I've moved!

I will no longer be posting on azia said what?  But you can find me here:

http://aziadupont.blogspot.com

AWESOME Links+ Catching Fire Teaser

Hope some of these links provide some valuable information/entertainment!

-This is a super cool "Call for Submissions" Photgraphy + Writing Opportunity!

-Blog Dot Squalorly writer Garrett Dennert wrote "What the Writer May Hear"

-Advice from Ksenia Anske- Make Agents Come to You, Not the Other Way Around

-What NOT to Do When Beginning Your Novel: Advice from Literary Agents on Writer Unboxed

-Flavorwire posted some Photo's of Famous Writers When They Were Teenagers

-The teaser trailer for Catching Fire is quite the two minute treat:

IWSG : Genre Commitment

You guys, I'm not even kidding-- you have no idea how happy I am that A to Z is over.  Yes, it was super fun to meet new bloggers and to see what awesome and creative things people came up with to blog about... but I really, really missed my favorite blogger's normal content.  I'm very excited to get back to our regular blogging schedules.

It's the first Wednesday of the month (holy hell, it's May already!  Speaking of May-- it was almost 80 degrees here in New Ulm yesterday, and now... well it's snowing.  Awesome.)  And, since it's the first Wednesday of the month-- that means it's time for Alex J. Cavanaugh's Insecure Writer's Support Group!

 

Hi.  My name is Azia and I have a problem.  

I have writer's commitment issues.

I cannot nail a genre!  People will find out I'm a writer and, naturally ask what I write.  

I'm all like, "Hey, this novel is YA and this other one is NA and this one is just a contemporary romance-kind of like depressing Chick Lit, and hey let's work on a poetry chapbook and I have a collection of essays, so yeah I don't know really know what I write." *insert insecure giggle here.*

Why can't I commit to a genre?  Is it bad that I haven't?  How did you guys know what to write?  

this seemed like an appropriate picture to represent my emotion

HELLLLLP ME.

A to Z : Z Poem - Raj Arumugam

It is the last day of the A to Z Challenge!  Thanks for sticking by me through my poetry adventures!  Tomorrow we go back to our regularly scheduled program-- and it is the day when all of us writer's ban together and reveal our innermost fears- The Insecure Writers Support Group!

Z Poem 
Written by Raj Arumugam
 
Z is useless
Like an appendix
It's not like English'd collapse
if you threw Z to the dogs
(you couldn't call it a sacrifice):
we'd still communicate
we'd still fornicate

it's like if your doctor cut
your appendix and threw it out
you'd still eat and shit

so, useless Z -
like many parts in the human enterprise
like your religion, your ideology, your prejudices:
it's there,
in the human system
but each a Z;
part of a strange assembly

A to Z : Yellow painted toe nails - Azia Archer

There are only 2 Days left of the A to Z Challenge.  Today I'm going to share a poem that I wrote last year, as it appeared in Haunted Waters Press.

Yellow painted toe nails
Written by Azia Archer

Yellow painted toe nails do not sit well on a canvas of pale feet.  The creamy white skin bleeding into the polish so that an unnatural fungal appearance prevails–reminding the owner that their feet are no longer where they once were; tanned, the shiny polished nails tucked into the sand innocently peaking out into the sunlight–giggling and well used.  The way a pair of feet should be.  Not now.  Now they’re cold, cracking, haphazardly folded into wool socks, sweating in loafers all day– tapping along side a desk.

A to Z : Xerox Candy Bar - Richard Brauitgan

 It's week 4 of the A to Z Challenge!  I'm still running with my poetry-theme.  Hope you enjoy!


Xerox Candy Bar
Written By Richard Brautigan

Ah,
you're just a copy
of all the candy bars
I've ever eaten.

A to Z : We Did Not Make Ourselves - Michael Dickman

 It's week 4 of the A to Z Challenge!  I'm still running with my poetry-theme.  Hope you enjoy!

*I have to say I'm REALLY excited to share this poem with you guys-- it's one of my absolute favorite of ALL time.*
 

 
We Did Not Make Ourselves
Written by Michael Dickman

We did not make ourselves is one thing
I keep singing into my hands
while falling
asleep

for just a second

before I have to get up and turn on all the lights in the house, one
             after the other, like opening
             an Advent calendar

My brain opening
the chemical miracles in my brain
switching on

I can hear

dogs barking
some trees
last stars

You think you'll be missed
It won't last long
I promise

I'm not dead but I am
standing very still
in the backyard
staring up at the maple
thirty years ago
a tiny kid waiting on the ground
alone in heaven
in the world
in white sneakers

I'm having a good time humming along to everything I can still
            remember back there

How we're born

Made to look up at everything we didn't make

We didn't
make grass, mosquitoes
or breast cancer

We didn't make yellow jackets

or sunlight

either

I didn't make my brain
but I'm helping
to finish it

Carefully stacking up everything I made next to everything I ruined
             in broad daylight in bright
             brainlight

This morning I killed a fly
and didn't lie down
next to the body
as we're supposed to

We're supposed to

Soon I'm going to wake up

Dogs
Trees
Stars

There is only this world and this world

What a relief
created

over and over

A to Z : "V" - Matthew Dickman

 It's week 4 of the A to Z Challenge!  I'm still running with my poetry-theme.  Hope you enjoy!

 
"V"
Written by Matthew Dickman

A to Z : Ulalume - Edgar Allen Poe

It's week 4 of the A to Z Challenge!  I'm still running with my poetry-theme.  Hope you enjoy!

