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This Is How We Do It…

Just read Rilke’s Letters to a Young Poet and Baca’s Writing in the Dark: Reflections of a Poet in the Barrio.

Rilke was my way of ending the year and Baca was the jumpoff for ’09. Both books serve as great guides for any writer who is feeling an internal dilemma when it comes to their writing process. For me that used to revolve around feeling community acceptance but not feeling like the community itself was pushing me to go deeper in my writing. And, in all fairness, that wasn’t communities job anyways.

A point of clarification, when I say community in the past tense, I am referring to my old NYC Open Mic haunts. If I say community in the present tense, I am referring to writers whose work inspires me via print, blog, correspondence or is just a chill person to hang around with.

These days, community pushes me forward by giving me longer blueprints for literary success which means I am reading more now than I ever have but am also ready to dedicate real sit-down time for more writing, editing, revision, submission and some critical writing. Will this plan work? We’ll see in 2010.

Back to the maestros, Rilke’s slim volume is so direct and no hassle, cutting past all the ga-ga and reaches the core question everybody who first puts it down on page is asking to themselves: Am I a real writer? Hell, it’s a question that has dogged me for years after I started laying it down on the pad. All to say, this is a classic text and one I can see myself revisiting every end of the year.

Baca’s book is a bit more broad and deals with the specifics of isolationism, not from writing but from living though incarceration, racial stereotypes and the benign neglect of inadequate state services. All of these factors being something that I have always lived with (though I’ve only felt the repurcussions of incarceration from a distance) and have worked their way into my writing life. But those specific experiences shouldn’t make this a guide for a select few, the sting of all these outside forces has forced the writer to travel within so when he speaks of “writing in the dark” it becomes a place of quiet and possibility where one can reinvent themselves through their writing. The result is a poetry that is every bit as internal as the process Rilke details but also honors the individual’s sense of personal history.

In the here and now, I’m finding other texts that are guiding my way through the new kid on the block I keep calling “da manuscript.”
• Barb has been detailing the formation of Diwata for a long time now and seeing it move from a concept, to text, to revision, with the next step, book editing, looming on the horizon.
• Oliver de la Paz has a new post on the current layout of his MS. I’m appreciating the snapshot he is sharing with the blogosphere and am eager to see how the final revision will look like.
• Javier is also pulling the curtain back and revealing the mechanics behind his new collection, the classes he’ll be teaching and more.
• Vince Gotera goes backwards in time and draws a map of how his first book, Dragonfly, came to be. His posts on metrics and rhymes are also badass and just the kind of poet education I’m always lookin’ for.
• Linh Dinh’s recent Harriet post, What I Usually Say to my Students, drops some great advice and generates an interesting dialogue in the comment stream.
• Rigoberto González, one of the most prolific writers I know, is always a great resource for how to improve one’s craft. Peep this interview at ForeWord Magazine.

And we’ll end with Gabriela Mistral and her breakdown on what it is to be an artist.

    Decálogo del Artista

    I. Amarás la belleza, que es la sombra de Dios sobre el Universo.

    II. No hay arte ateo. Aunque no ames al Creador, lo afirmarás creando a su semejanza.

    III. No darás la belleza como cebo para los sentidos, sino como el natural alimento del alma.

    IV. No te será pretexto para la lujuria ni para la vanidad, sino ejercicio divino.

    V. No la buscarás en las ferias ni llevarás tu obra a ellas, porque la Belleza es virgen, y la que está en las ferias no es Ella.

    VI. Subirá de tu corazón a tu canto y te habrá purificado a ti el primero.

    VII. Tu belleza se llamará también misericordia, y consolará el corazón de los hombres.

    VII. Darás tu obra como se da un hijo: restando sangre de tu corazón.

    IX. No te será la belleza opio adormecedor, sino vino generoso que te encienda para la acción, pues si dejas de ser hombre o mujer, dejarás de ser artista.

