Submitting Your Work. Handling Rejection.

Like any artist, I love to create the work I do, and I love to share it with others through publications, exhibitions, and sales. Below are some photos of artists in Northfield who are proudly standing by copies of their winning entries to the 2013 Sidewalk Public Poetry competition. Acceptance feels terrific!

LeslieSWalkPoetry

Acceptance II

Intellectually, I know that rejection is also part of the process of submitting work, but – let’s be honest – rejection always stings.

Sometimes I’ve let the stings of past rejections prevent me from going to the effort of sending work out. If you are an artist, you know how it goes. To remind myself that my job is to support, even champion my own work—and to cheer you on as you pursue an audience for your own creativity–I am sharing an illustrated version of an essay I wrote a few years ago.

PRE-APPROVED!

Like many writers, what I find most grueling is the labor of sending work out to prospective publishers.  Writing itself is filled with exciting unknowns.  I wonder what an engaging character will say next and when the storyline will twist under my hands like a live thing.  But the submissions process is riddled with the uncertainty of whether “they” will like what I have done.

Rejection I

Frankly, what has stopped me in my tracks all too often is fear:  fear of rejection by the nameless and faceless out there, the editors, contest judges, agents.  As one veteran novelist in my writers’ group said, “It never gets easier.  It’s always donkey work.”  And so, I have slogged along and often bogged down, leaving the manuscript unsent.

 

Locked Box 2006

Last week, I was sorting the mail, scanning for replies to my latest attempts to place my work.  I found one politely-worded rejection letter.  Then I shifted my focus and found something else:  in another marketplace I am assured of approval.  Not literary, but financial.  In the computerized and calculating corporate minds of multinational entities, I am “Pre-approved” for massive cash advances and flights of consumer frolicking.  The interest is guaranteed.  Plus, my identity will be absolutely protected.  Wow!  They must really like me – or at least my FICO score, the credit track record I’ve built up over the past twenty-five years.  Paradoxically, what keeps them coming is my reflexive and steadfast rejection of them.

Blocked Window

This unsolicited approval got me thinking.  On the one hand,  I am offered a Triple Diamond Mastercard for my history of financial solvency.  On the other hand, I also have a history of literary accomplishment, including some small prizes, publications, and public readings.  Why, then, do I so often “pre-reject” myself when it comes to my artistic life, where my real riches lie?

Rejection V

Yet, for me, outside approval of any kind barely registers.  Years ago, as a twenty-something teacher of freshman composition at a state college in the deep South, I had sixty students who ranged from those who were polite, gifted, and articulate to those who were steadfastly disengaged and unable to make subjects and verbs agree.  Of student evaluations at the end of the term, I recall only the negative one, and that verbatim:  “Well, I guess she’s okay as a teacher, but I don’t like the way she dresses.”   Ouch!  A glancing blow, nothing to do with my teaching, but intended to wound and it did draw blood.  The fifty-nine approving evaluations?  I dismissed those as mere politeness.

Rejection VI

I know I am not alone in having rather thin skin when it comes to sending out my poetry, fiction, and personal essays.  There is only the thinnest of boundaries between me and my work.   While tact is important, and I do not need or desire to bare all on the page, nonetheless I find that personal honesty is essential for a powerful piece.  To be happy with my work, I must say what I really think, dwell on what moves me deeply.

Pathway to Acceptance

Work for clients is distinctly different. I have enjoyed the financial rewards I earned from writing for nonprofit organizations for the past two decades (the formative years for my shining FICO score).  I have been privileged to assist fine institutions and inspiring people gain support for their work.  My years as a writing consultant have been wonderfully satisfying on many levels, including freedom and finances, but they have also created a split for me between art and money, between private and public, that I am consciously trying to bridge.  For business writing I have developed a deft touch, even a certain flair, but it is not my own art, and it has come at a cost:  erasing my personality.  Honest but persuasive business writing is essentially ghostwriting, because the personal point of view must be subsumed by the needs and voice of the organization.

Acceptance VI

To compound this, in recent years my artistic subject matter revolves around coming to terms with my family and community in order to understand myself.  To be offering material fraught with the delicate nerve-endings of childhood perplexities and current preoccupations makes me that much more sensitive to the seemingly frosty atmosphere of the submission process.  My habit is to by-pass the deep freeze that might be performed by strangers on my work by placing it immediately in my own cryogenic storage container (that bookshelf near my office door).