 
Ulalume
Written by Edgar Allen Poe

The skies they were ashen and sober;
  The leaves they were crisped and sere—
  The leaves they were withering and sere;
It was night in the lonesome October
  Of my most immemorial year;
It was hard by the dim lake of Auber,
  In the misty mid region of Weir—
It was down by the dank tarn of Auber,
  In the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir.

Here once, through an alley Titanic.
  Of cypress, I roamed with my Soul—
  Of cypress, with Psyche, my Soul.
These were days when my heart was volcanic
  As the scoriac rivers that roll—
  As the lavas that restlessly roll
Their sulphurous currents down Yaanek
  In the ultimate climes of the pole—
That groan as they roll down Mount Yaanek
  In the realms of the boreal pole.

Our talk had been serious and sober,
  But our thoughts they were palsied and sere—
  Our memories were treacherous and sere—
For we knew not the month was October,
And we marked not the night of the year—
  (Ah, night of all nights in the year!)
We noted not the dim lake of Auber—
  (Though once we had journeyed down here)—
Remembered not the dank tarn of Auber,
  Nor the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir.

And now as the night was senescent
  And star-dials pointed to morn—
  As the sun-dials hinted of morn—
At the end of our path a liquescent
  And nebulous lustre was born,
Out of which a miraculous crescent
  Arose with a duplicate horn—
Astarte’s bediamonded crescent
  Distinct with its duplicate horn.

And I said—”She is warmer than Dian:
  She rolls through an ether of sighs—
  She revels in a region of sighs:
She has seen that the tears are not dry on
  These cheeks, where the worm never dies,
And has come past the stars of the Lion
  To point us the path to the skies—
  To the Lethean peace of the skies—
Come up, in despite of the Lion,
  To shine on us with her bright eyes—
Come up through the lair of the Lion,
  With love in her luminous eyes.”

But Psyche, uplifting her finger,
  Said—”Sadly this star I mistrust—
  Her pallor I strangely mistrust:—
Oh, hasten!—oh, let us not linger!
  Oh, fly!—let us fly!—for we must.”
In terror she spoke, letting sink her
  Wings till they trailed in the dust—
In agony sobbed, letting sink her
  Plumes till they trailed in the dust—
  Till they sorrowfully trailed in the dust.

I replied—”This is nothing but dreaming:
  Let us on by this tremulous light!
  Let us bathe in this crystalline light!
Its Sibyllic splendor is beaming
  With Hope and in Beauty to-night:—
  See!—it flickers up the sky through the night!
Ah, we safely may trust to its gleaming,
  And be sure it will lead us aright—
We safely may trust to a gleaming
  That cannot but guide us aright,
  Since it flickers up to Heaven through the night.”

Thus I pacified Psyche and kissed her,
  And tempted her out of her gloom—
  And conquered her scruples and gloom;
And we passed to the end of a vista,
  But were stopped by the door of a tomb—
  By the door of a legended tomb;
And I said—”What is written, sweet sister,
  On the door of this legended tomb?”
  She replied—”Ulalume—Ulalume—
  ’Tis the vault of thy lost Ulalume!”

Then my heart it grew ashen and sober
  As the leaves that were crisped and sere—
  As the leaves that were withering and sere;
And I cried—”It was surely October
  On this very night of last year
  That I journeyed—I journeyed down here—
  That I brought a dread burden down here!
  On this night of all nights in the year,
  Ah, what demon has tempted me here?
Well I know, now, this dim lake of Auber—
  This misty mid region of Weir—
Well I know, now, this dank tarn of Auber,—
  This ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir.”

A to Z : This Is Not A Personal Poem - Alex Dimitrov

It's week 4 of the A to Z Challenge!  I'm still running with my poetry-theme.  Hope you enjoy!

This Is Not A Personal Poem
Written by Alex Dimitrov

This is not a personal poem.
I don’t write about my life.
I don’t have a life.
I don’t have sex.
I have not experienced death.
Don’t take this personally but
I don’t have any feelings either.
The feelings I don’t have don’t run my life.
I have an imagination. I’m imagining it now.
This poem is concerned with language on a very plain level.
This poem stole that line from John Ashbery.
This poem wants you to like it,
please click “like.”
This poem was written during a recession.
I’m so politically conscious
the word “politics” is in my poem.
This is not a New York poem.
There’s not enough room for all the wars in this poem.
Gay marriage is now in this poem.
Have you liked this poem yet?
It was written in 2011 in New York and posted 11 minutes ago.
Would you sleep with the poet who wrote this poem?
Would you buy his book? Click here.
This poem loves language.
This poem has slept with other poems
written by poets who love language.
All poets love language.
Let’s talk about language while people die.
This poem cares a lot but wants you
to think that it doesn’t really care.
The speaker of this poem may have been
born in a former Communist country.
It may or may not matter.
I had an orgasm before writing this poem.
I have my sunglasses on while reading this poem.
Everyone is going to die
please don’t take it personally.
The world. The world.
The world is blood-hot and personal.
I stole that line from Sylvia Plath.
Put your money on this poem.
I love the money shot.
This is not a personal poem.
This poem is only about Alex Dimitrov.

A to Z : So You Want to Be a Writer? - Charles Bukowski

It's week 4 of the A to Z Challenge!  I'm still running with my poetry-theme.  Hope you enjoy!

