One Poem, Eight Rejections
“Your use of metaphor jumps off the cliff of excess into the sea of confusion.” — Tamped Down: The Pipe Smoker's Poetry Quarterly.
“Too much rough stuff for us, although stanza five showed potential as a framework for a video game.” -- Warm Porridge Review
"Too tame for our readers." -- Slap and Tickle
“Derivative.” — Jazz Is A Poem/ Poetry is Jazz
“Oops, bad timing I'm afraid as we've lost our grant money, and our poetry editor went back to school to retrain in digital media, but if it's any consolation, we would have published this.” — Wichita Community Center Newsletter.
"This has a certain energy that crossed the brain-blood barrier and continued on, into the unknown. Do you suppose you could make the female protagonist a salamander rather than a human?" -- Amphibious World
“Not quite there. Do try again.” ASKANCE!
“As if!” — The New Yorker
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Author's Note
Inspired by Sally A. Houtman's "Contributor's Notes." A shorter version appeared at 6S.
Ha! Yes, I have received many akin to these. Cleverly wrought, but I'll have to pass... : )
As if, indeed. Clever, Gita.
Crossed the brain-blood barrier. *
The New Yorker form rejection letter tells me repeatedly that they regret turning my stuff down "despite its evident merit." So I got evident merit going for me.
@Con: Evident merit = damning with faint praise.
I love the journal names. The whole thing, very clever. fave
Cracked me up. Almost as funny as a fart.*
Love this! 'Can you make your female protagonist into a salamander?' Almost made Earl Grey come out my nose.
Very clever, Gita. I love the "do try again" one.
nice Gita. :-)
the best one I ever received said-
you can turn a good phrase but if you buy my book on writing you will be able to turn an even better phrase.
Excellent poem. Fave*
just eight?
all mine just say REJECTED!!!!
Oh, yeah, then they peel off my stamp and it comes back postage due. Maybe it's because I still write long hand? and spill wine and/or coffee over everything
Jerry, you need to get you a sippy cup.
This is brilliant. Full stop (I thought the word period would be redundant).
You started me laffing, Gita, and I durned near choked on the comments. (...still laffing...) *
"Oops, bad timing I'm afraid as we've lost our grant money, and our poetry editor went back to school to retrain in digital media"
Good piece. Enjoyed.
This is very funny... :)
An "as if" from the New Yorker supposedly means a lot! *
Funny and kinda accurate. Reminds me of "Fifteen Submissions to The Gibberish Review".
Hilarious.
What a great idea for a poem. Hilarious and brilliant.*
HA!
If it's any consolution, we would have published this.
Love it.
HAHAHAHAA, brilliant.
*
Nice collection of non-sequitors. But as Isaac Stern told me when I was a young music student, "If you believe the critics when they say you are good, you have to believe them when they say you are not good." I read this gem the other day: "She dressed like a whore and played like the devil."