We are excited to announce that this year's Pushcart Nominees are:
This year's nominees for Sundress's annual "Best of the Net" anthology are:
Poetry "LAPD Police Scanner Translation I: Pedestrian Incident" by Héctor Ramirez "How to Find the Center of a Circle" by Tiana Clark "On Contemplating Leaving My Children" by Jennifer Givhan "Fourth of July and Trans on the Brooklyn Side" by Kayleb Rae Candrilli "Johnny Hodges and Kalamata Olives" by Kaveh Akbar "before i was born, my mother" by Willy Palomo Creative Nonfiction "Notes on My Wasp Wing Tattoo" by Cameron Awkward-Rich "The Violence Question, Answered by a Goat: Or, Notes Toward a Discourse on Haunting through Poetry" by Jeanann Verlee Also, shout out to last year's nominee, Jacqui Germain, for having her piece "Conjuring: A Lesson in Words and Ghosts" chosen by Bruce Bond for last year's Best of the Net. We at Muzzle are feeling very lucky and excited to bring on a new group of Poetry Readers, Book Reviewers, and Copy Editors, as well as a Social Media Editor. We were rather overwhelmed by the response to our call for applications, and were only able to take on a small handful of the talented and necessary writers who applied. We're proud to be adding the talents of Raul Alvarez, Derrick Carr, Brionne Janae, Sarah Sgro, and Raena Shirali, Claudia Cortese, Irène Mathieu, Ellie White, George Abraham, and Shonté Daniels to our staff. Raul Alvarez, Poetry ReaderRaul Alvarez is the author of There Was So Much Beautiful Left (Boost House) and holds an MFA from Columbia College Chicago. His work is has been published in Fourteen Hills, Inferior Planets, PANK, Fanzine, Pinwheel, and elsewhere. He currently lives in Seattle and works for Northwest Immigrant Rights Project. Derrick Carr, Poetry ReaderDerrick Carr is a poet and organizer in the San Francisco Bay Area, where he's lived since he was old enough to read. He co-founded Yale's slam team in 2010 while getting his degree in African-American Studies. He's co-edited the anthology Tandem as a staff member at The Lit Slam. His poems have been published or are forthcoming in Oakland Review, Adroit, and here at Muzzle. You can keep up with him at tinyletter.com/whyderrick. Brionne Janae, Poetry ReaderBrionne Janae is a California native, teaching artist, and poet living in Boston where she completed an MFA at Emerson College. Brionne was a recipient of the 2016 St. Botoloph Emering Artist award. Her poetry has been published or is forthcoming in jubilat, Boaat, Plume, Bayou Magazine, The Nashville Review, and Waxwing among others. And most importantly Brionne is a Cave Canem Fellow. Sarah Sgro, Poetry ReaderSarah Sgro currently lives in Oxford, Mississippi, where she serves as Poetry Editor for the Yalobusha Review and co-hosts the Broken English Reading Series. She is from New York and previously worked as an editorial assistant for Guernica. Her poetry appears in Tagvverk ,Muzzle, TYPO, glitterMOB, Horse Less Review, Deluge, and other journals. Her website is sarah-sgro.com. Raena Shirali, Poetry ReaderIndian American poet and educator Raena Shirali is the author of GILT (YesYes Books, 2017). Her work has appeared in Boston Review, Ninth Letter, Tupelo Quarterly, Crazyhorse, Indiana Review, and many more. Her honors include a 2016 Pushcart Prize and the 2014 Gulf Coast Poetry Prize, among others. She will be Bucknell University’s Philip Roth Resident this spring at the Stadler Center for Poetry. Claudia Cortese, Book ReviewerClaudia Cortese is a poet, essayist, and fiction writer. Her first book, WASP QUEEN (Black Lawrence Press, 2016), explores the privilege and pathology, the trauma and brattiness of suburban girlhood. Her work has appeared in Blackbird, Black Warrior Review, Gulf Coast Online, The Offing, and Sixth Finch, among others. The daughter of Neapolitan immigrants, Cortese grew up in Ohio and lives in New Jersey. She also lives at claudia-cortese.com. Irène Mathieu, Book ReviewerIrène Mathieu is a pediatrician and writer based in Philadelphia. She is the 2016 winner of the Bob Kaufman Book Prize and author of the poetry chapbook the galaxy of origins (dancing girl press, 2014) and book orogeny(Trembling Pillow Press, forthcoming). Her poetry, prose, and photography can be found in The Caribbean Writer, Muzzle Magazine, Los Angeles Review, Callaloo Journal, Jet