Winter Tangerine

Thanks to Yasmin Belkhyr and Héloïse Cambonie at Winter Tangerine Review for the review "Five Reasons to Read: Mendeleev's Mandala," which reads, in part, "Human consciousness cannot be reduced to such a simple binary. Mathematics seek out metaphors. Geometry and logic embrace myths. In the end, electrons and angels are more or less the same thing."

This is a close and joyous reading of my book, one which honors my work more than I dared hope for. Thank you!

Also, check out the banner on the review--don't be surprised if you see something similar pop up here next, inspired by their idea at Winter Tangerine Review!

And blog readers, please take time to look at "Five Reasons to Read: Fake Knife," featuring the work of Dalton Day, and also consider entering The Winter Tangerine Awards (honoring new and emerging poetry and prose writers) with guest poetry judge Ocean Vuong! Open through June 1st.

Mendeleev's Mandala Available for Pre-Order

My new book, Mendeleev's Mandala, is available for a special pre-order price of  $13.95 + S&H from Mayapple Press. There's one button for orders from the US, and another button for orders from Japan.


Here are what some generous poets have had to say about it:

This book is a library whittled down to a message in a bottle. Here is a poet who has boldly refused to abide to the expectations of genre—but instead, pushes language and form as a means of asking the most urgent questions. The result is a courageous and kaleidoscopic, at times tender and vulnerable, exploration of motherhood and family—set against the backdrops of science, history, religion, myths, and mathematics. When a poet embarks on a book as myriad and borderless as this one, we are gifted the rare chance to stand at the threshold of a formidable human storm. And from here, it is clear that Goodfellow’s Mendeleev’s Mandala is an electric book. But its lines are not limited to lightning. They move more like thunder, startling, resonant, and suddenly everywhere in the mind at once. – Ocean Vuong, author of Night Sky With Exit Wounds

Jessica Goodfellow has a joyous intelligence and electric tongue. Reading this book a first time, my only regret was that I couldn’t read it a second first time. But then I read it a first second time and a first third. You see what I’m doing? I’m reading this book over and over, without ever completely taking it in. I think you will too. And like me, want only one thing from Jessica Goodfellow – more.  – Bob Hicok

From the origin of the number zero to immigration to map making, these poems leap dynamically between ideas and a blazing exploration of language. Folding and unfolding with searing brilliance, these poems reveal our human condition with a down-to-earth sense of humor and wonder. This must-read collection nourishes mind and body and opens up whole new ways of seeing the world around us. – Judy Halebsky, author of Tree Line

Black Tongue

I've just serendipitously discovered an amazing (newly-)online journal called Black Tongue Review, which pairs poems with original artwork in "a triple dog dare to create art by sending poems to other countries and asking that artwork be made as a reaction".

The current issues features work by poets I've long admired, such as Mary Biddinger (paired with artist Valerie Hegarty), Ocean Vuong (paired with the work of Izziyana Suhaimi), Chad Sweeney (together with the art of Chris Maynard), and Tony Trigilio (with visuals by Greg Dunn).

The styles of poetry and art featured are varied and interesting; this is a site you can spend hours at and not feel you've wasted a single minute.

News in Poetry

Do you get the weekly newsletter from The Review Review? (If not, you can sign up here.) I've been getting it for a month or so now, and every issue has linked me with articles and resources that are useful or interesting.

For instance, this week they report on The Grinder, a site aiming to take over the void left when Duotrope became a fee-oriented tracking service and database, keeping many cash-strapped writers from being able to use their once-free services any longer. Right now The Grinder is only up and running for fiction markets, but it plans to add poetry and non-fiction soon.

In other news, Ocean Vuong, a young poet I admire and whose name is the name as one of my sons and for just about the same reason, is intereviewed at The Well & Often Reader.

Poetry Kanto, Japan's longest-running bilingual journal (which counts among its impressive list of past contributors Jane Hirshfield, Alicia Ostriker, Ilya Kaminsky, and Judy Halebsky) has recently become an online journal, leaving behind its paper history. They have a call for submissions out now; submit 3-5 poems before June.

Harpur Palate, another journal I routinely enjoy, is calling for submissions for a "country living themed issue." If you've got something related, or could write something, give them a try.

Finally, not exactly breaking news but news to me nonetheless, Flavorwire has some crazy punctuation marks to consider. Do you know the ElRey mark, for example? When you want to express equivocal enthusiasm, use this:

And, unfortunately too late for Valentine's Day, we learn of the Love Point:

And who doesn't need a sarcasm mark?:

Flavorwire has seven other obscure punctuation marks, and you can find more such marks at my blogpost from 2011 called "Recognize these Puncs?"

Congrats to Ocean

One of my favorite new poets, Ocean Vuong, has won the Stanley Kunitz Memorial Prize for Younger Poets, through the American Poetry Review. Yay for Ocean!!!

Read an interview of Ocean with poet Mari L'Esperance here. And listen to one with Rachel Cruz here.

L'Esperance Interviews Vuong

One of my favorite poets, Mari L'Esperance, interviewed one of my other favorite poets, Ocean Vuong, over at Connotation Press.com.

I've mentioned Vuong's writing practice on this blog before, and L'Esperance discusses it in her interview with him, describing it as "reassuring and forgiving," which is an apt way to put it.

Learn about Vuong's childhood, and read a few of his poems at Connotation Press too.

Below see the cover to his chapbook, Burnings, published by Sibling Rivalry Press.

Three at Thrush

Thrush Poetry Journal has their March edition up and online, and I'm pleased to have three poems in it, alongside work by Ocean Vuong, Traci Brimhall, and Nate Pritts. I have really enjoyed the poems published at Thrush since its recent inception, and find it, along with the Sugar House Review, to be an online journal worth watching.

Ocean's Process

So you've probably heard all your life that writers should get up early, every day, day after day, and write. This is the discpline most often cited as eventually leading to great writing. Just being there in the chair, making the commitment, that's the key--it must be true, as everybody says so.

Well, almost everybody. In stark contrast to this conventional wisdom, poet Ocean Vuong describes his own process during an interview on Blog Talk Radio's Blood-Jet Writing Hour with Rachelle Cruz.

Vuong discusses his earliest attempts at writing on a daily basis, which he found to be a difficult method. Eventually he learned that, for him, "...writing a poem is a very rare occasion. I write very slowly....one poem every two or three months." In fact, Vuong says that for him, writing more than often than this is a distraction that dilutes the strength of his work. (And anyone familiar with Vuong's intensely evocative work knows the potency of his lines, which in no way could be described as diluted.)

Vuong compares writing a poem to pregnancy. For months he walks around with the poem inside him, nurturing it constantly without bringing it into the world, without putting anything on paper, until the right day comes and he is seized with "a frenzy of creativity after months of idleness." At that time, Vuong writes 10 to 25 drafts in the first sitting, which can last for hours, and within about three days, his poem is complete.

Vuong doesn't "believe in writer's block." He thinks what passes for writer's block is really just fruitless attempts at writing under the wrong process. Vuong encourages writers to experiment with various methods until finding what works for them.

Check out the entire interview (with readings of poems) here.

And read some of Vuong's poems here at Vinyl Poetry, here at Diode, and here at PANK Magazine.

(And by the way, despite the familiarity of the title of this post, I don't know Ocean Vuong personally; I was just enjoying his gorgeous name.)