Category: poetry

It’s Six o’clock do you know where your blogger is?

The next few months are going to be busy for me. (Yes I seem to do that to myself a lot) So, as I am sitting here trying to get all my weekend work caught up, I realize that my poor blog is AGAIN neglected. Friday we are releasing Andrew McDowell‘s second edition of Mystical Greenwood. That means I am trying to gather images and activities for the release day on our Facebook Party Room group. I have things I am trying to put together for the Fae Corps Blog…again to get everyone possible to see his book.

That is just the first thing I am doing. Then, I have our Halloween Anthology. This year it is called Darkness Screams. It received so many outstanding submissions that I split it to accommodate the quality of stories. (I have done this before with other anthologies)

So I am neck-deep in editing, Marketing image creation, and formatting for these two. I give myself two months to do this with each anthology because I have a routine. Once approved I invite the author/artist to join the company discord. I have each anthology set up in a private room within the channel. This allows Files to be shared and questions answered easier. I ask everyone to sign a contract (So I can legally publish their story/art/ poetry and they have protections of their copyright) I ask for a bio written in 3rd person and an image to represent them. (I say an image because I have had a few who gave me photoshopped images, due to personal reasons. ) Then I sit down and put together a rough draft of the anthology. I don’t worry in the first rough about perfect formatting or having it be edited and polished. After I get a feel for how the anthology will flow, I feel like I am more capable to suggest edits. Yeah, that seems so silly…the grammar will not change based on how it fits in the book, right? Actually, it might. It will help me to see the story on its own instead of trying to place it mentally in an imaginary book. I send the suggestions to the author and give them a deadline for when I need to see the finished copy.

Then I start while waiting for the stories to come back…to make images to catch the interest of possible readers. I do (For most of the anthologies) a cover reveal, A author/artist list for each anthology, A image to represent each story, and a meet the author/artist graphic. That can be quite the undertaking. In Darkness screams that is 3 graphics just to list the author/artist in each one. I, as you can see above, combined the cover reveals. I have already today done the story graphics for each book.

I still have more to do just for the anthologies… Then I have another book we are releasing in October. The third book in Ashira Dayta’s Magick Saga. (The cover reveal should be happening soon on Fae corps Blog. I am quite proud of that cover) It releases on October 31st. I have to do some images for marketing it as well.

Then I have other projects that are ongoing and need my attention. (For example Formatting for a Poetry book by NK – Titled Valley of Thoughts. We are supposed to be releasing that next year. Editing for Ruan Bradford Wright’s Novel Toe-Rag which is expected to release in February. Writing my own poetry and prose books. And just being a mom and person who has housework that is not getting done more often than not.)

I honestly intend to do this blog every week..but I end up overwhelmed. I think I will just post some of my poetry this week. I thank you for your patience. I swear I am not forgetting y’all.

Poetry for Darkness Screams

So those who follow me know that Fae Corps is just about to have a busy season. August 26th we are releasing the second edition of Andrew McDowell’s book Mystical Greenwood. And the submissions are in for Darkness Screams. I am busier than a one armed paper hanger…I wrote the above poem to put in the front of both volumes of Darkness Screams.

I will be able to return to posting here next week. thank you for your patience. (ps. Check the Fae Corps Blog tomorrow to see the covers for the next anthology!)

Monday Poetry

Monday Poetry

Inner demons and the war within

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

As many of you know, I just took a vacation. The vacation was fun…and it was miserable. I will explain. My daughter and I went to visit my mom. We enjoyed the visit…but there were snide little digs that my mom made that we did not enjoy. I don’t plan on going into details. When we got back we were both upset and trying to get back to the happiness that was home. Then today we were talking about it.

“It wasn’t that bad” “I just exaggerated it” “I am just ungrateful.” “I blew it out of proportion.” “She probably didn’t mean it the way it sounded.” “I was just looking for reasons to hate the trip.”

This often happens to me when I deal with my mom. I end up feeling guilty because I take what she says the wrong way. I told my therapist about a thing that my mom had said that had my daughter upset. I told her that I had told my girl “My mother loves me, but I don’t think she likes me very much. The difference Is I love you and I like you just how you are. I would not change anything about you.” My therapist asked me a question that has been bouncing around my head ever since. “Are you sure that your mom loves you?”

