Date: Friday, February 4 · 8:00pm – 11:00pm
Location:The Biltmore, 1977 Biltmore St., DC (5 minutes from AWP)

With performances by Daniel Nester, Don Share, Ander Monson, Lia Purpura, Melanie Henderson, Patrick Rosal, Garret Socol, DeLana Dameron, Bernadette Geyer.

32 POEMS is just that—a journal of thirty-two poems, one to a page. They’re available in print biannually, for a total of 64 poems a year.

DRUNKEN BOAT is one of the oldest online arts journals, dedicated to exposure of literary, visual, digital, and cross-media work from around the world.

DEFUNCT is a twice-annual publication featuring writing on all things defunct. New issues appear in April and October.

BORN MAGAZINE is an experimental venue marrying literary arts and multimedia.

That means the holiday shopping season is on us. I know, some of you have already bought all of your presents but not me. Why? Well, I don’t have that many to buy and I’ve become fascinated with watching people shop on days like Black Friday. I’m a regular mall walker, so the new influx of shoppers messes up my flow a bit but it is fun to pick out the: Husband who has no idea what to buy, the power Grandma shopper, the kid who got their gift cards early . . .

But, I digress. What I am hear to talk about is what a terrific gift literature can make for the holidays. I’m gearing up for a post on my own blog with specific suggestions, but here is the blog I made last year. The list goes through some poetry, fiction, non-fiction and even books on writing, but you know what is missing from that list? A separate section for literary magazines. I do mention a few magazines but I want to really promote the idea of purchasing magazine subscriptions for Christmas gifts.

When you purchase just a book or gift card, that is a one-time gift. When you purchase a subscription, you’re giving something that will come quarterly, twice a year etc. And, unlike the pie-of-the-month-club, a literary magazine won’t make you fat…well…maybe unless there is a particular sad poem that makes you really, really, really need a piece of chocolate.

The only issue with giving a subscription is that you need to know what the person might like. I say: ask them. As I noted in the blog post I mentioned above, readers love to talk about what they are reading. You could also check out their shelves or have one of their children or significant others do that for you. What do they already subscribe to? What is comparable? Could you extend a subscription? Is there something you have read that blew you away and you know you just had to gift that same magazine to your friend? (Like 32 poems!)

You may wonder if you’ll have your lit mag in time to wrap it for the holiday. When you order the subscription, send a message to the publisher and ask for a back issue (or current issue) to be sent to you so you can wrap that issue and note that the subscription is coming. You could also visit a copy shop and have an inexpensive color picture of the magazines website or cover printed so you can enclose that in an envelope with a card for your gift recipient or along with a nice piece of chocolate (again, I know, the chocolate). Other ideas fair readers?

I’ve been the recipient of two different literary magazine subscriptions and for a poet/adjunct English teacher, having someone else spend the money on a magazine really is a gift. Maybe even a nice enough surprise that you, the gift giver, will find yourself under the mistletoe . . .

(stop by Jessie’s blog on 11-22-10 for this year’s holiday shopping guide. We love people who leave other suggestions in comments)

Have you ever wanted to ask a poetry editor of a national magazine questions about publishing, writing, and poetry?

Well, guess what?

Post your questions in the comments here, and I’ll ask John. We’ll post the interview right here on April 20, 2010 as part of the Savvy Verse and Wit poetry blog tour.

When I started 32, there were doubters, my good friend.

You’re an indie magazine. How can you survive? Print is dead. You’re not The Kenyon Review!

I don’t listen to doubters. I do it anyway.

I’m actually allergic to negative people, so I carry an epipen at all times lest a negative person push me into anaphylaxis.

I digress.

The new magazine is out and about, and I’m feeling a bit nostalgic about the past seven years. In a recent interview, one of the questions asked was about how I started 32 Poems.

The idea grew from my head and percolated for 8-10 years. I had jobs in print production, direct mail fundraising, teaching, copywriting, and online marketing. Fancy that. Each set of skills was quite useful for running a magazine.

In 2003, I attended the AWP Conference in Baltimore, MD and brought bright red flyers to advertise our concept.

I had no exhibit table, no poems to publish, and no magazine. That is a lot of “no” for two people.

We got our first subscriber the next week.

I realized I had to make the magazine.

We’d love to have you subscribe?

]]> http://www.32poems.com/blog/1422/32poem/feed 2 http://www.32poems.com/blog/1418/take-yourself-less-seriously-to-be-more-serious http://www.32poems.com/blog/1418/take-yourself-less-seriously-to-be-more-serious#comments Mon, 08 Mar 2010 13:47:45 +0000 32poems http://blog.32poems.com/?p=1418 The previous post was post number 1,000. This is post 1,001. Wow.

I’m writing this to tell you I am taking myself less seriously. Since less is more, I am taking myself more seriously as well.

If you would like to join me, I would like the company. We can take ourselves more or less seriously together or be seriously less or more.

