Suzanne Frischkorn gets to lead off the 2009 poet interviews on Poetic Asides. (Woo-hoo! Yay! Hurrah!)

I enjoyed reading Frischkorn's most recent--and first full length--collection, Lit Windowpane (Main Street Rag Publishing Company), for many reasons. First, the poems are "spare," which is a fancy way of saying they are unassuming poems that pack a punch. Second, the poems seem to communicate with each other throughout--making the whole even stronger than it's individual parts, which are doing fine on their own (many of them published in publications, such as Diode, MARGIE, and No Tell Motel).

Here's a personal favorite of mine from Lit Windowpane:

Ruin

In the spider and on the web. On the branch
and in the pothole. Yellowed grass, wilted
fern, blackened growth. On the skeletal
stems of black-eyed Susans and in dawn's
stretch. The glint of street lights. The sibilant
mulberry behind blinds. Empty sky. Listen
to these old windows,
how they lend themselves to rattle.

What are you currently up to?

I’m putting together a new collection of poems, working on some essays and editing the New Haven issue of Locuspoint.

Mary Oliver describes your writing as "select and elegant," while James Hoch says your writing is "spare." I noticed it, too. Is that sparseness something you consciously do with your writing?

No, when I begin writing a poem I don’t plan how that poem will end, what shape it will take, or set out for a particular style. I let the poem lead me.

How many drafts do your poems tend to make? And, do you think your poems go through more or less drafts now than when you first started getting published?

I revise a lot when I'm working on a poem, but I've never counted individual drafts, I know it's many -- many, many drafts. My writing process doesn’t seem to have changed with publication.

Many reviews mention your focus on nature in Lit Windowpane, but a lot of that nature seems focused on the water. Is there a reason for this?

Water is definitely one of the unifying elements of the book. I once read that your childhood landscape will always be your landscape no matter where you live in adulthood. After writing Lit Windowpane, I realize that's true. Most of my early childhood was spent on Miami Beach, and for many years I lived a short walk from Long Island Sound. The poems in the book were written after I had moved inland. In hindsight of course it’s obvious that I miss being close to the water. 

Before Lit Windowpane, you published five chapbooks. What do you feel makes a good chapbook? 

My favorite chapbooks have a focused theme, either through image, style, form, or any of the numerous ways to create a sequence of poems. I’m partial to the chapbook in any case, including the chapbook without a theme that gives a sample of the poet’s work. The bibliophile in me loves the chapbook as an art object.

You have a nice website that includes information about you, your collections, and readings. What function do you think a website should serve for a poet?

Thank you. A website allows a poet to have a web presence that’s current, directs those interested in her/his work to points of interest, and includes contact information. Basically it should function as a marketing tool.

You've been published in several journals. How do you handle submitting and tracking your submissions?

I tend to either submit a lot or not at all, meaning I’ll go through regular periods of sending my work out and then find I need a break from the administrative side of poetry. My submission tracking system is rudimentary, it’s usually a word document that lists the name of the journal, poems submitted, the date of submission, and a note on whether the journal accepts simultaneous submissions or not.

Who are you currently reading?

Jean Valentine and Ralph Angel.

If you could pass on only one piece of advice to fellow poets, what would it be?

Read, read, read and read.

*****

To check out Suzanne's website, go to: http://www.suzannefrischkorn.net/

To check out Suzanne's publisher's website, go to: http://www.mainstreetrag.com/

*****

To learn how you, too, could possibly end up interviewed on this here blog, go to: http://blog.writersdigest.com/poeticasides/Call+For+Poets.aspx

For something kinda cool and really freaky, check out this piece from the NY Times blogs: http://ideas.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/01/09/dead-poets-animated-society/

Apparently, an animator by the name of Jim Clark has taken old photos of poets, such as Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson, and brought them to life so that it appears the poets are reciting some of their best known poems.

If you want something fun to try this weekend, here's a poetry exercise that I often employ myself in creating drafts of poems.

First, write a line or two. Don't worry about writing any further than that. The line can be a random thought that pops into your head, or something interesting that you hear someone say. Remember: Don't worry about any larger meaning when writing this line, and don't spend more than a few minutes--at the most--completing this task.

Then, in a hour or so, write another line or two without taking into consideration the earlier line you wrote. Again, don't worry about any larger meaning. Just write the line and move on with your daily routine.

Repeat this process every hour or so throughout the day or over a few days.

Then, collect all the random lines and try to make a poem out of them.

The beauty of this exercise is that it forces you to get creative with connections and juxtapositions of ideas and images. While this exercise may or may not produce a poem you like, it helps exercise your poetic muscles in a way that you can use this same technique to help with poem revisions later on down the road.

Since I like to provide examples, here are random lines I've produced over the past week:

* Don't even change your face.
* You'll never take me alive.
* What's between here and there.
* I still write love poems.
* Plane tickets and video games.
* Here she comes again.
* I'll take you wherever I want.
* Not everybody is a good guy.

Here's my attempt with these lines:

"What's between"

Not everybody is a good guy,
and I still write love poems. Here she
comes again, saying, "Don't even change
your face. You'll never take me alive."
Plane tickets and video games
in her purse, she tries being sincere,
but we're the only ones here who care
about what's between here and there.
I grab her wrist and tell her,
"I'll take you wherever I want."

*****

As you can see, I took several lines that were unrelated and made something out of them. It's definitely a first draft, but I think it's a good example of how you can employ this technique. None of the random lines were written with this poem in mind. In fact, half the lines were things I overheard others say that I found interesting.

Anyway, here's my little poetry exercise for the weekend.

