 

I joined the Helsinki Poetry Connection for an open mike night this week. My first in Finland and my first in at least 10 years. I'm well out of practice, but it was a good laugh as a few friends from my group also braved the experience and did amazing. Open mikes are the same in the US, UK and Finland in my experience. It all depends on the crowd, but there's usually a good sense of support, some fun, funny and downright crazy readers. It's a weird experience in another language. My Finnish is just not good enough to follow the poems, but I love listening to the sound of it and how everyone made it do different things. Helsinki Poetry Connection was welcoming and multi-cultural, so I didn't feel strange reading in English. I'll definitely do it again. 

A few other bits of good news: Emerge Literary Journal has published my poem 'Growing Through the Sidewalk'.

My poem 'Without Finnish Idioms' won Wax Poetry Art's European Poetry Competition and was the first, and currently the only, poem published in their new online magazine Europe Poetry Magazine. This was one of the poems I read at the open mike. It was fun to see if the Finns reacted to my translations of Finnish idioms. 

And 'Cafe Dreams' is in the current issue of dreams walking, a new magazine with some great work.

Check them all out. 

Things just keep ticking along. Autumn will be here before we know it. Keep positive.