Oh, To Be a Poet

It never ceases to amuse me the silly things I get in the mail because some lit mag I've subscribed to or ordered copies of has sold my name to a literary mailing list. it isn't altogether bad, as sometimes I get something halfway interesting that I consider, but yesteday I received a solicitation to be an associate member of The American Academy of Poets. It included an added letter from the poet laureate of the U.S., no less.

Small problem. I'm not a poet and never have been. Those of you who have been reading this blog for a while know that I'm not even a voracious reader of poetry.

Ah well, I can't help but laugh. Bark up another tree. At least it wasn't one of those pieces of junk mail that invites you to publish your work in an anthology as long as you pay for a copy of the volume.

Nah, this seems to be on the up and up, and says it's for the higher cause of advocating poetry and that's fine. So I have to limit my amount of snarkiness now. I read it a little closer and found myself feeling a little bad. But, still, not a poet. Maybe a version for writers would score higher with me, obviously.

In other news, though, a dear, dear friend of mine -- who was an excellent poet years ago but has not written anything in recent years -- told me yesterday she had written a poem for the first time in ages and sent it along. It was great! I am hoping that she will get back into the process of writing poetry -- and submitting it! I always thought she could do great things with that talent.

thanks for reading,

LLB