It's been some time since I've tackled a poetry question. This question was sent in a while ago, and deals with a situation I've experienced personally myself (and is probably common to many poets who've submitted their work long enough).

What can/can't we do with a poem that was either accepted by a journal and then never used, or accepted by a journal that died before they used it?

First off, let me just say that I'm not a lawyer, so don't take my word as law. That said, I can't imagine a lawsuit involving poetry, and I'm married to a paralegal.

I'll address the latter case first (the journal that died before using the poem). Unless the journal bought the rights to your poem before dying, I don't see any reason why the poem would not still be considered unpublished. While it's disappointing that the poem was so close to publication, you should be able to move the poem back into your bin of poems that need to be submitted.

If you were paid for the poem already, then you may need to contact the editors about releasing the rights to your poem. But if the journal died before they used the poem, you probably weren't paid.

The other case (the journal that accepts a poem and never uses it) is only a little more complex. If the journal accepted your poem and has not paid you for it, then contact the editor to find out what he or she plans to do with the poem. If the editor does not have an acceptable answer to your query, then request that it be removed from consideration in a future edition of the publication. And I suggest being nice about how you handle this, especially if you may wish to submit to that particular publication or editor again. In this case, as above, the poem would still be considered unpublished.

If the journal accepted your poem and has paid you for it, things can get a little trickier. Most likely, you will need to pay back the publisher, and there's even the (very slight) possibility that the publication will not release the first publication rights to the poem. I doubt the situation would come to this in 99.9% of the cases. Most editors/publishers want to work with writers, not against them.

*****

Click here for other Poetry FAQs.

If you don't find an answer to your question there, then feel free to send me an e-mail at robert.brewer@fwmedia.com.

Well, after taking last week off, here we are again ready to write poems, right? I hope that you've been able to hit the ground running in 2009 by writing, revising, and maybe even submitting your poems. I've been able to do some writing and revising so far, but I need to submit some poems somewhere today to be able to keep that 2009 resolution alive.

Anyway, now that we're in a new year, I think it makes sense to make this week's prompt to write a poem that deals with something new. You can decide what that new thing is. You could write about the new year, a new item (many people just received gifts during the holidays last month), a new relationship, or even the lack of anything new.

Here's my attempt for the day:

"Will"

She drove through the mountains
at night and in a fog to find me
waiting for her. It was still early
in spring. She was a little scared,
but she came. Then, we wandered
around, found ourselves in church
beside a receding lake. She drove
through the mountains, because
she believed in something new.

I know I'm a day late on the Happy New Year post (and that I completely missed the Wednesday Poetry Prompt), but I've been very preoccupied with the family this past week. You see, I've had all four of my boys since Saturday--so we've been playing games, watching movies, going to playgrounds, attending family gatherings, etc. We've been totally familying (new word) it up this week.

I believe in setting goals. So, I guess I'm going to share my New Year Poetry Resolutions. If you want to, feel free to share yours as well in the comments below.

1. Write at least one first draft of a poem each week. (Should be do-able if I can manage to not miss any Wednesday Poetry Prompts--or PAD Challenges--in 2009.)

2. Submit poems at least once each week. (This is the one I always have trouble keeping.)

3. Revise at least one poem each week. (Preferably more.)

4. Assemble a collection to submit around to publishers.

5. Attend more poetry readings/events/etc. this year than last.

6. Read at least 2-3 collections of poetry each month.

7. Live, learn, and love!!!!!

I did not forget today was Wednesday. Things have just been a bit busy. Now I need to get to sleep here soon before Santa shows up with his sleigh, but let's do our Wednesday prompt first. Baby Will is laying across my lap and looking around--probably wondering what all the clicking-clacking noises of my keyboard are. In the living room, I can hear A Christmas Story streaming in across TBS. They just covered the part where Ralphie decodes the message: Be sure to drink your Ovaltine.

That sparked my idea for this week's prompt. I want you to write an acrostic poem. An acrostic takes the first letter of each line and spells out a message (or word); or it takes the last letter of each line and spells out a message (or word); or a double acrostic takes both the first and last letters of each line. Anyway, I was thinking of Ralphie with his secret message and thought maybe we could write secret messages of our own.

Here's my attempt:

"For Real"

Some people don't believe,
and some people do.
Not that it matters to me,
though not believing seems
appropriate for those
clowns who think angels
lash out against demons

and punish everyone
under heaven who isn't
saved today. Forgiveness
is a limited time offer for
some people. But Santa
Claus still rides his sleigh
over the cornfields and

mountains, over the tropical
islands and the frigid
nations. Santa Claus is
going to do what he can
to make good children happy,
or give coal to the bad.
The last thing a person

offers should be their hard
won good behavior. They
never think anything exists.

Both mom and son are happy and healthy.

William James Brewer entered the world at 10:02 am. He weighed in at 8 lbs, 1 oz; he measured 20" longways, 14" around the head, 13" around the chest.

Actually, for those who follow the blog religiously and know of my obsession with the number 808, it actually made an appearance again this morning--for when Baby Will was weighed, the scale read 8 lbs, 0.8 oz. The nurses, of course, rounded up to 8 lbs, 1 oz.

Since Tammy and I were married on 08/08/08 at 8:08, we figured this was just one more good omen.

Anyway, I just stopped by the apartment to walk the dog. Gonna get back to the hospital for the mommy-daddy-baby sleepover.

It's our combined 4th time through this process, but it's still just as exciting (though, luckily, just a tad less nerve-wracking) as the first time. Tammy and I are currently getting ready and will be hitting the road in a few to deliver William James Brewer via C-section. Wish us luck!

Either later tonight or tomorrow, I'll send details of how everything went.