I’m alive.
by Candis Jean
A couple of weeks ago, I managed to accomplish my New Year’s resolution: submit to my favorite publishing house for their annual submission call.
This has been on my To-Do list for years, so it was a crazy proud moment listening to my favorite poet in my voicemail saying Candis, you sick fuck. This is Derrick. Check the website.
Turns out, the three pieces I sent in got me qualified for round 2, which placed me in an intimidating Top 21 spot with writers I very much admire.
Round 2 means you’ve got 20 days to complete a manuscript of 40 poems.
I hadn’t exactly written them yet.
In the end, I threw out all but six poems I had in my hard drive.
The rest are all new.
I just sent the manuscript in; there’s a lot of screaming self-doubt as I checked over the 40 and went “oh, no. No. That needs to be tighter, what was I thinking there, and that line? Why didn’t I catch that in edits??” And the big one: did I do too many tell versus show poems?
I’m banning myself from looking at the manuscript until the final decision gets made on the 15th.
Eight to twelve of us get picked for a book deal, and oh man that part is exciting—because even if I’m not in there with them, these writers are top notch awesome, and I can’t wait to curl up with their books while I work towards next year’s submission.
So that’s what I’ve been up to this month.
Making poetry.
