Hope to see you there!

Second, I received my contributor’s copy of the current issue of Eclipse, which includes a great piece by Judith Slater, also a member of the UNL community. My piece, “Hypotheses (or In the Lake of the Woods) is a poem I wrote in response to the Tim O’Brien novel, a book I taught in one of my composition and rhetoric classes. The poem also appears in my poetry collection Ghost Girl. In 2008, Tim O’Brien was the writer-in-residence here. I was lucky enough to take his master workshop. It was an unforgettable experience.

Third, my contributor’s copy of the anthology hell strung and crooked from Unhook Press has also just arrived. Yeah! It includes  a great interview with Mark Doty. Speaking of the poet, I’ve read a few of his books, but my current favorite is his memoir Dog Years. It’s a wonderful book. One of the best memoirs I read last winter.

And finally, today is the first day of a new semester. I’m teaching a composition class and a poetry class. The latter is my favorite class to teach because it combines women’s studies, women’s literature, and creative writing into a class called English 253A: poetry writing: Women’s Poetry. Along with a few short essays, this term I’m teaching Anne Sexton’s Transformations, Louise Gluck’s Averno, Natasha Trethewey’s Bellocq’s Ophelia, Carole Oles’ Waking Stone, Denise Duhamel’s Kinky and Kim Addonizio and Dorianne Laux’s edited text The Poet’s Companion. It’s going to be an amazing class. I’m so excited!

Ghost Girl Peruses the Want Ads, Ghost Girl Can’t Recall What Happened Next, Neighbors
http://www.lauramadelinewiseman.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/006_Ghost-Girl_001_madeline_Ghost-Girl-Peruses-the-Want-Ads_2010_07_09_Ghost-Girl-Peruses-the-Want-Ads1.mp3
http://www.lauramadelinewiseman.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/006_Ghost-Girl_002_madeline_Ghost-Girl-Cant-Recall-What-Happened-Next_2010_07_09_Ghost-Girl-Cant-Recall-What-Happened-Next.mp3
http://www.lauramadelinewiseman.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2010/07/006_Ghost-Girl_003_madeline_Neighbors_2010_07_09_Neighbors.mp3

In other news The Whistling Fire has some of my poems from the My Imaginary series. I also have poems in the recent issues of Big Muddy and Nebraska Life. And, this just in, San Pedro River Review has accepted a poem and Specs has accepted a poem for their forthcoming issue on toys. Yeah!

Also, Poemeleon‘s just released their special issue on gender, which includes three of my poems. It’s such a great issue! Check out the work by Davi Walders and Jeannie Hall Gailey.

Illuminations nominated my poem “Wife Brand” for the 2010 Pushcart Prize.

Sure makes for good news.

And, poemeleon accepted 3 of my poems from another series I’ve been working on which is forthcoming from Dancing Girl Press later this year, My Imaginary. Poemeleon has some great poems up, check out Dorianna Laux’s “Olympia” for example.

All this sure made for a good weekend.

prairie flowers in west branch, iowa

After a brief hiatus in Iowa, I’m back in my snug corner of the Midwest. For three weeks, I was the artist-in-residence at the Herbert Hoover Historic Site in West Branch Iowa, a growing artist-in-residence program directed by Adam Prato and one in which I was one of two artists for 2009.

(one of the beautiful trees in the park)

Prior to my three weeks in West Branch, I’d never done a residency, but I’m glad I did. I wrote oodles in the mornings when I worked in the Wright House. In the afternoons, I found an inspiring spot in the park and wrote there–the birth place, the prairie, the presidential museum, the friend’s meeting house, etc. The park itself is breathtakingly lovely, with enormous trees and abundant wildlife such as catbirds, groundhogs, goldfinches, and swallows. The people, from the park rangers to the visitors to the folk who dress up in living history garb to the multitudes who visited during their annual festival, Hooverfest, were friendly, nice, reminding me again how great Iowans are.

birthplace

And if all that wasn’t enough, I did a poetry reading in their theater attended by locals and the requisite family members.  I had a booth at their festival where many stopped by and asked about my work (How great is that?). My 3 and 1/2 year old nephew became a junior park ranger after doing various activities in the park. (The pledge alone is adorable. I watched several kids, after completing their activity book, take the pledge to take care of national parks while adults beamed with cameras). Finally, the local paper even interviewed me about my work as an artist-in-residence and took some photos of me writing in the one-room-schoolhouse. The writer posted the article, and a brand new poem I wrote while there, on their online newspaper. In the print version of West Branch Times, the story takes up an entire page (!).

sign

With the gift of time to write and research, it was  a lovely and productive way to spend three weeks of the summer.