I write this entry whilst periodically running into the kitchen to prepare the closest thing to a full meal — and the only non-liquid and non-mashed food — that I have had since Friday. Please excuse any typos, language issues, etcetera, etcetera.
A Most Exciting Thing: my friend R. and I have decided to both read all of cummings’ work, straight through, all the way, badaboom. As you can probably tell by my obsessive poem posting, I’ve been inexplicably drawn to the work of the great initialed one for quite some time. This is a quest to find out why.
A Second Most Exciting Thing: One of my professors from graduate school had some very good news today, about which I can only say, yay for awesome people getting awesome news! 
A Third Most Exciting Thing: Grant Application One is DONE! And Grant Application Two is all over but the attachin’. I’ve also found two more grants that I plan to apply for tonight. I write of these because these applications represent a major achievement for me. For a very long time, I have been very afraid of filling out grant applications, and sending poems to The Big Magazines, and so forth — perhaps out of fear of rejection. Now, I’m taking a new track: you never know if you don’t try. So bring on the slips! I fear them not.
Tomorrow is the last day of Hedda Gabler, sadly. I spent much of the afternoon thinking about verb tense in her Act Four “confrontation” with Tessmen over Eilert’s manuscript: Nicholas Rudall translates one line as “I have not got it.” Which seems much more ominous, final, and indicative of Hedda’s mental state than Rolf Fjelde’s translation as “I don’t have it anymore.” Or maybe I’m spending way too much time thinking of verbs and should, instead, spend more time thinking about ponies.
I am definitely thinking about a Fourth Most Exciting Thing, which is that Finishing Line Press has sent me a mock-up of what the book cover will look like — and I am so excited! The photograph is by an absolutely amazing photographer named Bogna Kuvzerawy — everyone should check out her work here! It is breath-taking and inspiring.
And now … THE COVER!
Emma Bolden is the author of How To Recognize A Lady, a chapbook of poems published as part of Edge by Edge, the third in Toadlily Press' Quartet Series, and The Mariner's Wife, a chapbook published by Finishing Line Press. Her third chapbook, The Sad Epistles, is forthcoming from Dancing Girl Press. She was the recipient of a Tennessee Williams Scholarship to the Sewanee Writers' Conference and was named a Finalist for a Ruth Lilly Fellowship by the Poetry Foundation/Poetry magazine. Her work has been published or is forthcoming in such journals as Prairie Schooner, the Indiana Review, Feminist Studies, The Journal, Redivider, The Greensboro Review, and Verse. Her manuscript was a semi-finalist for the Perugia Press Prize. She is a Visiting Assistant Professor of English at Georgetown College, where she also serves as the poetry editor of the Georgetown Review.
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February 28, 2008 at 4:04 pm
didyousayhername
E.: I am so, so very happy for you in regards to your grant applications. So very, very pleased. HOORAY!
One can never spend too much time thinking about verbs. Especially verbs in translation. But ponies are good to think about, too. What about the. . . verb “pony”?
I’ve cummings on hold at a local bookstore and shall purchase him tomorrow. When I called to see if the bookstore had Mr. cummings in stock, the bookstore clerk said, and I quote, “You know that’s a really big book, right?”
I AM SO SO SO EXCITED ABOUT THE WIFE! THE BEAUTIFUL SPLENDID MARINER’S WIFE AND HER BEAUTIFUL SPLENDID COVER! IT IS SO FABULOUSLY MAGNIFICENT!
February 29, 2008 at 4:07 am
mariegauthier
You know the movie, “Finding Nemo,” and the moment that Nemo’s dad & Ellen Degeneres/Dorie pop up out of the water in Sydney after the whale has dropped them off, and they realize it’s Sydney, yay, and the scene flashes to the Sydney opera house, and you hear a swelling male opera singer? — that is my feeling re: your day. Congratulations on your grant apps, that’s a gigantic deal, and your COVER!, which I love love love! {music here}
February 29, 2008 at 12:55 pm
rosswhite
It looks awesome. It makes me want my copy in the mail ASAP. I’ve already read the book and I want my copy in the mail!
February 29, 2008 at 3:52 pm
Jessie Carty
The cover looks gorgeous! I need to get over there and pre-order
I also just ordered and received Michael McFee’s book from Bull Durham.