Fuel Review, Lime Hawk, Big Lucks, and elsewhere. She has been a Fulbright scholar and a Callaloo Fellow, and her work has been nominated for the Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net. Irène is a contributing author on the Global Health Hub blog and an editor for the humanities section of the Journal of General Internal Medicine. She holds a BA in International Relations from the College of William & Mary and MD from Vanderbilt University. Ellie White, Social Media EditorEllie White holds a BA in English from The Ohio State University, and an MFA from Old Dominion University. She writes poetry and nonfiction. Her work has appeared in Antiphon Poetry Magazine, Harpur Palate, Tincture, and several other journals. Ellie’s chapbook, Requiem for a Doll, was released by ELJ Publications in June 2015. She currently lives near some big rocks and trees outside Charlottesville, Virginia. George Abraham, Copy EditorGeorge Abraham is a Palestinian-American poet attending Swarthmore College. He competed in the College Union Poetry Slam Invitational (placing 2nd out of 68 international teams), the National Poetry Slam, and the Individual World Poetry Slam. A 2016 Brooklyn Poets Fellow, his work was featured as part of the Brooklyn Poet of the Week spotlight series. His work has appeared or is forthcoming in Thrush, Emerge Literary Journal, Riwayya, Crab Fat Magazine, Yellow Chair Review, the Shade Journal, Black Napkin Press, APIARY, and more. He hopes to continue bringing awareness to Palestinian human rights and socio-economic struggles through art. More work and contact info can be found at his artist website: http://gabrahampoet.wixsite.com/gabrahampoet Shonté Daniels, Copy EditorShonté Daniels is a young poet and games journalist from New Jersey. She is currently an editorial associate at Rewire. Shonté's games criticism has appeared in places such as Deorbital, Kill Screen, and Motherboard, and her poetry has been on Apogee, The Rectangle, and Phoebe. Follow Shonté on Twitter @JohnnyxH or visit her website at Shonte-Daniels.com.
We are so excited to share our new logo from poet and web developer Meghann Plunkett!!Q&A with Meghann Plunkett*Questions from Stevie Edwards, Editor-in-Chief SE: I know you primarily through your work as a poet, but you also have a background as a web developer. Do you see any interplay between your interests and talents in poetry and coding? MP: I’d say that I see a connection between writing code and editing poetry for sure. I was a poet long before I was introduced to web development and one of the first things I became delighted by was the notion that code could become more “elegant” by being reworked or reorganized. This made me literally clap my hands and spin around. I feel this is what happens when we edit our poems or stories into the most effective shape we can. And the editing process is never over. I love the idea that these two very different disciplines are constantly striving, chiseling and reaching for elegance. *** SE: You recently moved from NYC for an MFA program in the great metropolis of Carbondale, IL. Could you tell me a little bit about your decision to pursue an MFA and how you’re finding the experience? MP: Haha. Yes, it’s certainly been a change. I think I always knew that I was interested in pursuing an MFA at some point in my life, but I wanted to be in the world first. After graduating from Sarah Lawrence I had almost every job imaginable. I worked as a shop girl at the Plaza Hotel, I waited tables, I house sat, pet sat, baby sat and for a time I boomed sound for a terrible reality television show called “Street Court,” which was like Judge Judy except “in the street” ..literally. After learning web development and finding a stable job, I realized how much I missed being able to dedicate my mind and life to poetry. That was the turning point and I knew it was time. I am just ending my first year and so far, I couldn't be happier. My cohort is filled with talented, kind and motivated people. My professors, Judy Jordan and Allison Joseph are beams of motivation and wise insight. Being in an MFA is special. It creates an environment that allows poetry to be the most important thing. When does that ever happen? *** SE: You recently had an article published in Luna Luna Magazine about—and I hope this isn’t