So You Want to Be a Writer?
Written by Charles Bukowski

A to Z : Rebound Poem - Gregory Sherl

It is week 3 of Arlee Bird's A to Z Challenge.  I will continue my theme of poetry by posting a poem a day.  Hope you come back and check them out! 

Rebound Poem (as appeared in kill author)
Written by Gregory Sherl

I fake break-up with K so I can rebound with myself. Alone, I fog every mirror with my fake kissing. I am never thinking about the weather’s attitude when I dress for the day, but I am always finding myself offended by the afternoon rain. This is how I feel when I wake up: all lightning like. K writes a novel in my veins. The first line goes You will never have to worry about the wind again. I can’t read the rest, she’s covered it with skin that matches my skin. I tell her Tell me how it ends and I’ll trade you my pudding snack for four Oreos. She goes into the other room and I can smell her smiling at me. Big books scare me so I only read novels that are 472 words long. I am writing a poem called “Rebound Poem” and it’s going to be really fantastic when I finish it.

A to Z : Quinquagesima - Justine Nicholas

It is week 3 of Arlee Bird's A to Z Challenge.  I will continue my theme of poetry by posting a poem a day.  Hope you come back and check them out!

 

Quinquagesima
Written by Justine Nicholas

                                            —To Toni Williams (1944-2004)

In another year, perhaps, we could recall
all those seasons we had chosen not to mourn
today.
         A single lily spreads, thrust from mud
where snow covered your blood. This is the way
spring would come, you said

                                      fifty days after

you left. Perhaps the cold will return once more
after the rain
                  after fifty days

                                      after you leave again.

A to Z: Pull A String, A Puppet Moves - Charles Bukowski

 It is week 3 of Arlee Bird's A to Z Challenge.  I will continue my theme of poetry by posting a poem a day.  Hope you come back and check them out! 

 

Pull A String, A Puppet Moves
Written by Charles Bukowski
 
each man must realize
that it can all disappear very
quickly:
the cat, the woman, the job,
the front tire,
the bed, the walls, the
room; all our necessities
including love,
rest on foundations of sand -
and any given cause,
no matter how unrelated:
the death of a boy in Hong Kong
or a blizzard in Omaha ...
can serve as your undoing.
all your chinaware crashing to the
kitchen floor, your girl will enter
and you'll be standing, drunk,
in the center of it and she'll ask:
my god, what's the matter?
and you'll answer: I don't know,
I don't know ...

A to Z : Other People's Problems - Tyler Gobble

It is week 3 of Arlee Bird's A to Z Challenge.  I will continue my theme of poetry by posting a poem a day.  Hope you come back and check them out! 

Other People's Problems (as appeared on madswirl)
Written by Tyler Gobble 

I am down with OPP:
bring me your problems
people, I am here
for you, I am here.
Dead mother? yes
Cheating lover? yes
Public intoxication arrest?
yes yes yes. See, I am only
me when I am with you
telling me your problems.
These are the reasons why:
One, I think I love you.
Two, you have this power
over me, as a result
of my deep infatuation
with people like you: human beings.
They have this complicated ball
inside them, like a dust cloud
of nagging hope.
Three, I’ve never been good with
empty space.
Let me help you help me help you.
There is peace somewhere
between us. If we touch each other
I know we can find it.

A to Z : Nikki - Dante Basco

It is week 3 of Arlee Bird's A to Z Challenge.  I will continue my theme of poetry by posting a poem a day.  Hope you come back and check them out!  

Nikki 
Written by Dante Basco

Nikki : Dante Basco (Def Poetry Jam) from Moonroof Martinez on Vimeo.

Yes, that is Rufio.
 

A to Z : Mad Girls Love Song - Sylvia Plath

It is week 3 of Arlee Bird's A to Z Challenge.  I will continue my theme of poetry by posting a poem a day.  Hope you come back and check them out! 

 
Mad Girls Love Song
Written by Sylvia Plath

I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead;
I lift my lids and all is born again.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)
The stars go waltzing out in blue and red,
And arbitrary blackness gallops in:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.
I dreamed that you bewitched me into bed
And sung me moon-struck, kissed me quite insane.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)
God topples from the sky, hell's fires fade:
Exit seraphim and Satan's men:
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.
I fancied you'd return the way you said,
But I grow old and I forget your name.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)
I should have loved a thunderbird instead;
At least when spring comes they roar back again.
I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.
(I think I made you up inside my head.)

A to Z : Leisure, Hannah, Does Not Agree with You (2) - Hannah Gamble

  It is week two of Arlee Bird's 2013 A to Z Challenge!  For the challenge (and National Poetry Month) I have decided to post a poem for each letter of the alphabet!

 

Leisure, Hannah, Does Not Agree with You (2) (as appeared at The Poetry Foundation) 

Written  by Hannah Gamble 

—After Catullus

My house disgusted me, so I slept in a tent.

My tent disgusted me, so I slept in the grass. The grass disgusted me,

so I slept in my body, which I strung like a hammock from two ropes.

My body disgusted me, so I carved myself out of it.

 

My use of knives disgusted me because it was an act of violence.

My weakness disgusted me because “Hannah” means “hammer.”

The meaning of my name disgusted me because I’d rather be known

as beautiful. My vanity disgusted me because I am a scholar.

 

My scholarship disgusted me because knowledge is empty.

My emptiness disgusted me because I wanted to be whole.

