Your captain can almost never tell in advance which of his prompts will kickstart players’ imaginations. Haiku will always attract entries; it has the charm of the minimal. Anagrams bring out the ingenuity in word-game lovers. But every so often I invent a prompt with no idea of whether it will work. That was the case when, on August 3, I asked people to “consider writing either an insincere fan letter or a clever rejection of an unwanted submission or invitation. This can be done either in verse (12 lines or fewer) or in a prose paragraph.” To my great pleasure, the prompt seems to have hit a nerve. Of the more than 100 entries in our comments field, many inspired first drafts met sympathetic reactions from other contributors, often yielding an admirable synthesis.
Amanda J. Bradley contributed “Thoughts on Devotion in Detainment”:
Imprisoned here, shackled to the shadows
of your words, I roam the confines of my cell
reciting them. I am your biggest fan: your captive,
rapt audience, slave to your genius. What pin
stuck in me—voodoo doll, acupuncture patient,
lover of words—would lance my heart?The heart of a prisoner adores her captor, proves
her devotion in drops of blood and spit spilt
on pages and pages, reams and reams of words
in lines and letters. Surrendering to handcuffs,
I am adherent, devotee, whether the warden earned
or demanded it, beside the point. There is nothing
like a gun in the mouth behind lock and key.
There is nothing imagined that is not real.
There is nothing to do but order a last meal,
make a deathbed confession, declare false
when questioned, knowing the genuine flails
and fails in all of us, determination be damned.
But from here, hidden by force, how could I not
adore and understand your words, your conviction?
The rhetorical prowess is extraordinary, especially following the stanza break. Emily voiced her enthusiasm prior to making one crucial suggestion: “I love the confident line breaks. Reading down all the final words along the righthand margin is like a getting the poem in concentrated form. So many wonderful moments, including ‘There is nothing / like a gun in the mouth behind lock and key.’ I have to wonder if the first stanza adds all that much?”
I agree with Emily and hope that Amanda will further improve her outstanding effort by shortening the title to “Devotion in Detainment”—a title that Coleridge would have liked.
As for Emily, her “Unhinged Fan Mail to the Wasps” begins with an alliterative phrase in the beguiling manner of Wallace Stevens, then elaborates a conceit likening a hornet sting to a woman’s midlife changes:
Hairless hymenoptera, come for me stinging,
slinging spit to form your nest, our paper anniversary.Come for me in spring, but don’t stop when
menopause hits August, the planetary hot flash.Come close to my lips while I’m swimming laps;
play favorites with my flowers.Come at me, on occasion, from the grass.
Whirling in this waltz, like lovers in the Londonseason that stole your waist—your petiole—for fashion,
I forget which of us begat the stalking.
I have but one suggestion for Emily: that she shorten the title to “The Wasps.”
In “Consuming Literature,” Millicent Caliban mixes a consumption metaphor with the canine’s fabled hunger for homework:
In regard to your submission,
after I printed it out,
my dog ate your poem.
It gave him something to chew on
and lifted his spirits
on a hot, dull day.
His digestion responds to verse:
makes him frisky and alert.
He enjoys playful metaphors.
Please send more of your work
as long as it has good taste
and no toxic invective.
Insincere flattery is reliably fruitful, as Brian16 demonstrates in “Parasocial”:
Thank you for buying
all of my novels.
Following on Tumblr,
Bluesky, Facebook, X.YouTube videos—
curated life bits
promote the next book
keep old ones in print.Regretfully, your
pages might inspire.
I dare not read your
seven thousand words.My Sweet Lord showed us—
cautionary tale.
Your genius might spark
my plagiarism.Not intended, of course.
Who among us hasn’t
copied Shakespeare by
mistake? Best of luck!
“Your genius might spark / my plagiarism” is brilliant. I would love the poem even more if it were briefer—I suggest removing the first two lines of the penultimate stanza and the final stanza altogether. Would “Sorry” or “Best of Luck!” work better than “Parasocial” as a title?
Emily’s proposed revision of Palevanilla’s “Dear Predator, uh um, Editor” is excellent. Here’s the original:
Dear Predator, uh um, Editor
I received your letter addressed to “Esteemed
Professor.” I’m almost flattered. Thank you
for the kind invitation to provide
a 2-page article or brief review
on otolaryngology. It seems you’ve
confused me with someone who
is actually a physician,
biologist, or epidemiologist.
Alas, I am the wrong kind of ist, with
extremely low tolerance for bullshit.
I am merely a psychologist whose
recent research focuses on ethics
surrounding publication practices.
If you agree to waive your exorbitant
fee, I could provide a 2-page opinion
piece summarizing my thoughts on poor
quality predatory journals with
mimicked names meant to deceive
desperate academics in need of publication.
And, though not entirely consistent
with your mission, at least I will not confuse
laryngitis with cholecystitis.
And here’s how Emily edited it:
I’m almost flattered
by your kind invitation to provide
a 2-page article or brief review
on otolaryngology. Alas, I am the wrong
kind of ist, with an extremely low
tolerance for bullshit.
Merely a psychologist whose
recent research focuses on ethics
surrounding publication practices,
I could, if you agree to waive
your exorbitant fee, summarize
my thoughts on predatory journals
attempting to deceive
the desperately-in-need
of publication.
Ana P.’s “I must tell you the truth” is a winner:
your unsolicited submissions are so copious
that I’ve started launching them into spacemaybe the poems are gathering right now
to be seen by the sunevery single one of them basking in its attention
as they vanish, at ease with the unknownI will continue until the craters of the moon
are chock-full of carbonor I can no longer tell a poem from the moon,
whichever comes first.
Emily certified her status as the team’s official bench coach with her suggestion that, “gorgeous” as the poem is, it might be even stronger if Ana changed “the first couplet to: ‘I’ve started launching your unsolicited/submissions into space.”
Honorable mention to Paul Michelsen for “Shoulda Been a Nine Liner”—with its beautifully parenthetical last line, “(Please see attachment.)” Palevanilla, happily prolific, wrote a poem about “gentle” rejection letters, “And it comes with a subscription.” The poem ruefully acknowledges that some rejection letters “are better than some acceptances,” but this doesn’t console the writer aware that “99,900 / hopefuls received the same exact letter / with their name following dear.”
Finally, Anna Ojascastro Guzon wins this week’s award for best title—“To Be Honest”—a phrase implying that most of the things the speaker says are untrue. Her use of erasure is exemplary:
Hi Pam!
Dear Pam,
I appreciate your faith in my abilities to
Thank you for thinking of me as your replacement
as head of the fundraising committee
for the varsity cheerleading squad.Honestly, I wish I could but unfortunately
Honestly, there’s no fucking way that I’d
I would but honestly, your request makes me want to cry
Honestly, why don’t you ask Jen to get off her
However, I am unable to commit to this position at this time.
Sincerely,
AG
For next month, consider anew the sonnet. We love those of Wyatt, Sidney, Milton, Wordsworth, and Keats, but none of them rivals Shakespeare in his command of the form. I have modernized the first lines of three of Shakespeare’s sonnets: numbers 40, 43, and 104. Your prompt is to write a sonnet of your own, using any of these three lines as your opening:
- Take all I love, from dolls to jewels to guns,
- When I wink, my eyes see things as they are
- To me, dear friend, you never can be old
Deadline: two weeks after this post goes up. Good luck, everyone, and thanks.