    X. De toda creación saldrás con vergüenza, porque fué inferior a tu sueño, e inferior a ese sueno maravilloso de Dios, que es la Naturaleza.

    © Gabriela Mistral

Some VidPo from Small Press Traffic’s "Locals" MLA Reading

The highlight of my X-Mas Stocking was a brand new shiny digital camcorder. This badboy will not only let me record more live poetry readings but also acts as an MP3 recorder which means I can start to submit with fury to some of the online journals that are putting up audio poems. Wicked! As you’ll see from the playlist below, my new toy picks up some great audio (so all of y’all who attend poetry readings to be seen and have long & loud side conversations while the poet is on the mic– you might find yo’self on blast!) but still has focus problem with venues that have poor lighting.

Poems from Xochiquetzal Candelaria, Oscar Bermeo, Javier O. Huerta, and Del Ray Cross recorded at SPT’s ‘Locals’ MLA Reading at the Hotel Utah.

Acknowledgment: 2008

I’m looking through some old blog posts to capture where my head was at last year when it came to my writing and am happy to see that I’m still the same puzzled but thoroughly optimistic marginal writer I was last year.

Marginal not in the “Oh woe is me! When will the world recognize me!!” type tragic figure but marginal in the “Hey, I have nothing to lose and everything to gain by writing poems that challenge myself.” So maybe I am not the same writer cuz last year I was not happy with being marginal. I can distinctly remember a time in the midst of 2008 where I was hella pissed off about being on the sidelines and the perception that my writing and my opinions were being overlooked in favor of more recognized writers. Yeah, it was a little bit of a pity party and I was the Promoter, DJ, MC, Doorman and the Crowd.

The good news is that said Pity Party resulted in me making some strong power moves and getting more attention the best way I can: Writing more, revising more, publishing my own chap and reading in more public spaces.

I fell a little short in the last department but look to rectify that in 2009 and try to hustle for some more local gigs that will keep my performance poetry skills sharp and aid in my editing process.

Speaking of goals, a private one I made for myself was to regularly write more article length book reviews and send them out to various journals for publication. I completely dropped the ball on this and instead settled for shorter reviews on my Good Reads page. I’ll consider this a good start in the right direction but not where I want to be next year in terms of serious literary review.

A goal that I did stick to from last year is the release of a new chapbook in 2008. Funny thing is that last year at this time I was working on a chapbook project with poems from my last KSW Workshop with Truong Tran but put that project on hold because of National Poetry Month and ended up writing a new set of poems that became Palimpsest. I’m still revising that chapbook and hope to get it done before April since I plan on attacking NaPoWriMo again and developing more poems for my manuscript.

With all that said I want to give 2008 a major shout out as a year where I became even more serious about my writing, learned the difference between revision and editing (Thank you, Robert Vasquez), learned that being marginal is not a bad thing at all, and went back to being the guy who is willing to take a few risks.

An extra shout out to anyone who published me, asked me to submit work, left a comment on the blog, bought one of my chapbooks, swapped some good media for one of my chaps, and/or reads the blog on a regular basis. For reals, thanks much.

Some highlights from 2008:
• Co-featuring with Barb at the Sacramento Poetry Center
• OCHO #15
• CrossBRONX
• The publication release party for In the Grove #16
• Hosting and reading for Achiote Press
• Reading at the Eastlake Sessions
• Returning to the BX and reading at Spanic Attack’s sudaca bronx jam in front of family, friends and colleagues
• Hangin in NYC with my family and best friend
• Being chosen as a finalist for this year’s Andrés Montoya Prize
• BorderSenses
• Introducing Edwin Torres at SPT
• Ozone Park
• Palimpsest
• Meeting, hanging out with, and reading alongside Jimmy Santiago Baca
• Reading at Books and Bookshelves with Camille Dungy and DeWayne Dickerson

Rest In Power: raulrsalinas, Reginald Lockett, Alfred Arteaga, Studs Turkel, Mahmoud Darwish, John Leonard and all the voices that left us to early.