OT: Getting published!

[KC Elbows]

Spur of the moment, I submitted a poem called "poison" to poetry.com's monthly contest. Pretty dark poem, I was feeling funky when I wrote it, and a little snooty as well, but I was happy with the poem nonetheless. This was a month or two ago.

Well, my wife just called, they sent their response, and they're publishing it, and its a finallist for their main contest. I told my sifu he's gonna have to be extra tough on me tonight, cause if I have too good a kung fu night, I'll get home and no one else will be able to fit in the house with my big head(quiet sharky-not the John Holmes sort).

Anyway, thought I'd share my happy day. If anyone wants to read it, go to www.poetry.com and, in the space for author's name, type Brian Karius(so much for anonynimity).

Don't worry EWallace, it doesn't rhyme.

Actually, Badger, now that I think about it, I sent it in the same week I had to start rhyming because of you, so I guess I owe you a thank you for being the sadist that you are.

Everyone have a good one. I'm going to kung fu.

[Sharky]

Excellent, nice and deep. I especially like the last stanza man.

Good shet.

Good luck with the contest!

[joedoe]

Congrats man.

[Budokan]

That's fantastic, KC! Congrats!!:)

[IronFist]

Dude, who is Francis Farmer? He's mentioned in a Nirvana song title, too.

Nice, poem, btw. I agree on the last stanza being cool :)

IronFist

[Ryu]

Great work, KC!!!

Ryu

[Mr Punch]

Cool doggerel BJ;) Who IS/WAS FF??

[KC Elbows]

Frances Farmer was actually a she. She was an actress, and the same week I wrote the poem, I had watched Lenny, the biogrphy of Lenny Bruce, and Frances, the biography of Frances Farmer.

Frances Farmer had a very promising film and stage career going, but she crossed her agent, who decided to do a smear campaign, as she was doing more stage than film, and her agent didn't like that. Anyway, Frances was an athiest and was very outspoken in her politics, and, like most celebrities, had a bout with drinking. Her mother was very controlling, and, after a drinking binge that turned out bad, she was remanded by the courts to her mother's custody, and institutionalized. At the time, lobotomes were in vogue, and there was this guy travelling around the country demonstrating lobotomes to different institutions. I once heard that this particular guy claimed to have done over 50,000 lobotomes. Anyway, one of his test dummies is believed to have been Frances Farmer. End of story.

Glad someone asked that question. I have one more chance to proofread the poem, and it hadn't occured to me that is was probably "Frances" not "Francis". Thanks guys.

[KC Elbows]

Mat,
You gave me a true paranoid moment. I was like "How did he know to call me BJ? How does this person in Tokyo know me?"

Then I looked at the bottom of my poem.

Fortunately the contest does not include a psyche eval.

[Badger]

Glad my being wacky helped ya man!:)

Good Going Dude!



Badger

[ewallace]

Nice work BJ Elbows. Since it didn't rhyme I thought I'd take a look at it. What is the prize if you win?

[KC Elbows]

2nd and 3rd is just a bronze and silver plaque, or something like that. 1st is $1000. If it goes to first, then I get the grand, and then I have a chance to win the annual contest with it. The annual is for $10,000.

What's amazing is the amount of poetry these guys go through. On the website, there's a link to watch poems as they are entered in real time. Every 30 seconds, there's another poem, even on the slowest day. After watching that a little while, I had to stop, as I started calculating the mathematical odds of my winning, and it was depressing.

[ewallace]

Just like the lotto bro. You have just as much of a chance of winning as everyone who enters. Let us know if the contest promoters need a little...uhhh...encouragement.

[KC Elbows]

Good thinking. I'm pretty sure the KFO's buddhist mafia can take a bunch of poets any day.

Now that's right thinking!:D

[Ray Pina]

Beautiful poem. I liked it.

However, I have to warn you. Poetry.com is a bit of a sham. I know. I did the same thing. You are one of a chosen few to win a prize and be published. You are one of thousands. They will publish your poem either for a fee, or, they will publish it in a nice hard cover bound book and charge you like $80 to buy it, with the other 700 first prize candidates and make a load of cash.

I know, when I heard it too -- from another poet -- I was like, "right, no way. this poem is the bomb." And it was, like your poem. All true poems, from the heart, are absolute perfect. Up to each reader to find its value -- some poems for some types.

I liked your poem. But be careful. There is a website, don't remeber it, but poetry.com was on its list of fraudulent contest.

If you really want to get published, for poetry, grap a publishing magazine, like Writers, or soemthing like that, and they have legit contests.

Sorry to be the barer of bad news. Either way, it doesn't matter. That's a great poem. Good luck though, maybe I am wrong.

[Sharky]

Or we could write a load of wack ass poems to make yours look better.

[KC Elbows]

The thought occured to me. BTW, I've also seen the site you're talking about that had the list of contests not to trust, but I couldn't find it.

However, for my purposes, this is an OK start. The poem is being published, the only way I have to pay is if I want to buy the book its in, which I don't(seeing as I calligraphied the same poem unto some old parchment I have, I doubt the book would be on as high quality paper.)

The main goal was to get out of my shell, get some stuff out there, and get some credits so that when I'm done with my book, I have a resume to work with.

I'm out of my shell, and the poem took me no time to make, its not one I would consider my best or anything(though I am proud of it, just keeping perspective).

Next was going to be more professional venues.

Thanks for the warning. I would rather be made aware than have people afraid to rain on my parade.

[Ray Pina]

Best of luck to you man. I'm in the same boat. I should be done with the book I'm working on by the fall. I'm at about 235 single spaced pages now. Been at it a year and half now.

I'm having fun though.

Yea, getting some things published doesn't hurt. I have articles published but tottaly unrelated to the book. Had afew poems here and there.

In the end, I just want my manuscript to be solid. Then send it out with a good query letter to try and pick up an agent.

My plan, send it out to 10 agents, 5 publishers on my own, and maybe two authors in the related field to see if I can get a recomendation.

Then repeat, over and over and over again until it happens.

Best of luck. If you want it bad enough you'll get it. At least that keeps me going. Been experience to date.