Michael Sikkema : my (small press) writing day

I don’t have a writing day or writing routine. No office no desk no ritual no retreat no system. I’ve had time to write this because I was rained out at work.

I don’t have a writing day. I have fits and starts, 10 minutes between conferences, some time in my car before the rest of my landscaping crew shows up, late nights with a very bad movie muted and mashed up with good music, sometimes early mornings when dream still fogs everything and no one else is awake.

I compose in small notebooks and on notecards. Both push me to condense. If I’m working on a chapbook or book project, the notecards allow me to ignore ideas about order and sequence as I shuffle them each time before I re-read them.

Usually I have a stack of books on my bedstand and another on our dining room table, with a third stack in the kitchen that has to go back to the public or university library.  Reading always informs my writing whether that’s the plan or not. I like all genres but prefer texts broken up, so I can read a passage in between this or that. Sometimes while camping, I can sit and read an entire book cover to cover.

I don’t have a writing day because of kids and jobs and everything else but that’s perfect because when faced with the odd open block of hours, I can’t just sit down and turn on the poetry tap anyway. Rather than a writing day, I usually write a little everyday. It works.

Michael Sikkema is the author of 4 full length collections of poetry, around a dozen chapbooks or collaborative chapbooks, and can be found most often in West Michigan, migrating northernly in the summer.

Darren C. Demaree : My Writing Day

Without flowery language, I present to you my writing day, and since I write every single day I give this bare schedule to show other writers that even if you have a job or jobs and a family you can be incredibly productive if take every opportunity given to you to write.

6:30 am – Wake up.

6:45 – Feed dogs.

7:00 – Feed Baby Kathryn.

7:20 – Make breakfast for family.

7:45 – Take dogs out.

8:00 – Wife heads to work.

8:20 – Take Belle to 2^nd grade.

8:45 – Take Thomas to Pre-K.

9:15 – Feed Kathryn and put her down for her nap.

9:30-11 – Read poetry.  Work on sequence mapping, or sketch new poem titles/ideas.

11:15 – Pick up Thomas from Pre-K.

11:30 – Make lunch for Thomas and I.

12:00pm – Feed Kathryn.

12:30 – Set Thomas up with books/toys/show.

12:45-2 – Write new poetry.

2:30 – Wake up Kathryn, feed her.

3:00 – Take dogs out.

3:30  Pick up Belle from School.

4:00 – Poetry business.  Return emails, send out poems/manuscripts, sign contracts, etc.

5:00 – Make dinner for family.  Feed dogs.

5:30 – Wife comes home.

6:00-8:00 – Editing work or teaching.

8:30 – Help put the kids to bed.

9:30 – Watch the end of a game or a movie.

11:00 – Go to sleep.

I get two and half to four hours a day where I can be lazy or I can write.  I choose writing every time.

Darren C. Demaree is the author of eight poetry collections, most recently Two Towns Over, which was selected the winner of the Louise Bogan Award from Trio House Press. He is also the recipient of a 2018 Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Award, and the Nancy Dew Taylor Award from Emrys Journal. He is the Managing Editor of the Best of the Net Anthology and Ovenbird Poetry.  He is currently living in Columbus, Ohio with his wife and children.

Jose Hernandez Diaz : my (small press) writing day

I haven’t had a writing day in a while because I’ve been focused on editing and submitting my manuscript for the past year or so. I think I’ll be motivated to create new work after my first manuscript lands with the right press. With that said, I think of reading, editing, submitting, and writing as part of the same family. Nevertheless, I will now describe what an average writing day looked like for me as I wrote my manuscript:

I wake up at 7:30-8, check my email. Then I make coffee. I tend to drink strong coffee. I have some cereal. Shower. Then I drive to the library.

I enter the library and take the escalator to the second floor. I go to the contemporary poetry section and get books to read. Some books this library has: Dome of the Hidden Pavilion by James Tate, Slow Lightning by Eduardo C. Corral, Bright Dead Things by Ada Limón, Shock by Shock by Dean Young, Life on Mars by Tracy K. Smith, Black Aperture by Matt Rasmussen. I own most of these books, too. I usually read two or three books at a time so I don’t get bored with one text.

On a good writing day, I’ll first read some poetry/prose poetry at the desk for an hour or so. Maybe I’ll read an online journal. Some favorites: Triquarterly, New Orleans Review, The Journal, Poetry Northwest.

Also, I’ll listen to some experimental music. Dave Douglas or Matthew Shipp. Chicano Batman, Las Cafeteras, or Kendrick Lamar. When I feel I’m in a good zone, I’ll start looking up lists of verbs. I’ll select a word from the list, for example, “threw.” Then I will begin, “A man threw a football toward the top of a skyscraper, in Downtown Los Angeles.” I have to be in the right mood. Then I will add another line. Then another. Etc. I usually go with whatever comes out, trying to flow with the absurdity or surrealism of the prose poem. Some days the words come out easily. Other days, I don’t feel inspired and I stick to reading or editing. Or Twitter.

