A Break in the Clouds

44º overcast with grayish layers of clouds

While it may be cloudy outside my window today, I did receive a little sunshine yesterday afternoon in the form of an acceptance email from the Georgetown Review. Many thanks to Lauren Martin and Steven Carter for sharing the good news with me. It couldn’t have come at a better time, given the string of rejections I’ve had lately. Also, this is one of the newer poems from last fall, so it’s good to know I’m still doing something someone likes and wants to read/publish. Another awesome thing about this acceptance is that I had submitted again to GR based on a handwritten note from Emma Bolden, the poetry editor, on my first submission. She encouraged me to send again, and I did. Usually, this doesn’t turn into a publication, but this time it did (happy dance).

Of course, ye olde rejection machine just couldn’t rest. About two hours after the acceptance, I received a rejection email from a journal for which I had such a strong feeling and good hope. Thanks to my friend Anne for reminding what that great movie The Big Lebowski has to say on the subject: “Sometimes you eat the bear and sometimes the bear, well, he eats you.”

Now, my composition students beckon me to finish grading their papers already!

“The dude abides.”