My wholeness would have disgusted me because to be whole

is to be smug. Still, I tried to understand wholeness

 

as the inclusiveness of all activities: I walked out into the yard,

trying to vomit and drink milk simultaneously. I tried to sleep

while smoking a cigar. I have enough regrets to crack all the plumbing.

I’m whole only in that I’ve built my person from every thought I’ve ever loved.

A to Z : Keen, Fitful Gusts Are Whisp'ring Here & There - John Keats

  It is week two of Arlee Bird's 2013 A to Z Challenge!  For the challenge (and National Poetry Month) I have decided to post a poem for each letter of the alphabet!

 

Keen, Fitful Gusts Are Whisp'ring Here & There
Written by John Keats

A to Z : Just lost, when I was saved! - Emily Dickinson

 It is week two of Arlee Bird's 2013 A to Z Challenge!  For the challenge (and National Poetry Month) I have decided to post a poem for each letter of the alphabet! 





Just lost, when I was saved!
Written by Emily Dickinson

Just lost, when I was saved!
Just felt the world go by!
Just girt me for the onset with Eternity,
When breath blew back,
And on the other side
I heard recede the disappointed tide!

Therefore, as One returned, I feel
Odd secrets of the line to tell!
Some Sailor, skirting foreign shores—
Some pale Reporter, from the awful doors
Before the Seal!

Next time, to stay!
Next time, the things to see
By Ear unheard,
Unscrutinized by Eye—

Next time, to tarry,
While the Ages steal—
Slow tramp the Centuries,
And the Cycles wheel!

A to Z : i like my body - e.e. Cummings

 It is week two of Arlee Bird's 2013 A to Z Challenge!  For the challenge (and National Poetry Month) I have decided to post a poem for each letter of the alphabet!

i like my body
Written by e.e. Cummings

i like my body when it is with your
body. It is so quite a new thing.
Muscles better and nerves more.
i like your body. i like what it does,
i like its hows. i like to feel the spine
of your body and its bones, and the trembling
-firm-smooth ness and which I will
again and again and again
kiss, i like kissing this and that of you,
i like, slowly stroking the, shocking fuzz
of your electric fur, and what-is-it comes
over parting flesh...And eyes big love-crumbs,

and possibly i like the thrill
of under me you quite so new

A to Z : Heavy Petting in Cooper City, FL - Gregory Sherl

 It is week two of Arlee Bird's 2013 A to Z Challenge!  For the challenge (and National Poetry Month) I have decided to post a poem for each letter of the alphabet!

Heavy Petting in Cooper City, FL (as appeared in PANK Magazine)
Written by Gregory Sherl

We’re so young I still look out the window when you cry.
Still, this is how it starts: there is tongue kissing before baby
names. There is forgetting how to sleep alone before
baby names. Sometimes your thighs are too sweaty to hold
before baby names. Lately everything falls right out of me:
a wave having a seizure while someone tries to learn how to surf.
In this poem we are in bed because everyone can guess why.
We are in bed and I say Your tongue is the coldest tap. That is a lie.
You are so fucking warm. You are an electric blanket we keep next
to the icebox. In bed I say You are the equivalent of seven brownies.
You say Prove it. So this is what I do: I bake the sun up.
We forgot to draw the blinds, so I bake the sun back down.
It is pitch black, so I bake some lightning bugs and tie them
to my chest hair. While I bake, you go into the other room and send me
dirty text messages with descriptions of your back spread out like a speedway.
I have to go into the icebox to cool off. I don’t turn on the electric blanket.
My blood is milk, skim, thin enough to reach my toes. I have shivered
in my sleep since at least eight years before we met.
There is a timer, and then the timer is done being a timer. I am done baking.
I hold the seven brownies in my lap while you drive us to the doctor’s
office. The doctor checks your blood pressure, feels for lumps. Then he checks
the brownies for lumps. I was smooth with the icing, and the doctor
is pleased. He puts his stethoscope to the seven brownies, says Big breath now. The brownies puff out their chests like muffins.
They sigh like long distance runners. The doctor takes off his latex gloves.
He says Equivalent, like it was a category on Jeopardy! He says Homologous, synonymous, identical, tantamount, indistinguishable.
The doctor looks at me. He wants to know if the brownies
came from a box. I tell him I picked them from the garden,
that I was turned on by how soft the soil felt between my toes.
He says And her? pointing at you. I tell him I keep an Easy Bake
Oven between the sheets.

A to Z : Grief - Matthew Dickman

 It is week two of Arlee Bird's 2013 A to Z Challenge!  For the challenge (and National Poetry Month) I have decided to post a poem for each letter of the alphabet! 

Grief
Written by Matthew Dickman

Grief by Matthew Dickman from Portia Elan on Vimeo.

A to Z : Flying Inside You Own Body - Margaret Atwood

I am a participant in Arlee Bird's 2013 A to Z Challenge!  I am posting a poem for each letter of the alphabet.  Sometimes the poem will be prose, other times it might be an artistic rendition of the poem, or a reading by the poet... the possibilities are endless!  I hope you will be stopping by throughout the Month of April to check them out!

Flying Inside Your Own Body 
By Margaret Atwood

Your lungs fill & spread themselves,
wings of pink blood, and your bones
empty themselves and become hollow.
When you breathe in you’ll lift like a balloon
and your heart is light too & huge,
beating with pure joy, pure helium.
The sun’s white winds blow through you,
there’s nothing above you,
you see the earth now as an oval jewel,
radiant & seablue with love.
It’s only in dreams you can do this.
Waking, your heart is a shaken fist,
a fine dust clogs the air you breathe in;
the sun’s a hot copper weight pressing straight
down on the think pink rind of your skull.
It’s always the moment just before gunshot.
You try & try to rise but you cannot. 