If it’s a good day, I’ll have 3 drafts of prose poems. If it’s a slow day, I’ll have 1 or zero drafts. I tend to keep most of the initial writing. Maybe I’ll have some minor grammatical edits.

When it comes time to submit, I try to send to 5-10 journals. Sometimes I’ll send prematurely. Once I get the poem in a final form, I typically won’t stop sending it out until it gets picked up. If I believe in the poem, I won’t give up on it. Since my writing tends to be surreal or strange (and not what I’d call “mainstream”) I usually receive some rejections. Still, if I believe the poem is strong, I will stick with it and keep sending it out. They eventually land. It helped when I got the NEA fellowship because I feel it validated my otherwise unorthodox writing style. Before that, I’d try to legitimize this writing style by saying “Well, James Tate and Ray Gonzalez are celebrated for writing odd prose poems. I can do it, too.”

I leave the library around sunset. Maybe I’ll look at the koi fish in the fountain. In the past, I’d smoke a cigarette. Presently, I’m trying to quit.

I get home and eat. When I get a chance, I’ll look over the poems I wrote that day on my laptop. Maybe I’ll make some final edits or send out another submission. In bed, I’ll watch the news and check if the Dodgers, Lakers, or Rams won. I go to sleep around 11:30 pm.

Jose Hernandez Diaz is a 2017 NEA Poetry Fellow. He holds degrees from the University of California, Berkeley, and Antioch University Los Angeles. His work appears in The Best American Nonrequired Reading, Green Mountains Review, Huizache, North American Review, Pleiades, The Progressive, The Shallow Ends, Verse Daily, Witness, among others. He has served as an editor for Floricanto Press and Lunch Ticket. His manuscript was a finalist for the 2018 Andrés Montoya Poetry Prize. He tweets at @JoseHernandezDz.

Jónína Kirton : April 30th, 2018

8:00 am – Woke with my eyes full of grit and a face I do not recognize. Something to do with water retention and the way my pillow and my face interacted. I shrug it off, brush my teeth, then boil water for tea.

8:10 am – Tea in hand I join hubby in the living room for our early morning CNN.

8:45 am – I get restless. All those emails are calling my name, so I head for my desk. First, I check Facebook and WORD. It is not my turn. Last Saturday I played JOINTS for 34 points and have been waiting for my cousin to make her move. My joints are stiff. I should probably do some stretches and eat better but there is Room Magazine stuff, Writer’s Studio stuff, Aboriginal Writers Collective – Westcoast stuff, invites to events, people to invoice and then there are those who I need to thank for past events etc. The emails never seem to stop. There is always more. I find myself wondering what a day off would feel like.

9:15 am – I begin to work on a manuscript that I am consulting on. This is probably the fifth thorough read. I have been making notes in track changes for days now but end up deleting half my comments as they seemed too much. Doubt is riding me hard today.

11:45 am – Took a wee break from the manuscript. Had a tea and yogurt with granola and berries. Peeked in on Facebook and saw it was my move on WORD. I played ‘DIM’ for 24 points. Not because I am feeling dim. It was my best move.

12:05 pm – Back to the manuscript. Thinking I will be done very soon but I am so wrong.

12:30 pm – Feeling stressed now so back on Facebook and it was my turn again so played ‘SIX’ for 40 points. I have six books of poetry to read before May 8^th. I am on a jury for an important poetry prize. My eyes are already tired. Thank Goddess for these expensive computer glasses. They were a good investment. 

12:35 pm – Checking twitter for notifications and to see what everyone is up to. Retweeted a few things and commented on the hypocritical outpouring of those offended by the White House Correspondence dinner’s comedian, Michelle Wolf. I am thinking if she was a man would there be this outrage and why is the president allowed to call people names and say disgusting things… he said filthy in a tweet about her. Whose filthy… I mean really?

12:40 pm – Outrage is over, and I am back at that manuscript finding ways to offer critiquing that is supportive when what I really want to do is rewrite some of the poems. Did I just say that out loud? There are no control issues here. I am not a perfectionist. But then… I can spend days, weeks and months on a poem, dissecting and analyzing every word, every line and every line break. I have been known to edit a poem until its raw juiciness is lost. I learned the hard way to keep all drafts. Yup, I really could lead this poet astray so remind myself, less is more. That works well with poetry.

1:00 pm – Suddenly there is a strange beeping sound on my computer and someone who appears to be Apple says I need to do a scan. It looks like the Apple website, so I press SCAN and then panic. Within seconds I am on a call with Apple. We spend 45 minutes sorting out how to install malware and do a real scan. There has been no damage to the computer, but I have many other questions for the agent as I have been saving them all up for when I had time to make a call. Things like the fact that I have not been able to access OneDrive since that last MAC update. He can’t help me and fear I may have lost a lot of work. Thankfully, my more recent work is on my MAC and backed up on my Time Machine. I need a time machine… I am running out of time.

1:45 pm – Back to that manuscript and now I am feeling good about it. I think I know what to suggest and where to back away. I know how important it is to not mess with a poet’s voice. Our poet selves can be so fragile. I once didn’t write for a year after receiving feedback that I felt was too harsh.