Acceptance IV

A few years ago, I became aware of my tendency to deflect praise.  Maybe I thought it was the only way to attract more?  In any case, I assigned myself three new steps.  First, I forced myself to smile and say, “Thank you,” to compliments rather than brush them aside.  Second, I listened and remembered.  Third, I captured the compliments that sounded sincere, writing them down on an index file card and putting them in a file box.  Today, that box is about half full.  The compliments have come from strangers, friends, and family, and they range from the skin-deep to the soulful:  “That jacket is the exact same green as your eyes—so pretty!  (from a visual artist helping me choose art supplies);  “You are a born teacher – I love your voice!”  (from a student in a yoga class I taught); “Your poetry has roots in the unseen world” (from another poet); and – my favorite – “Mom, you are the best mom in the history of the universe, including aliens!” (from my then six-year-old daughter).  I look through this box occasionally, and it is getting a little easier to read good things about myself, to recognize that other people value my life and my work.

Acceptance III

So, today, I’ve decided to extend myself a special, unlimited offer. I am offering it to you, too. It reads like this:

“CONGRATULATIONS!  Because of your excellent history and unparalled possibilities, you have been given a blank page.  Fill it in with any amount of insight.  Share it with those you know.  Then share it with strangers.  Enjoy what they share in return. The exchange rate will fluctuate, but the value of the page will increase.  By accepting this offer of pre-approval, you have lifetime protection from identity theft.  Rather, your identity will be stronger than ever, impossible to fake. Remember: you alone determine the prime interest.

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FlagLate summer always make me think of daylilies. They aren’t flowers I knew as a girl. The first year I lived in Lake Charles, Louisiana, in an old rented house with overgrown flower beds, I encountered the daylily for the first time.

I had moved to Lake Charles to enter an M.F.A. program in poetry at McNeese State University. That same year, I first read a poem by Adrienne Rich that still resonates with me.  It is titled “I Am in Danger — Sir”, a quote from a letter Emily Dickinson wrote to a respected editor, Thomas Higginson, who had major reservations about her work. In the body of the poem are these lines,

“…gardening the daylily,

wiping the wine glass stem…”

that continue to enchant me. They speak to the daily attention to small things that make a difference, that add up over time, tiny packets of effective effort that carry intention from the realm of wishing into concrete accomplishment. Every morning in its season, the daylily opens a new blossom; the gardener reaches up and removes the spend bloom from the day before. Similarly, to share work, an artist need to be the creative plant and the attentive gardener.

This year, my intention is to tame the submission process by doing just a little bit each day.

Daylily II 2013Daylily III 2013Daylily 2013Daylilies IV

Book Spine Poems

A good friend of mine, Bonnie Jean Flom, knows her way around a classroom. With long years of experience not only as an artist but as a grade school teacher, principal, and educational consultant, Bonnie Jean is still discovering and sharing new ways to excite young children about language and learning.

Recently she shared with me an idea that got me excited, too, and so I want to share it with you. Bonnie Jean spent time during April in the Austin, Texas visiting her son, Scott Norman. While there, she spent a delightful day with the fifth graders he teaches. In addition to helping these young students write and publish their work for their classroom, Bonnie Jean observed students celebrating National Poetry Month by arranging books in stacks so that the titles on their spines created short poems. The students then photographed their poems before re-shelving their constituent books.

Poetry + photography? I thought this sounded like a wonderful idea!

Here are two examples that showcase the limitations of my library and imagination but also the fun I had. After a little experimenting, I decided they read most naturally from the top down. Frustrations included not having the sounds I wanted, wide variation in font size and style, realizing how many of my books have dull titles like “Complete Poems” that mask the excitement of the contents within, and (ouch!) having a slippery, heavy stack slide onto my toes. (Lessons learned: wear thick clogs and compose short poems.)

In the photos, I have endeavored to line up the germane phrases, but they still might be rather hard to read. I include the texts below.

Poem One:

Spine Poem One

Elements
Sensitive Chaos
World Poetry
Doubt

Engineers of the Soul
The Enchanted Loom
The Pleasure of Finding Things Out

Poem Two:

Spine Poem Two

God Be With the Clown
Write from the Heart
The Story of My Life
Fractured Fate

Can Poetry Matter?
Tirra Lirra By the River
Help, Thanks, Wow
The Opposite of Fate

Talking to the Sun
A Kiss in Space
Imaginary Gardens
The Golden Gate

So…are you itching to try it yourself? Go ahead! And let me know what you come up with!

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Summer always means Shakespeare at our house. We think of his birthday, celebrated on April 23. (Born in 1564, that would make him 449 years old today.)  And then it seems natural to seek out a production of his work or to re-read a play  or recite a few of the sonnets. This year, Julia and I hosted a “Reader’s Theater”; a total of 9 people gathered at our house to read Hamlet, scene by scene, one act per day. We paused after each scene to discuss the action, to look up unfamiliar words and concepts, to puzzle over character’s motivations, to examine recurring themes, and to recast the actors’ roles. Everyone got to share in the big parts as well as the bit parts. We also included vestigial costuming (a grey pashmina draped over the head for the ghost of King Hamlet, a red beret for Laertes who is off to France, matching Disney World lanyards for the goofy Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee that are Rosencrantz and Guildenstern.)  We had lots of laughs and some new insights, too. A reader’s theater approach is a low-tech but highly interactive way to bring any dramatic work off the page.

