I feel good about my manuscript still (manuscript 2, that is). It’s been probably a month since I finished it and I don’t hate the poems yet. In fact, I wrote to Annie the other day that I was having a hard time thinking of them apart from the collection—that each of them were little cogs in a bigger machine. I like that. I get excited about that.

So, basically, I just want someone else to be excited about it too.

I’m sending out again today. I figure if I send to one contest a month it will be affordable and it will keep me in the game.

The hardest part about ALL of publishing, for me, is the cost. It’s really, really expensive for me to constantly send work out, and sending manuscripts out is basically exorbitant. I have some cost-saving measures in place: my brother gifted me a free laser printer a few years back. I try to time my purchases of mailing supplies with holidays where I receive money as gifts.

But I think my argument is larger here: I mean, I have been afforded enough privilege in my life to even be able to send my work out consistently. I consider myself lucky, with the realization that there are people in the world creating wonderful poems, but, because of economics, can’t afford to get in the game.