3:15 pm – I am back on Facebook and playing WORD. I played ‘BONE’ for 16 points this time. BONE is a word that appears in the title of my first book, page as bone – ink as blood. BONE and bones is throughout my writing. Perhaps because mine often hurt. But I digress. The score is 80 to 66 and I am winning. I never win against this guy and so will not get too excited as he has many tricks up his sleeve.

3:20 pm – Back to the manuscript. We are almost there.  

3:45 pm -  I think I am done with the manuscript. I draft an email with my thoughts and spend thirty minutes adding and deleting things I think I want to say. I question myself over and over. Am I saying too much? Am I apologizing too much? Am I making sense? Eventually it comes together, and I press SEND. $350 will be due and it only took me forty hours of work and we are probably not done. I think I should have asked for more money. Will I get quicker at this? Goddess, I hope so.

4:15 pm – Finally took a shower, washed my hair and now a walk but first a few more emails. Did I mention how tired I am? I have sixty-two grant applications to read, four ten-page manuscripts and six books of poetry to read as a judge. Did I mention how tired I am and that the sink is full of dirty dishes and that my taxes are due but not done. It is April 30^th. I hope I don’t owe money.

4:30 pm – The walk is lovely. I leave tobacco, offer prayers at the beginning of my walk. The sun is shining, and I am happy to be outside. While walking I come across a new boxing school and they are offering a free month. I have been sitting all day and am in need of a regular exercise program. I peer into the open door and try to imagine myself boxing at my age. I wish it was a yoga studio. I would love to walk to yoga. I would love to do yoga. Next block I come to the Buddhist Temple. I stand outside hoping to hear some chants but nothing. I often stand outside and listen.

I love my neighbourhood, there is so much diversity here.

4:55 pm – I am close to home and just passing my favourite coffee shop. I want to go in and order a hot chocolate with whipping cream, but I resist. They have the best whipping cream, but I have a salad waiting for dinner and just burned enough calories for that. There will be no weight lost today. The best I can hope for is not to gain.

5:00 pm – Back to emails and writing this.

6:09 pm – My cousin rejoins our WORD game. She makes a big comeback with JOLT for 42 points. I am still in the lead with 146 to her 128. And it is my turn. I usually win when we play.

6:11 pm – I put down “QI” for 45 points. I am smiling. My QI is riding high as I am heading off to the kitchen to make my salad and kiss my husband who has just returned from his saxophone lesson. What a patient man he is.

6:23 pm – Salad in hand and heading for the TV I am considering getting back into my pajamas for the evening but resist.

6:25 pm – I am in my pajamas. We watch, Terror and 2 episodes of the The Crossing.

9:30 pm – Hubby takes a smoke break and I peek in on Facebook re my WORD games. My friend, the one that always wins, has played FANAL for 32 points. Is that even a word? I look it up and according to Merriam-Webster it is archaic language for a beacon on a ship or a lighthouse. I feel I am in need of a beacon, a lighthouse to point the way. Being a self-employed writer is not easy. So many decisions to be made, so much to do. I miss the days of just writing poetry for the sake of poetry. Oh, have I mentioned I did not write any poetry today and that I have a bird poem due for a chapbook that will be launched at the International Ornithologists’ Union in August. I have been paired with a scientist working with endangered birds in Argentina. We have talked via skype and I have her field notes for inspiration. So far, I have three lines…

in the cavity of this tree   

cooperative breeding

may or may not have taken place

Goddess help me find a way to write about this great scientist’s work with endangered birds.

11:00 pm – Checked Facebook while hubby brushes his teeth. I played SAVIOUR for 92 points. Both the scientist and I are trying to be saviours. She on her tummy in the rainforest watching her wee fledglings falling out of trees onto ledges during flash flooding and me well I am only trying to save myself from the tide of paper, all the things I have to read, review and comment on. My ‘fledglings’ are those I mentor and they are strong and no one is falling out of the nest and onto the ledge if I can help it. 

Jónína Kirton is a Métis/Icelandic poet/author and facilitator. Born in Treaty One (Portage la Prairie, Manitoba) she currently lives in the unceded territory of the Musqueam, Sḵwxwú7mesh, and Tsleil-Waututh. A Room Magazine Editorial Board member she is one of the co-founders of their new reading series, Indigenous Brilliance, an exciting new partnership between Room and Massy Books. Kirton received the 2016 Vancouver’s Mayor’s Arts Award for an Emerging Artist in the Literary Arts category. She was sixty when she published her first collection of poetry with Talonbooks in 2015. Much to her delight, page as bone ~ ink as blood, has received some critical acclaim. Two years later she brought us her second collection, An Honest Woman, again with Talonbooks.  The book was a finalist in the Dorothy Livesay Poetry Prize. Betsy Warland had this to say about An Honest Woman: “Kirton picks over how she was raised familially and culturally like a crime scene.” Apparently, all that dreaming about being a Nancy Drew when she grew up did come to fruition. Just not the way she thought it would as a child.