]]> http://www.32poems.com/blog/1418/take-yourself-less-seriously-to-be-more-serious/feed 1 http://www.32poems.com/blog/1269/should-editors-have-to-take-a-poem-from-a-poet-they-solicit http://www.32poems.com/blog/1269/should-editors-have-to-take-a-poem-from-a-poet-they-solicit#comments Fri, 13 Nov 2009 12:30:09 +0000 32poems http://blog.32poems.com/?p=1269 If I accept a poem, all is well. People name their first-born children after 32 Poems. There were 64 babies named “32″ this year.

When I solicit people, I say upfront that I might not take their poems. My note says something about how I can promise a careful read even if I can’t promise publication. My goal with that line is to give the poet a chance to say “no thanks” if they fear rejection after a solicitation. I also aim to set their expectation. I’ve heard stories of poets getting angry and annoyed — certainly, no editor wants that — when getting their poems rejected after a solicitation. Trust me, it hurts an editor to say no. We are not rejecting poems and then performing happy dances to celebrate.

If I don’t take a poem, then I write a NICE note to explain why. I invite the poet to send more poems and to send more soon.

I try to show respect to the poet throughout the entire process. I can take a long time to respond. John Poch, our editor, does not take as long as I do. I let the poet know I am slow to read and invite them to submit elsewhere if they are in a hurry to publish. Sometimes they do and sometimes they don’t. On occasion, a poem is accepted elsewhere and that is sad for me. However, I feel it is only fair to let the poet send elsewhere if I am going to take a long time to get to it. For me, a long time is over two months.

One reason I may say no to the work of a poet I solicit is when the new work is nothing like what I’ve been reading and like what I had loved. This usually means that only between three and five poems did not speak to me. Often, a number of other poems the poet wrote DID speak to me and that is why I asked, yet sometimes people are insulted anyway.

Hopefully, I do not become the poet’s enemy for not taking a poem. After all, I am publishing this journal that supports and promotes poetry, and how many people are insane enough to do that? But that is another topic for another day.

]]> http://www.32poems.com/blog/1269/should-editors-have-to-take-a-poem-from-a-poet-they-solicit/feed 9 http://www.32poems.com/blog/1236/submission-guideline-changes http://www.32poems.com/blog/1236/submission-guideline-changes#comments Tue, 27 Oct 2009 10:24:56 +0000 32poems http://blog.32poems.com/?p=1236 Since John Poch will be editing 32 Poems from afar next spring, we will not be reading manuscripts via regular mail after December 1. If you wish to submit poems between December 1, 2009 and May 1, 2010, please email your poems to us at 32poems at gmail dot com. As you know, we do not read from May 1 till August 31.

Email the poems (less than 5, please) in one MS Word doc or docx file. The cover letter should be sent as the body of the gmail.

As usual, we prefer shorter lyric poems that fit on a single page, but we sometimes bend the rules to fit other extraordinary work. Do NOT email other materials, promotional, correspondence, or otherwise, to this address. Please query us after 3 months if you still have not heard a reply concerning your poems. We aim to keep our response time at less than 2 months. We will go back to our ordinary postal submission process in September 2010.

And don’t forget to subscribe or give a gift subscription!

]]> http://www.32poems.com/blog/1236/submission-guideline-changes/feed 0 http://www.32poems.com/blog/941/news-flash-32-poems-cures-blogitis http://www.32poems.com/blog/941/news-flash-32-poems-cures-blogitis#comments Mon, 16 Feb 2009 19:05:58 +0000 32poems http://blog.32poems.com/941/news-flash-32-poems-cures-blogitis/ A blogger at Balanced on the Edge raves about 32 Poems. If you aren’t subscribing to 32 Poems yet, maybe you should. =-) I should note that John Poch selects most of the poems. Her comment below about Bernadette Geyer’s poems reminds me that one of my favorite parts of editing is finding amazing poems.

I have been reading some great poetry lately. Next to my computer rests my first copy of 32 Poems, Volume 6, No. 2, published and edited by Deborah Ager, and I’ve got to say, it’s the best $14.00 I’ve spent on poetry in over a month. I’m not familiar with the names of all the poets included in this volume, but of course I recognized Billy Collins, whose tiny poem The Pencil is almost what I’d call a cameo, as it turns the very words of the poem into a metaphor in the quintessential style Collins is known for….

The second and third poems, starring Thumbelina’s mother, captured my imagination the most. They are both modern sonnets, with slant rhyme, except at the final couplet. I love poems that mess with the rules. But even more, I love how the author, Bernadette Geyer, entered into a secret world and made it come alive for me. She went inside Thumbelina’s realm and painted the myth, as if on a miniature Flemish canvas in egg tempera, with all it’s dark, psychic power.

Yes, I think I’ll renew my subscription to 32 poems, in case anyone is wondering. What an exciting life. Feeling much better now.

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