eternalquiet

If each of you could have a mermaid-adjacent superpower or magical ability, what would it be?

I have a few questions I hope you don't mind answering:

1.) Did you formally study poetry anywhere, like in college or anything? If so, what program did you attend?

2.) Have you ever submitted to / been accepted by any contest or literary journals?

3.) Who are some of your favorite poets? Do you find that any other poets have influenced your style?

1.) That's really cool. I focused on English and Theatre Education when I was in undergrad, and I just finished my MFA in Creative Writing with an emphasis in poetry.

2.) I feel that so hard! Submitting to journals is tough, and it's hard to find a good home for your work. And if you're going for the contest circuit or trying to get a book published, it can be expensive to pay for the submission fees. I've got a book I'm trying to get published right now, because I'd like to get into teaching, and having at least one publishing credit would be good.

And it does kinda seem like your audience, if you're submitting to journals, is most likely to be writers in a more academic setting.

3.) I haven't read any of them, and now I have some new entries on my reading list! My favorite poets in recent memory have probably been Nick Flynn (specifically his collection "Some Ether") and Aaron Smith (and his collection "Primer"). I recently re-read Brian Turner's collection "Here, Bullet" and remembered why I loved it so much the first time.

Yeah, man. He made a comment regarding the fact that he plays video games sometimes. He must be a total loser with no life.

I have been anxious pretty much all of my life. My first panic attack was when I was 7. We didn't know it was a panic attack at the time, but looking back I recognize it for what it was. That anxiety has been with me all through elementary, middle, and high school. Through college, and graduate school, and now in my job.

The biggest thing I struggle with is letting small mistakes feel catastrophic. A simple mistake at work can send me into a spiral where I am sure my bosses hate me and are disappointed in my work and want to fire me. I then go down this thought path where, I'm sure I'm going to be fired, I won't be able to pay rent, I'll be evicted from my apartment, I'll be homeless, and I'll die in the cold on the street. Sometimes there doesn't even have to be a mistake I've made, sometimes it's just like...a look on my boss's face. All these things I imagine to be problems that never really turn out to be problems, but I can't stop imagining the worst.

So...like, I guess...how do I not?