Hamlet Reader's Theater

Screen Shot 2013-06-25 at 5.44.54 PM

In other regional Shakespeare news, check out the Great River Shakespeare Festival held in Winona, Minnesota through August (www.grsf.org).  In addition to performances and other events, the festival is holding its sixth annual sonnet contest, open to authors around the globe.
Note also that the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, which included in its first season a noted production of Hamlet, is hosting productions both of Hamlet and of Tom Stoppard’s companion black comedy, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead, in the spring of 2014, as part of its 50th season. (www.guthrietheater.org)
Thank You For Hamlet Reader's Theater

Parades of Interdependence

July Fourth Parade Lake Bluff 2008

They say everyone loves a parade. Do you?

I must be an exception to the rule because my first impulse is to avoid them. (I am an introvert, and like to interact with people one at a time in quiet settings.) Still, I have a pleasant memory of standing on a bridge with my family in Portland, Oregon, where we lived when I was in third grade. We were on that bridge in order to get a close view of the Rose Parade. I also turned out for one Mardi Gras parade during the two years I lived in Lake Charles, Louisiana. As Fat Tuesday celebrations go, this one was just my speed—clapping decorously, picking up a few pieces of candy and a handful of beads, & home by 9:00 p.m.

Images of 4th of July

Since becoming a parent and a Northfielder, I’ve begun to associate parades with the Midwestern summer—Fourth of July—and the end of summer—Defeat of Jesse James Days. And now,  parades seem to me a metaphor for civic participation: many different people (and pets) moving, with their own particular steps and personal styles toward a common goal.

Fourth of July Reinactors Lake Bluff

When I am feeling optimistic, I see parades as one expression of how we are all in this together. We all start out with a small circle and gradually, through the ebb and flow of life, discover new places, different people and ideas, and, underlying surface contrasts find commonalities that cross the borders of language and culture, age and sex, and all of the orientations toward any of the ‘isms’ that galvanize sub-groups. We are different but we walk through life side-by-side.

Fourth of July Indian Dancers

As I write this in 2013, the hope of meaningful immigration reform is gathering new solidity. At the same time, the sustainability of all our lives depends on creating new kinds of co-operation that cross all the boundaries laws and minds can construct. I am powerfully reminded as I look at these photos I have taken over the past ten years of how much we are share—an immigrant past (however recent or distant), a joy in life’s goodness, a cherishing of freedom to be who we are, and (perhaps) a love of parades, too.

Fence and Fireworks

Because photographs speak powerfully to me, I include this one of fireworks viewed through a chain link fence. As I look at it, I think of the many people who stand outside, yearning for the freedom we claim everyday as U.S. citizens.

July in My Eyes I

And because sonnets, compassion, and the State of Liberty are always in style, here is the sonnet that poet Emma Lazarus (July 22, 1849 to November 18, 1887) wrote in 1883 to help raise money to pay for the pedestal on which the Lady with the Lamp stands.

The New Colossus

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightening, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”

Emma Lazarus

(This poem is in the public domain.
In 1903, the lines were inscribed onto a bronze plaque
and attached at the base of the Statue of Liberty.)

TwoKidsinWagon

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RedWagon

(Special thanks to Carolyn Warden who introduced me to the tradition of the Lake Bluff, Illinois Fourth of July celebration, where I took many of these photographs!)

Other Notes:

Flag

It is officially summer, and despite continued wind and rain we’re rejoicing in the flowers blooming. Here are a couple of views from the front of our house. The bright yellow of the” buttercups” is a welcome stand-in for the sun on our many overcast hours. (One friend just asked for a cutting, and another just identified them as evening primrose!)

 

Buttercups 2013

Porch Pansies 2013

 

 

Poems by Two Fathers

Spring for Post #4 June 12With Father’s Day on the horizon, I got curious about the origins of this holiday. I was moved to learn that it was first launched by a daughter, Sonora Smart Dodd, in 1910. Dodd wanted to honor fathers like her own, William Jackson Smart, a Civil War veteran and single parent to six children. When the holiday didn’t catch on initially, despite the support of then-President Woodrow Wilson, Dodd renewed her efforts to make it a national holiday during the 1930s. Finally, through a presidential proclamation in 1966 followed by a bill signed in 1972 by President Richard Nixon, the third Sunday in June officially became the day on which we honor fathers in the United States. This determined daughter began her efforts honor the contributions of fathers to their families when she was twenty-eight years old; she lived to see the fruits of her labor in her ninetieth year.

