the texas review has accepted one of my poems for publication. this is my first piece published. sort of feel validated. it's an amazing feeling of euphoria. for those of you who have been published many times, does it go away or does it feel like this every time?

jason

Congrats, Jason! It is always exciting to get an acceptance. No doubt this is the first of many.
Was it a metrical poem?

no, not really a metrical poem. tried to be a sonnet. 14 lines, turn, rhyme, but i liked the language of the poem, so i decided not to put it into iamb, especially since i don't have the strongest grip on meter. prof gwynn told me it had a nice rhythm of its own. so i didn't mess with it. it did get rejected from another magazine in its original free verse form.

here's something i don't know if it is odd. i get all excited when i get rejections. i'll walk around the house going, look, so and so didn't take my poem, and i'll have a big old grin. is that odd?

jason

Jason, we all react differently. I used to groan, curse, drink, and break things. Now I reach for another envelope. Yes, an acceptance is always a pleasure.

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Ralph

Congratulations Jason! Very cool!
Raisin' a glass to ya over here!

Y'know what I'm curious about? How does one knows when the time is right to even send something out for consideration?

I'm kinda thinkin' somewhere in the vicinity of another 15-20 years for the likes of me! (Good thing I plan to live forever, eh?!)

Again, very happy for you!
What a cool Christmas present!

Clink!

---Pua

Jason:
I can't say I've ever been terribly happy about rejections. Acceptances give me mixed feelings: joy that someone likes my poem, self-consciousness at the sudden realization that it could have been and therefore should have been much, much better. All the weaknesses suddenly become painfully obvious. Then it appears in print. After many years of publishing reviews, articles, and poems (and even a few short stories), it is still almost impossible for me to read my own stuff in print. I hope you feel otherwise about your own work.
You've had the benefit of a fine teacher, and now you're getting results. Congratulations!
Richard
PS As long as we're on the subject, let me point out something obvious that we all forget: rejections often are no reflection on the quality of your work. The magazine might be full for the next several issues, the editor might have been simply transfering poems into the return envelopes in order to clear his inbox, the editor might have been in the wrong mood or just an outright crappy mood. The editor might be an idiot.

yeah, it's such a crapshoot sometimes with these journals. now, i've sent some work in, before i started studying with my prof, that i look at now and just go ugh. i can understand why they were turned away. i've had some real strong work not published. but that was when i was sending everything into these contests. which i've decided not to do anymore. i suppose i might enter one or two that look interesting, but they just don't pay off. they have to select one, whereas a magazine can take as many as they want. i like the odds better there.

i got lucky with the texas review. prof gwynn is friends with bob phillips who is the editor. so i invoked his name to get my poems looked at. got me to the first step. he rejected three others that were with the one that got accepted, and i thought 2 of them were equal to the one he took, but who knows. you know, i wouldn't mind working on one of those magazines one day. sort of a graduate assistant, when i get to grad school.

pua, the great thing about your art is that you can always change it. lots of people have published a poem one way, and then whey they collected them, made some changes. you do have to be careful about over editing. i tell when mine are 'finished' when sam gwynn says, 'looks good, send it out.' that's how i know it's done. that and i can kind of tell.

jason

Jason,

Congrats. I've been published in the Texas Review, and even with my bias, it still is a wonderful journal. Enjoy, and keep writing!!!

Peace,

Mike.

i've read a couple of issues of it. it's a good journal. i like it. even if they never publish me again, i still like it. i like the fact that they pay in a year's subscription. saves me money.

jason