Burning the Old Year

Letters swallow themselves in seconds. Notes friends tied to the doorknob, transparent scarlet paper, sizzle like moth wings, marry the air.   So much of any year is flammable, lists of vegetables, partial poems. Orange swirling flame of days, so little is a stone.   Where there was something and suddenly isn’t, an absence shouts, [...]

Read Full Post »

The Caterpillar Chronicles

As 2010 comes to a close, I conducted a search of year-end Calls for Submissions with the hopes of finding one more compelling opportunity to submit original fiction, essays, and poetry.  Thanks to the extensive list of calls from publications, presses, colleges, and universities compiled by NewPages.com, I stumbled upon The Caterpillar Chronicles, a brand [...]

Read Full Post »

Christmas Eve

They had entered Amberson Addition, and the moon of Mr. Amberson’s delight was overlaid by a slender Gothic filagree; the branches that sprang from the shade trees lining the street.  Through the windows of many of the houses rosy lights were flickering; and silver tinsel and evergreen wreaths and brilliant little glass globes of silver [...]

Read Full Post »

At a Lunar Eclipse

Thy shadow, Earth, from Pole to Central Sea, Now steals along upon the Moon’s meek shine In even monochrome and curving line Of imperturbable serenity.   How shall I link such sun-cast symmetry With the torn troubled form I know as thine, That profile, placid as a brow divine, With continents of moil and misery? [...]

Read Full Post »

Time to Submit – Fiction Open

Glimmer Train’s December Fiction Open is accepting fiction submissions between 2,000 and 20,000 words until midnight (PST) on January 2.  This quarterly opportunity is open to all writers and all themes.  Unpublished novel excerpts are considered, provided they feel like complete stories.  Multiple submissions are also accepted.  The reading fee for each submission is $18.  [...]

Read Full Post »

Lady Jane

“I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading!  How much sooner one tires of anything than of a book!  When I have a house of my own, I shall be miserable if I have not an excellent library.” ~ Jane Austen, Pride and Prejudice  English novelist Jane Austen was born on this day [...]

Read Full Post »

In conclusion…

I’ve spent the last week holed up in my office writing my final essay of the semester – another Bakhtinian analysis, this one on the later works of Virginia Woolf.  It’s complex, heady stuff, and, frankly, I’d rather be watching Nestor, the Long-Eared Christmas Donkey.  With all of the salient points made and the minimum [...]

Read Full Post »

Winter Morning Walks

Just as a dancer, turning and turning, may fill the dusty light with the soft swirl of her flying skirts, our weeping willow – now old and broken, creaking in the breeze – turns slowly, slowly in the winter sun, sweeping the rusty roof of the barn with the pale blue lacework of her shadow. [...]

Read Full Post »

Call for Submissions – Carpe Articulum

Carpe Articulum Literary Review is accepting entries for its annual Novella Contest and semiannual Carpe Verbum Essay/Nonfiction Award through January 7, 2011.  Eligible submissions for the Novella Contest must be of a single novella or self-contained excerpt from a larger work and must not exceed 150 double-spaced typed pages.  Previously published manuscripts will be considered, [...]

Read Full Post »

2011 AWP Conference and Bookfair

Registration for one of the largest and most essential literary events in North America is now open to attendees, presenters, and exhibitors.  The Association of Writers & Writing Programs is hosting its Annual Conference & Bookfair in Washington, DC February 2-5, 2011.  The 2011 “Big Literary Conversation” offers more than 380 literary readings, lectures, and [...]

Read Full Post »