I am obsessed with Margaret Atwood.
She is my favorite female writer of all time.
Oh, to get inside of her brain!
Wouldn't that be amazing?

A to Z : Eulalie by Edgar Allen Poe

I am a participant in Arlee Bird's 2013 A to Z Challenge!  I am posting a poem for each letter of the alphabet.  Sometimes the poem will be prose, other times it might be an artistic rendition of the poem, or a reading by the poet... the possibilities are endless!  I hope you will be stopping by throughout the Month of April to check them out!

 
Eulalie
Written by Edgar Allen Poe

A to Z : Digression On Number 1, 1948 by Frank O'Hara

I am a participant in Arlee Bird's 2013 A to Z Challenge!  I am posting a poem for each letter of the alphabet.  Sometimes the poem will be prose, other times it might be an artistic rendition of the poem, or a reading by the poet... the possibilities are endless!  I hope you will be stopping by throughout the Month of April to check them out!

Digression On Number 1, 1948
Written by Frank O'Hara

I am ill today but I am not
too ill. I am not ill at all.
It is a perfect day, warm
for winter, cold for fall.

A fine day for seeing. I see
ceramics, during lunch hour, by
Mir6, and I see the sea by Leger;
light, complicated Metzingers
and a rude awakening by Brauner,
a little table by Picasso, pink.

I am tired today but I am not
too tired. I am not tired at all.
There is the Pollock, white, harm
will not fall, his perfect hand

and the many short voyages. They'll
never fence the silver range.
Stars are out and there is sea
enough beneath the glistening earth
to bear me toward the future
which is not so dark. I see.



This painting by Jackson Pollock inspired the poem!

A to Z : Color As Beginning - Richard Brautigan

I am a participant in Arlee Bird's 2013 A to Z Challenge!  I am posting a poem for each letter of the alphabet.  Sometimes the poem will be prose, other times it might be an artistic rendition of the poem, or a reading by the poet... the possibilities are endless!  I hope you will be stopping by throughout the Month of April to check them out!

A to Z : Becoming Domestic -Nicole Krauss

I am a participant in Arlee Bird's 2013 A to Z Challenge!  I am posting a poem for each letter of the alphabet.  Sometimes the poem will be prose, other times it might be an artistic rendition of the poem, or a reading by the poet... the possibilities are endless!  I hope you will be stopping by throughout the Month of April to check them out!

Becoming Domestic
Written by Nicole Krauss

A hundred million migrants roam the planet.
They kick up a soft dust, from space they appear
To be weather, a little storm the wind faithfully carries.
When it rains they lift their bowls to the sky.
They sleep with a rock under their heads.
At dawn they are the first to break the photographic stillness.
They have lost all sense of distance. A sort of arrival—late,
Under darkening skies, the smell of miles on your clothes—
A sort of arrival is needed to say how far you've traveled.
The crunch of gravel in the neighbor's driveway.
He will join the road with those other sedentary dreamers,
The unnumbered who've found a home just to leave it.
There is no good reason why night after night
I sleep here with you.
Only that the roof over our heads has not yet fallen.
---
Nicole Krauss is the author of one of the *most* *incredible* novels I have ever read- The History of Love (add it on Goodreads!)

A to Z : All The Birthday Candles -Sarah Certa

I am a participant in Arlee Bird's 2013 A to Z Challenge!  I am posting a poem for each letter of the alphabet.  Sometimes the poem will be prose, other times it might be an artistic rendition of the poem, or a reading by the poet... the possibilities are endless!  I hope you will be stopping by throughout the Month of April to check them out!

All The Birthday Candles (as appeared in Country Music)
Written by Sarah Certa

December 10th is Emily Dickinson’s birthday
and also mine. I tell people this
as if it means something. As if sharing a birthday
makes us friends, allies
across time, like two leaves grown on the same tree
just over a century apart, or gate posts
on either side of a field that could be a cemetery
if all the things in it seemed more dead, if their echoes
weren’t so loud. I keep hearing
the scrape of the iceberg slicing open
the steel belly of the Titanic, the cries
of children drowning. I think of all the bullets
people have shot at each other
and themselves, and my temples
ache like that time I had a seizure and felt like someone
was banging my head against the bars of a cage underwater, the closest
to someone trying to kill me
I’ve ever felt. Sometimes my ears ring
and I think it’s the vibrations of the atomic
bomb and all the wars
I’m too sensitive to talk about, though someone keeps
projecting war films on the back wall
of my brain, stained sepia clips
of legless soldiers in trenches in France, pyramids
of dead bodies, Anne Frank’s toothy grin, and smokestacks
that make my nose burn so hard I’m afraid if I sneeze I’ll cover
this table in ashes, which will look and feel and smell
no different than my own ashes
some day. God I feel like an asshole
for being able to choose whether or not
I want my body burned when I die, for choosing
not to finish my lunch today
because I want to be
a little thinner. Vietnam is a rusty fork
twisting my brain like spaghetti, like the intestines
of a soldier shot in the stomach. Headlines say weekend violence
in southern Afghanistan rose the U.S. death toll
to over 2,000 this year, so I write this down
because I don’t know what else to do. It’s early October
and Jeff has been dead for half a year. I hate
that in all my thoughts about him
he is floating horizontally above the county roads I drive on
in the early mornings, a shadow
between the trees like Olympian torches, the trees like burning towers,
like all the birthday candles
he’ll never blow out. I’m always reaching
back through time, brushing snow
off of headstones, reaching
for Emily’s hands. I want to bake a cake
with her, have a birthday party
in the snow. I want to lace
my fingers in hers
and hold the world that’s come between us
like an orphan in our arms, like a child
whose parents died in a fire
no one knows how to put out. I want to sing
to it, tell it to make a wish, let it believe, for a moment,
in something greater than itself.

