Quick Rejection
I received yesterday a rejection from a high profile literary magazine. I mailed the submission 11 days ago. That is a very quick rejection. It makes me wonder if my submission was even read. This literary magazine last year wrote on my rejection slip that one of my poems survived their first round, and they encouraged me to submit again in the future. I think they had my submission for at least three months last year. So, I’m feeling a mixture of confusion and feel insulted over this.
At least I heard back from them. I have some submissions out there that are pushing eleven months. As I said in a previous post, I’ve come to learn that it is a waste of time to contact literary magazines after six months. In my experience they have either lost your submission, or they haven’t bothered to send you your rejection slip.
posted by Gerald Huml @ 11:38 AM
4 comments
4 Comments:
You're a whiner. Now stop, it, grow a thicker skin and don't obsess over how quickly your work was returned. If you want to survive as a poet, writer better poems and grow a thicker skin.
Don't worry bro. I wall-papered my bedroom before finding a publisher for my book. You will have no problem at all if you keep at it. Honestly, there is GOING to be someone who will have the same exact emotions when reading your poem as you had while writing it. You just need to keep at it. Trust me!
Getting published has not a f*%#ing thing to do with how GOOD one's poetry is-- it has to do with how aesthetic tendencies of editors line up with the poet's. Figurative "Thick skin" is like literal thick skin-- it can't just be "grown," it must be agitated time and time again, like blister and re-blister and re-blister on top, to form a callous. In time, rejection will become comforting, affirmative even, in light of a lot of the crap today that is published and is dictating the aesthetic tendency that a lot of us are NOT in line with.
Best of luck and keep fighting the good fight. Look at Baudelaire- he thought he wanted to be accepted by his contemporary poets, all the while, he was just writing poetry that was much more interesting and complex.
Thanks for the encouragement WallyJ and Mackenzie. I think my aesthetics are not particularly fashionable right now. Poets who are familiar with my work say that I seem to be getting more than my fair share of rejection right now. One poet suggested that I should start my own literary magazine and publish poems in line with my aesthetics.
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