Directory Insistence

I finally submitted my data to Poets & Writers for inclusion in their online directory. It was pretty easy to do online, just a series of forms to fill out. The site says it takes a few weeks for the entry to show up.

Last year, I urged all the poets in my department to fill out the (paper) forms so we could submit them together and get listed. I think one other person besides me actually filled out the forms, and I thought that I'd mailed them in. But I was working between several offices then, and I fear the paperwork probably ended up in a box with other "urgent" stuff. It's amazing how mail will wait for years in a forgotten box (instead of, what? spontaneously exploding into flames after 30 days?)--and, for the most part, it's a relief that so much of it ends up not really mattering at all. But I do feel bad about P's application. Which is somewhere in my possession.

One other thing: the online directory is searchable by category (i.e., how writers self-identify) and, just to see, I did a search for L/G/B/T writers. I was surprised at how few turned up. So I'm glad I included that tag in my listing.

One last thing: big congratulations to my friend Ben Grossberg, whose manuscript has won the Richard Snyder Award from Ashland Poetry Press. Ben's chapbook, The Auctioneer Bangs His Gavel, is just out from Kent State. Please buy it--it's really very good. The new book is going to be called Underwater Lengths in a Single Breath (nice title).