A to Z Theme

Monday is the first day of the A to Z Challenge!  This will be my first year participating and I'm very excited about it!  (Last year I was a creepy lurk.)  

I've decided to share with you guys a poem a day!  I think it will be a nice way to showcase some of my favorite poetry/poets with everyone!  Some posts will be the actual poem, some will be videos of the poet doing the reading and some might be an artistic representation of the words. 

I love, love, love the abstract representation of human emotion that poetry brings to the table.  It's such an incredible art form.  I hope you guys will stop by during the month of April to get your daily dose!  I luckily finished the list a few weeks ago, so I'm hoping that the month goes by rather smoothly. 

Are any of you guys participating in A to Z?  If you are-- what's your theme?  If you're not- you still have time to get signed up!  (And you totally should!) 

Informative Articles and B*tches in Bookshops

I like to read about "the craft" (no-- not the witch movie with my doppleganger, Neve Campbell, though that is a good movie)-- I'm talking about writing.  I compiled a list of a few of my favorite reads from the last couple weeks.  I hope you find them as interesting/informative as I did!

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-Chuck Sambuchino discusses the Top 10 Worst Types of Critique Partners

-The Word Cafe gives some advice on what to look for in a critique group

-Wendy Van Camp @ No Wasted Ink has compiled an *awesome* list of need-to-know Twitter #Hashtags for authors

-Jocelyn K. Glei compiled a list entitled "25 Insights on Becoming a Better Writer"

-Out of print writing compiled an extensive list of Manuscript submission opportunities

-5 Ways To be An Unsuccessful Indie Author by Rachel Thompson tells you about the major "don'ts"

-Jane Friedman @ Writer Unboxed discusses 5 Industry Trends Requiring Every Writers Attention

-January Magazine shares Ernest Hemingway's Seven Fiction Writing Tips

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And because this never gets old:

Read so hard libraries try to find me

Sunday Confessions!

It's been awhile since I've participated in one of Alyx@Every Day is a New Adventure's Sunday confession-- and I'm waiting for eggplant to brown, so I thought Why the hell not?

1. I've been writing a lot of poetry.  And by a lot-- I mean about a poem a day!  (I feel like I'm constantly revising or working on something new and it feels so good!)  I've said more times than I can count that I'm not a poet, but I'm starting to feel comfortable with my poetry and am actually embracing it.  Maybe I am a poet.  Not to mention, it's a great break from the cluster-fuck that is my fiction writing at times.  I'm about to be knee-deep in Camp NaNo, and the pacing of poetry is helpful with my writer's block.  I've actually comprised a list of great poetry for the A to Z challenge.  I'm excited to share them with everyone!

2.  I am addicted to Tumblr.  Do you guys "tumbl"?  I can post all of these strange photographs, and songs, and words, and and and!!!!  All in one spot and it's just there for me like a collage.  I'm in love.  My Tumblr page is definitely a companion during my creative process.

3.  I am in utter shock that Kate Winslet has signed on for the Divergent movie franchise... She's like... a real movie star.  And those books are like... I won't go there.  But, how cool is it that the Turk who died in Mary's bed is going to play Four/Tobias!?  (Those of you who watch Downton Abbey know what I'm talking about.)

4.  Speaking of Y.A.-- Cinder by Marissa Meyer : GET YOUR HANDS ON IT.  it is gold, you guys.  GOLD.  I can't wait to get my hands on the second novel in the Lunar Series!  It's nice to read a Y.A. that is not a LOVE story.  It's incredible.  You will love it.  LOVE IT.  Cyborgs.  And Sci-Fi. And people from the moon.  It's a great read!

5.  Garrett and I have had such a strong pull towards the town we live in, like we are meant to stay here awhile.  It's hard when you've got such wanderlust and then life keeps telling you that maybe it has other plans for you.  There are so many things here that are in the beginning stages of development-- the community is just full of possibilities!  I've never felt so connected in my entire life.  Garrett and I are constantly networking and meeting some of the most incredible people who are full of passion... Our life is truly in a new, powerful and, beautiful stage.  I'm feeling overwhelmed with positive emotions and love.  Moving here has been the best decision we've ever made.

Do you guys have anything to confess?  What about Camp NaNo?  Anyone participating?  What about the A to Z challenge- what's your topic?  Have you read Cinder?  And what do you think of the Divergent casting?  TELL ME!  Most importantly- ARE YOU ON TUMBLR?

FSF : Conquer

I sure do love Lillie McFerrin's Five Sentence Fiction!

What it’s all about: Five Sentence Fiction is about packing a powerful punch in a tiny fist. Each week I will post a one word inspiration, then anyone wishing to participate will write a five sentence story based on the prompt word. The word does not have to appear in your five sentences, just use it for direction.

