Just stumbled across this interesting story of a book author promoting his book by dropping cash from a plane. You can check out the article here. Apparently, another publicity stunt helped him become a bestselling author in Indonesia a few years back.

Since I'm always wondering how to drum up interest in poetry, I started wondering if dropping money from the sky would help the poetic cause as well. Something tells me no, or if yes, then it would be for all the wrong reasons. However, maybe there's a way to slightly change Tung Desem Waringin's approach.

Instead of dropping money from the sky, maybe dropping poems from the sky would work. Maybe litter the streets with 8x11 sheets of paper with poems on both sides. Maybe do this once a week over every decent-sized city in the U.S. After all, if people are bombed with poetry long enough, there's a chance they may actually read--and (gasp!) enjoy what they're reading.

Or maybe I should get my head out of the clouds.

...this really cool portrait painted by poet/publisher/artist Didi Menendez of MiPOesias, Ocho, Oranges & Sardines, Menendez Publishing, and so much more. The portrait is of yours truly, and you can see it at http://americanpoets.blogspot.com/2008/05/robert-lee-brewer.html.

When Didi's not publishing poets, she's painting them. In this year alone, she's painted several poets, including Suzanne Frischkorn, Courtney Campbell, Ron Silliman, and Billy Collins. To check out these and others, go to http://americanpoets.blogspot.com.

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The writers conference in Los Angeles went really well. I'm so glad to have met some of my blog readers there (thanks for introducing yourselves!). The event was successful again for all involved--with happy writers, editors, agents, and even the event organizers, who are notoriously hard to please.

Hope everyone had a good time in the forum (http://forum.writersdigest.com) while I was away. Or maybe an even better use of time would've been to write a poem or two and/or submit your work.

Until later, keep poeming!

I'm prompting from sunny Los Angeles this week. The weather is perfect outside and the palm trees are already swaying. But enough about me, let's get to the prompt.

For today's prompt, let's write a poem about commerce. You can write about haggling over Christmas tree prices, bleeding money at the gas pump, getting double-charged for shampoo in the checkout aisle, or whatever. Just make sure it has something to do with buying and selling.

Here's my poem for the day:

"That's It"

I don't need any cigarettes
or beer this morning, though
I'll be back tonight, you can
bet. Probably should get one
or two tickets. Yeah, better
go ahead and do that before
I forget. Give me a fifteen
and a seven. Throw in a two
while you're at it. Do you
happen to know who won
the race last night?
                           Really?
I wish Tony Stewart'd won
because I had money on him.
Gordon, eh? Geez, I wish Tony
had won. He broke my lovely
heart. I had money on him.
Could've made something had
he won. Geez, you better go
ahead and get me a twelve
and a pack of unfiltered.

Over the weekend, I was asked by a poet for tips on how to handle criticism as he tried thinking out whether he should join a writing critique group. With his work, he was afraid of a few things:

1. He wouldn't be able to handle the critiques. That is, he was afraid too much negativity would lead him to give up writing.
2. He wouldn't find the right readers to give critiques. He'd written a massive blank verse poem, and he's afraid the wrong group won't appreciate his words.
3. He won't appreciate the written words of his peers. He seemed to have a particular view of other contemporary writers--thinking much of today's writing is kinda like spam.

Now, I'm not going to get into a debate of his stance on contemporary poetry, which I personally think has very good vital signs. However, as a former participant of several online critique groups and a student that logged more than 60 credit hours in writing courses at the University of Cincinnati, I will speak a little on the value of critique groups.

So there, I've already tipped my hand: I think critique groups are valuable, even if you don't agree with the critiques. And here's why:

First, the only way to gauge if something is actually working for your readers is to solicit feedback. Sure, you know what you're trying to do, but you don't know if anyone else is picking up on it unless you hear it from your readers. After all, you can't go around explaining your intentions to every reader--unless you actually want a very small audience.

Second, bad feedback is still valuable, because it forces you to look hard at your work and try to justify exactly why a particular line or image is fine as it is. And you need to be honest with yourself. If you can't honestly defend your work, then you may have an area that needs revision.

Third, there's nothing better than good feedback. After taking in all the praise though, be sure to develop a certain sense of paranoia. Is everything really okay? Can I change a line here or there? I've found that when I receive absolutely no negative feedback that I'm usually more self-critical of my work. After all, there's no such thing as a perfect poem.

Fourth, critique groups give you the ability to talk out problems you're having. If you know something's not working, you can ask the group to pay attention to x or y and give specific feedback.

Fifth, critique groups provide camaraderie with other poets. And that's often hard to do, especially if you don't live in a major city--but even there, poets are a bit hermetic and love to fly solo.

So there are some reasons why critique groups--as well as workshops, conferences and creative writing programs--are a good thing (in my opinion).

*****

As far as handling the criticism, as mentioned above, you should always be prepared to defend and scrutinize your work. It's a crazy tightrope act, but one that poets need to perform to get the most out of their lines.

Personally, I always bring a new poem to my critique group hoping for the best and expecting the worst. Usually, I find my words are somewhere in the middle.

Currently, I'm not a part of a critique group, but I still have some trusted readers for poems that I feel are close to getting where I want them to be. These are the readers I trust to let me know if my writing is hitting the mark or falling short. I know they'll let me know, because we've built up a level of trust over the years--both in giving and receiving criticism. Hopefully, if you haven't already, you will be able to find such a group of trusted readers.

Okay, had a great Memorial Day weekend with my boys. And I'm now super tired, because something told me it was a good idea to go for a 3 1/2-mile run late last night and then follow it up with a 4-miler this morning. But such is life when trying to get in shape with a busy travel schedule. That's right, I'm headed out to Los Angeles, California, this afternoon with an expected arrival time of 9:06 p.m. (PST). Gonna be workin' the BEA/WD Writers Conference tomorrow--starting bright and early at 7:30 a.m.

If you're planning on attending, definitely feel free to pull me aside and say, "Hey," followed by what you like or dislike about this blog.

If you want to know more about the conference, go to http://www.writersdigest.com/bea.

*****

Related to my travel-o-rama, just wanted to let you know that the blog posts may be a bit spotty this week/weekend. I think my blogger friend Chuck Sambuchino (http://guidetoliteraryagents.com/blog) will have a laptop with Internet access at our undisclosed location--so Wednesday's Poetry Prompt should get up tomorrow morning. However, if there are any problems, I'll get it up as soon as I'm able.

*****

If you're bored in my absence and don't have me as a Facebook friend, please request me--I'm listed as Robert Lee Brewer, and I look kinda like that guy up in the upper left-hand corner of this page. ;)

For those of you without a Facebook account, they are free and easy to set up. And they offer online Scrabble. Is there anything cooler than that online? Outside of my blog, that is?