I made two promises to myself this year after taking the vast majority of last year “off” from creative pursuits due to a host of reasons, including poor health and feeling totally burnt-out and lost.

The first is to finish at least one poem (all edits done, not just a complete draft) every month. So far I have not done this. But I didn’t decide on this goal until halfway through January and I did do work, but much of it was to gear myself and my life up again to being more conducive to having the time and mindspace to write. I know this doesn’t sound like an impressive goal compared to so many poets out there, but its purpose is to create consistency in my creative life. I would like to finish 30-40 things this year, but realistically I am aiming for just one a month.

The second promise was to stop shelling out money to contests and start answering open submissions instead. (There are a small handful of contests I do still enter, but we’ll save that for another post.) Continue reading →