This week: CONQUER
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"I can't do this," Joseph's fist wrapped tightly around the crystal hanging from his neck, "I'm not strong enough."  Steadying himself with his back against the wall, he pleaded with Amara, his weakness sending static electricity to every corner of the room.

"You're wrong, god dammit!" Amara's voice, deep and strong, echoed with each syllable.  "Crush the damn thing!  Crush it!"  she pushed the hammer into his free hand.

Joseph locked in on Amara's glaze and in one swift gesture, ripped the crystal from his neck and threw it on the floor, greedily crushing the crystal with each blow, the Queen's screams ringing in their ears, "Nooooo!"

Top Ten Movie Countdown

 

 I know- you are probably thinking, Another blogfest, Azia?   But, can you really blame me?  They are such fun and I love reading what other people have to say about similar topics!  Make sure you head on over to Alex J. Cavanaugh's blog and check out all of the entries!

All we have to do is list our Top Ten favorite movies. How easy/awesome is that?  Here we go!

Step Brothers:

It's too funny... stupid, yes.  But, hilarious.

It's Kind of a Funny Story:

This movie just makes you feel good when it's over.

Something Borrowed:

 When I need to watch a chick-flick-- this is my go-to film.  The story line is a little twisted, and I'm not the biggest fan of the novel... But, the casting is great and John Krasinksi is amazing!

District 9:

WHEN IS THE SEQUEL COMING OUT.  Seriously.  This story is GOLD.

What's Eating Gilbert Grape:

One of the best movies of ALL TIME.

Snatch:

No explanation needed.  This movie is genius.

Fight Club:

YOU ARE NOT YOUR FUCKING KHAKIS!!!!

Wild Target:

HILARIOUS.  Get your hands on this movie NOW.

The Royal Tenenbaums:

I could watch this movie a thousand times over and never get sick of it.

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind:

My absolute favorite movie of all time EVER.

Bonus :Favorite Christmas Movie- The Family Stone

Okay, this was A LOT harder than I thought it would be!  I have some honorable mentions: Jerry Maguire (I know, Tom Cruise is such an annoying actor- but hot damn do I love that movie!), Legends of the Fall, Drive, Across the Universe, ALL of the Harry Potter movies (obviously), A Lot Like Love, Avatar... just a name a few.  Ha.

Have you seen any of the movies listed above?  What are some of your favorite movies?

Got Green Blogfest 2.0 - Kiss Me I'm Irish

Click the image above to check out all of the entries

Mark over @ Aloha! Mark Koopmans says hi from Hi is hosting the Got Green Blogfest 2.0 -- he's giving us free reign to write about whatever we'd like-- so I'm going to take this opportunity to share a song and the story of Finn.

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I had the pleasure of seeing Gaelic Storm in 2010-- talk about a high energy show!  Okay, okay-- they may be L.A. based and, the music may be both Irish & Scottish in inspiration-- but this celtic band knows how to jam.  (Neat fact- they played in the famous dancing scene between Jack & Rose in the movie Titanic-- how cool!)

Kiss Me I'm Irish - Gaelic Storm

Eyes glazed over, Finn stumbled left and then right and then left again as the music blasted from every speaker.  The bar was full of people covered in glittering green hats, dressed as Leprechauns and enjoying green Miller Lite beer on tap- $2.  With his eyes closed, he began to sing,

Kiss me, I'm Irish!
I am the wild rover.
My eyes they are smiling,
And I'm seldom sober.
I like my whiskey,
And I love to dance,
So if you're feeling as lucky as me, take a chance,
And kiss me, I'm Irish...

Suddenly, a large pair of lips pressed against his.  At first gentle, the mouths movements became  hurried revealing the sandpaper like roughage of his assailants upper lip.  Startled, Finn popped his eyes open.  There stood his roommate, John, laughing hysterically, 'You said you were Irish, bro!'

Five Sentence Fiction : Paradise

 It's that time of the week for Lillie McFerrin's Five Sentence Fiction!

What it’s all about: Five Sentence Fiction is about packing a powerful punch in a tiny fist. Each week I will post a one word inspiration, then anyone wishing to participate will write a five sentence story based on the prompt word. The word does not have to appear in your five sentences, just use it for direction.

This week: PARADISE
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The sound of murmuring voices flooded his ears but he no longer had eyes that allowed him to look in their direction.  There wasn't much of anything to see-- just darkness and the sound of his own thoughts, an echo against the black walls surrounding him.  It was just a dream he thought to himself, a euphoric paradise encasing his mind as pictures of beautiful moments snapped passed him-- children running up and hugging his legs, wiping the sweat from his brow after a long day of work, the sun setting against the backdrop of the farm- a burnt orange that made the sky look as if it was on fire, the glint in his wife's eyes on their wedding day.  Suddenly, he felt trapped, my wife, my wife!  Thrusting back and forth in his mind, a scream no one else could hear filled his head, Gloria!

Top Ten Tuesday : Spring To-Read

Today I'm participating in The Broke & The Bookish:

 Taken from the site: Top Ten Tuesday is an original feature/weekly meme created here at The Broke and the Bookish. This feature was created because we are particularly fond of lists here at The Broke and the Bookish. We'd love to share our lists with other bookish folks and would LOVE to see your top ten lists!

