Women of the Quill,

It is six in the morning and I have read all the manuscripts and handed them off to Elliott, the significant other of the press. Now it is her colossal job to read your unique work with her unique vision and insight. We are working with due diligence but with care. Then we together will select the final manuscripts to send to our esteemed judge Barbara Crooker, who has a new book of her own! Her collected works are now available from FutureCycle Press, and you can order one to read with great enjoyment. (info@barbaracrooker.com)

Because we have been blessed and because of the added month of extended submissions, the press, thanks to you all, is on more solid ground. We have the money for the chapbook winner, to file for nonprofit status, and maybe even pay an accountant to do our taxes. (We are poets after all!) And we hope to announce a New Year’s surprise soon, which will give you the opportunity to preview more of the extraordinary poems we have read and have astonished us. In the meantime, sit tight–stay warm, meditate if you are into that or ice fish.  And do consider writing your next poem, as a moving forward.

The work for me also continues. For all of you who asked for manuscript evaluations, this is my morning’s work, and has been for a week now. Each of you get who asked for this get my undivided attention for an hour to an hour and a half.(Not bad for fifteen bucks, a grand opening special!) When I write to you (or you receive a call) I will try to notice both the beauty and strengths of your poetry, and possible directions and ways to explore and revise at the same time. Going deeper is one of my focuses. Using every tool of the craft which may enhance your individual poems, is the other.  Often the best places to look carefully at exemplary poems are to go back to those favorite poets each of you shared with us, and notice how they do what they do. In fact, just yesterday I read again, considered again, Elizabeth Bishop and her poem, “One Art.” The poem took her years to write, and went through dozens of revisions. Now there’s perseverance!

My best to you all. Jane