The question becomes how are we sure if anyone loves us? When my parents got divorced, my mom told me something that stuck in my brain. She said that Daddy loved her, but not in the way she needed. Perhaps the demons eating at my brain are doing so, not because I am unloved or unwanted, but instead because I need more than those who have loved me were capable of giving. So my internal war today is the question – Am I too needy? Is everything I do stemming from the desire to be loved more than anyone is possibly capable of? And is my inner voice just looking for an excuse to be miserable?

I am at war with myself, and to be frank, I doubt that I am going to win.
I am fighting the demons within, and it looks like I am losing again.
The words that whisper in my brain are getting real loud within.
Teaching me that I am failing seems to be the goal,
Leaving me there to somehow the answers know.

Yeah, I guess I am going slightly mad,
For I find myself doubting even the truth I had.
Instead of knowing that I am whole and hale,
I find doubt behind every thought, everywhere.

I don’t know if I will get every day this week posted. I am not able to get the week scheduled today. I am busy fighting that war inside me.

Monday Poetry

Monday Poetry

Monday Poetry

Opinion Time

I really don’t see the reason why automatic Rifles are necessary. I can accept handguns (self defense) and shotgun or regular rifles (hunting) but I don’t see a reason why automatic rifles are not being made harder to get ahold of…the only use of AR weapons is killing people..

Starting the week with book covers

So I have a list of “Titles” for upcoming Poetry books. Some with a theme in mind…others not. I know I am supposed to do a cover reveal thingy for each book, but this feels more fun. These are not in progress yet. I did the cover design because it was fun. These are going to be the ones I choose from when my current volumes are written. The idea is that eventually, I will have a poetry book starting with each letter of the alphabet. Which do you like best…and Why?

This one has two possible…have yet to decide which I want. It will be general poetry.

This will be general poetry.

This will be general poetry…but I think I am likely to lean a little bit into the idea of addiction here…not sure.

This will be general poetry.

This will be general poetry.

This is one I am working on. It is going to be entirely Political poetry. I don’t know if I am going to stick to my standard rules as far as the number of poems inside or if I will adjust for the book. I do like how it is coming together so far.

Also In progress right now. It is general poetry.

This is probably going to be religious poetry. I have been considering this one hard.

General poetry. How could this title be anything else?

Again General.

This is another where I am not sure which I like better. This one will be written in letter format. A sort of Prose Poetry. I have the idea only so far.

This one is uncertain. I have already done one volume of Love poems. Still I love the imagery in the title and the cover I made is so nice…It will be there if I am ever ready to do a second one.

Another cover I am not sure which I like better…

General.

General. I actually made the cover for a different author. He didn’t like it, but I really loved it. so I had to find a use for it.

This is going to be all LGBTQIA+ Poetry. I am Pansexual and have thoughts on the Queer that I have yet to put to words… This is going to be me doing exactly that.

General.

This has another cover – But I really like this one better. This one suits me better. It will be general poetry.

General

General.

This is going to be me exploring various poetic forms. I am usually a free verse writer. I think that it would be interesting to do a book with at least one of each of the forms. This is going to be difficult to write, but I am looking forward to the results.

General.

Gemeral.

I use Evernote to write. It keeps me organized…I have a notebook on Evernote for each of my poetry volumes. I have these all organized under a stack labeled Future Poetry Volumes. I include the cover in each notebook so I don’t lose it. That being said…I have a file on my computer for Publishing. Inside the Publishing File is a file for Book Covers. I organize that file too…so the file where my book covers live on my computer has folders for each volume. I have folders in there with titles and no cover. Those have yet to get to the stage where I am ready to make covers for them, I may do this post again in a couple of years with those titles. I don’t know. They would have to make it into my Evernote for me to write in them. At this point, they are interesting titles and nothing more. The ones on this list are in the running to be my next volume…Heck, my next volume was on this list.

So, which title and cover did you like best? Why? Is there a theme you think I should consider? I end up doing two or three volumes a year most of the time. So I feel like I will be able to do this list without overreaching myself.

Oh! also the three I posted two covers for….Which cover would you choose for each one? I really am having a hard time choosing.