Tim&Julia

Father’s Day is big news at our house every year. For weeks in advance, Julia and I think of surprises and treats for Tim. This year, we are planning a picnic to River Bend Nature Center, where Julia and Tim have taken science classes and volunteered to dust the natural history specimens. The particulars are top secret, but with a special menu, trivia quiz, handmade cards, new wardrobe items—and a rare afternoon of Doing What Dad Wants To Do—we think he’ll enjoy the day. Tim’s choices will probably involve some televised sports, and Julia and I will probably keep our humorous comments regarding sports to a minimum.

Julia&Tim

In the spirit of the day, I wanted to spotlight the creativity and sensitivity of dads, and so I include two poems here. The first is by Tim and became an instant favorite when I read it earlier this spring. The second is one by a poet from whom I have learned a great deal: Ronald Wallace, founder and co-director of the Creative Writing Program at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where I did my undergraduate work. (All his volumes of poetry and criticism are delightful. For a full list, please check his bio pages.) His poem below is a palindrome, a rare form that reads backwards and forwards the same. It is a technical tour de force, but the real trick is that it is such a heartfelt evocation of the loved shared by fathers and daughters. I have had this poem memorized for decades, and every time I recite it I feel a little choke in my throat.

Hope you enjoy these poems. Have a great Father’s Day!
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ApplesApple for You (November 2000) copy

How can this tree flourish, untended,
In my grandfather’s orchard,
This island in the returning prairie?

I pick a yellow apple,
See its luster and bruises,
Know I’m caught between past and future.

I give it to my young daughter.
She savors it; understands perfectly.

Timothy Braulick
(Copyright 2013; used by permission; all rights reserved.)

Palindrome: Fathers and Daughters

Ronald Wallace

Fathers read to daughters,
teach love of words and stories,
their hearts full of light.
The fathers give to love
the only hope they have.
But have they hope only?
The love to give fathers
the light of full hearts.
Their stories and words of love
teach daughters to read fathers.

Ronald Wallace
(Copyright 1983; used by permission; all rights reserved.)

Click HERE to read Ronald Wallace’s bio at Poets.org

Other News

Mailbox

For many years, I have been fascinated by labyrinths, those deceptively simple but sophisticated technologies for mediation and healing. This week, I added two new pages on labyrinths; later this summer I plan to post an interview with labyrinth maker Marilyn Larson.

SEEKING INTERPLANETARY POETS!: NEWS THAT IS OUT-OF-THIS-WORLD!

Mars-Schiaparelli

Earth_Western_Hemisphere

Here’s a wonderful collaboration between hard-core science and light-hearted, grassroots art: NASA is inviting everyone to contribute a haiku to be considered to be carried into the Martian atmosphere. In addition to the three winning poems, the first names of everyone who submits will also be carried to the red planet’s atmosphere. Poems must be submitted before the end of June. For full contest rules, please go to http://lasp.colorado.edu/maven/goingtomars/contest-rules/

And what’s more, the public gets to vote on winning poems—kind of like “Dancing with the Stars”.

Between July 1 and July 29, 2013, do visit http://lasp.colorado.edu/maven/goingtomars/contest-rules/ to vote.Mars Rock II

Even though the odds are…well, astronomical…I can’t resist submitting one. Or writing five. If you would like to start voting early, I invite you to help me decide which I should submit. I will be submitting mine the last week in June. Be sure to get me your vote by June 22, 2013. You can vote in the Comments section at the end of this post.

Mars Haiku (by Leslie Schultz)

1)
We lie awake, Mars,
wondering: how did you make
ice? Your rock-red heart?

2)
Mars, we lie awake
wondering what lies under
ice caps, heart-red rock.

3)
Not strawberry, flame,
cardinal, antique barn door,
ruby. Still secret.

4)
red marble rolling:
blue marble comes calling now
across icy space

5)
Mars: humans fight fear,
laws of physics, driven by
curiosity.

And if you would like to publish your own Martian haiku here on Planet Earth, send it to me, and I will devote another post to Mars haiku in the long dog days of summer. Then sit back and know that, win or lose, your name will rocket into space later this year and next year will do an orbiting dance in the Martian atmosphere.

For someone who values words, this is literally as high as one can aspire: go for it!

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MailboxMars and Earth images are public domain images which were found on the bitbox post, 35 Stunning Hi-Res “Public Domain” Astronomy Images

For a lighthearted take on Saturn energy, take a look at a new page on the ancient topic of labyrinths, a long term exploratory and publishing interest of mine. Click HERE to visit Winona Media’s new Labyrinth’s page.