This week, we are to list the Top 10 books on our Spring To-Read list!   

 click here to read the other entries 

And for my list:

 

The Prophet by Khalil Gabrin

In a distant, timeless place, a mysterious prophet walks the sands. At the moment of his departure, he wishes to offer the people gifts but possesses nothing. The people gather round, each asks a question of the heart, and the man's wisdom is his gift. It is Gibran's gift to us, as well, for Gibran's prophet is rivaled in his wisdom only by the founders of the world's great religions. On the most basic topics--marriage, children, friendship, work, pleasure--his words have a power and lucidity that in another era would surely have provoked the description "divinely inspired." Free of dogma, free of power structures and metaphysics, consider these poetic, moving aphorisms a 20th-century supplement to all sacred traditions--as millions of other readers already have. --Brian Bruya

Monogamy Songs by Gregory Sherl

Monogamy Songs is some kind of new beast. Maybe it's a memoir. Or a book of prose poems. Or maybe those "poems" are really mini-snapshots of true, horny, heartbroken, frustrated, medicated, nervous, passionate, jealous, sweaty domesticity. Sherl's language in this book is spiked and unguarded, sometimes in shocking ways. It's also breathtakingly beautiful. Monogamy Songs is the most personal book so far by this exciting young writer.

The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis

The story takes the form of a series of letters from a senior demon, Screwtape, to his nephew, a junior "tempter" named Wormwood, so as to advise him on methods of securing the damnation of a British man, known only as "the Patient".

Screwtape holds an administrative post in the bureaucracy ("Lowerarchy") of Hell, and acts as a mentor to Wormwood, the inexperienced tempter. In the body of the thirty-one letters which make up the book, Screwtape gives Wormwood detailed advice on various methods of undermining faith and promoting sin in the Patient, interspersed with observations on human nature and Christian doctrine. Wormwood and Screwtape live in a peculiarly morally reversed world, where individual benefit and greed are seen as the greatest good, and neither demon is capable of comprehending or acknowledging true human virtue when he sees it.

Gregor the Overlander by Suzanne Collins

When eleven-year-old Gregor follows his little sister through a grate in the laundry room of their New York apartment, he hurtles into the dark Underland beneath the city. There, humans live uneasily beside giant spiders, bats, cockroaches, and rats—but the fragile peace is about to fall apart.

Gregor wants no part of a conflict between these creepy creatures. He just wants to find his way home. But when he discovers that a strange prophecy foretells a role for him in the Underland's uncertain future, he realizes it might be the only way to solve the biggest mystery of his life. Little does he know his quest will change him and the Underland forever.

The Easter Parade by Richard Yates

Children of divorced parents, sisters Sarah and Emily Grimes are observed over four decades, and grow into two very different women.Sarah is stable and stalwart, settling into an unhappy marriage.Emily is precocious and independent, struggling with one unsatisfactory love affair after another.Richard Yates's acclaimed novel is about how both women struggle to overcome their tarnished family's past, and how both finally reach for some semblance of renewal

Eleven Kinds of Loneliness by Richard Yates

Richard Yates's unflinchingly realistic stories explore loneliness, but they don't neglect failure, cruelty, and heartbreak. Most of the stories feature men who have been disappointed, somehow, by their inability to fulfill the promise of their youth.

Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov

Awe and exhilaration—along with heartbreak and mordant wit—abound in Lolita, Nabokov's most famous and controversial novel, which tells the story of the aging Humbert Humbert's obsessive, devouring, and doomed passion for the nymphet Dolores Haze. Lolita is also the story of a hypercivilized European colliding with the cheerful barbarism of postwar America. Most of all, it is a meditation on love—love as outrage and hallucination, madness and transformation.

Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy

Leo Tolstoy’s classic story of doomed love is one of the most admired novels in world literature. Generations of readers have been enthralled by his magnificent heroine, the unhappily married Anna Karenina, and her tragic affair with dashing Count Vronsky.

In their world frivolous liaisons are commonplace, but Anna and Vronsky’s consuming passion makes them a target for scorn and leads to Anna’s increasing isolation. The heartbreaking trajectory of their relationship contrasts sharply with the colorful swirl of friends and family members who surround them, especially the newlyweds Kitty and Levin, who forge a touching bond as they struggle to make a life together. Anna Karenina is a masterpiece not only because of the unforgettable woman at its core and the stark drama of her fate, but also because it explores and illuminates the deepest questions about how to live a fulfilled life.

Cinder by Marissa Meyer

Humans and androids crowd the raucous streets of New Beijing. A deadly plague ravages the population. From space, a ruthless lunar people watch, waiting to make their move. No one knows that Earth’s fate hinges on one girl. . . .

Cinder, a gifted mechanic, is a cyborg. She’s a second-class citizen with a mysterious past, reviled by her stepmother and blamed for her stepsister’s illness. But when her life becomes intertwined with the handsome Prince Kai’s, she suddenly finds herself at the center of an intergalactic struggle, and a forbidden attraction. Caught between duty and freedom, loyalty and betrayal, she must uncover secrets about her past in order to protect her world’s future.

Living Buddha, Living Christ by Thich Nhat Hanh

Buddha and Christ, perhaps the two most pivotal figures in the history of humankind, each left behind a legacy of teachings and practices that have shaped the lives of billions of people over two millennia. If they were to meet on the road today, what would each think of the other's spiritual views and practices? In this classic text for spiritual seekers, Thich Nhat Hanh explores the crossroads of compassion and holiness at which the two traditions meet, and he reawakens our understanding of both.

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(all descriptions were taken from Goodreads) 

What are some of the books on your To-Read list this Spring?