Review requests

Today’s adventure in book promotion for my new poetry chapbook, Hearts, available from Kelsay Books or Amazon, is to send queries for possible book reviews. As a poetry chapbook, it will probably not be chosen for an actual review, but I’m hoping to make a listing or two of Newly Received Books, which will broaden my reach beyond my personal contacts.

Speaking of reviews, I have my first customer review up at Amazon! Five stars! If you do read Hearts and are so moved, I’d be honored to have you submit your own rating/review.

One-Liner Wednesday: Hearts!

My first poetry chapbook Hearts is now available from Kelsay Books and Amazon!

This joyous announcement is brought to you through Linda’s One-Liner Wednesdays. Join us! Find out more here: https://lindaghill.com/2023/05/31/one-liner-wednesday-sorry-3/

I don’t know I don’t know; or, On Writing a Chapbook: The Story of Being Many Seeds

A fascinating look into the mind of poet Marilyn McCabe as she crafted her chapbook “Being Many Seeds” both as a print and an audio/visual experience. Check it out!

O Write: Marilynonaroll's Blog

So with the birth of a new collection of poems, I thought I might share the backstory, as the poems came together in an unusual way, for me.

The poems in this book began as a monthlong exercise in imitations. Each day I’d choose a poem from a literary magazine or book of poems I had lying around, and I’d try to do a word-for-word imitation, but trying often to use opposite words. That is, if the poem started “One early morning…” I might say “Every late night….” I tried to choose poems that seemed unlike anything I might write: longer lines, narrative rather than lyric.

I didn’t overthink the process, I just let words rise up as prompted by the original poem, and figured whatever subject matters were lurking in my brain would arise naturally from this process. So then I had thirty or so of these, and looking…

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Fire in the Amazon

Large swaths of the Amazon rainforest are on fire. Media tends to call these wildfires, but the vast majority of them are intentionally set. I think of wildfires as being caused by lightning strike or an accidental spark. When fires are set intentionally, they should be called arson.

While the current scale of the fires is new, the problem is not. For years, farmers and ranchers have burned parts of the Amazon rainforest to clear land for themselves. They have been opposed by indigenous people and their allies, some of whom have been killed trying to defend the forest.

The fires are devastating for the plants, animals, and people who live there, but the scale of the destruction now threatens the very mechanism that makes the rainforest possible. The vegetation, especially the large, tall trees, transpire large quantities of water, which form clouds and help to keep the rainforest green. If too much land is burned, the amount of rainfall will decrease so much that it would be impossible to sustain a rainforest ecosystem.

Plants also take in carbon dioxide and release oxygen. It is estimated that 20% of the world’s atmospheric oxygen is produced in the Amazon. As more and more of the rainforest is destroyed, the level of oxygen in the air that all people and animals need to breathe could diminish, while the level of carbon dioxide, already at record highs, could become even higher, accelerating global warming and increasing drought, which diminishes plant growth and causes a downward spiral.

The government of Brazil is making only half-hearted measures to control the fires and has refused the assistance of other nations. President Bolsonaro is a climate change denier, who sees this issue as being solely about the economic development of Brazil. His short-sighted actions may cause world-wide suffering for decades.

It highlights to me how interconnected we are as a planet. At this point in human history, we can’t afford countries being isolationist and concerned only with making their rich citizens even richer.

Money can’t buy oxygen or make more rainfall or change the temperature.

Free Kindle Version of My Chicago novel to celebrate the Windy City’s 179th birthday

Melanie Villines, editor of Silver Birch Press, is making the Kindle version of her novel Windy City Sinners available FREE this weekend. Check it out!