an over-generalization—people who publicly advocate for supporting women in abusive relationships but aren’t advocates for women they encounter in their daily lives. In this article you suggest we ask ourselves “how we each have helped cycles of abuse by doing nothing, by doubting the victim and shying away.” Do you think this challenge to victim-blaming shows up in your poetry at all? MP: I’d say that is a good summary of my intentions for this article, yes. I’d say that I have been shifting my life and my work to really focus on female issues in general, and victim blaming is certainly a part of that. I have a lot of current work that is not out in the world yet that deals with these issues. I’m interested in looking at these issues, victim blaming for example, and studying the process from external to internal. This isn’t in the Luna Luna article, but victim blaming begins from an external source and can often result in an internal dialogue with yourself. It is easy to become your own oppressor in this way. This concept is fascinating and heartbreaking to me. It’s scary too, to look at my own internal landscape and ask myself how much of this was told to me? How much of that so I keep telling myself. *** SE: I know this is a huge and not easily answerable question, but do you have any thoughts on how to disrupt the seeming complacency toward sexism within the poetry community? MP: This is hard. I just thought about it and I hate my answer because it places a lot of the action and the fixing mostly on women. But I think that the only way to eradicate sexism and harassment in any community is to not stay silent. The more we talk, the more awareness spreads. Often when I stayed silent in the past it was because I assumed I was alone and that these actions from a certain person were personal problems. What I have learned is that if there is a source of hate being directed at you, it is also being directed at others. When I realized this, I started to see the problem as systemic and get angry. Speaking out is the most commonplace super power I have encountered. It is magic. Oh and also, you don’t have to be a victim to speak up. Men see it all the time too. Say something. *** SE: Do you have any favorite recent feminist poetry reads? MP: I’m not sure how these women might feel to have this label put on them, but it is my opinion that every female poet with a strong political voice is a feminist poet. There are so many of them, how to narrow them down? I’ll just list those whose name begin with the letter A: Aja-Monet is just one of my favorite activist and women in general. Aimee Baker has a long poem about women who have been abducted. Ada Limon’s newest book Bright Dead Things. Aimee Nezhukumatathil’s poem about C-Sections. Ansel Elkin’s book Blue Yodel. Angel Nafis and her book Black Girl Mansion. *** SE: What was the last poem that really moved you? MP: Ansel Elkin’s "Reverse: A Lynching" from her book Blue Yodel. So Powerful. *** SE: How long have you been writing poetry. What sparked your interest? MP: I’m not sure. I remember writing autobiographies for my teddy bears as a kid. But, I don’t think I really started writing until college. Matthea Harvey and Jeffrey McDaniel opened my eyes to what poetry was and could be. *** SE: So, let’s say you sit down with a computer or with a notebook or etch-a-sketch or whatever it is use for writing and poems and nothing comes out. What do you do? MP: I usually end up cleaning. Monotonous things often help me get into a creative space. I might be able to visually see how prolific I am by gauging how dirty my house is. *** SE: Are there any TV shows you’ve recently binged watched? MP: Jessica Jones. Dear Lord. *** SE: Favorite treat? MP: Pickles. Ice cream. Ramen. *** SE: Favorite thing to read that isn't poetry? MP: I’ve been reading a lot of Neil Gaiman as of late. So, magical short stories? Note: Meghann's poems "Adolescence" and "Long Distance Larceny" appeared in our Winter 2014 issue, and more about her work as both a web developer and a poet can be found on her website: meghannplunkett.com
Bettering American Poetry Nominations
Pushcart Nominations
Our nominees this year for Sundress's annual "Best of the Net" Anthology are:
1) “Conjuring: A Lesson in Words and Ghosts” by Jacqui Germain 2) “Dark Pairing” by Tarfia Faizullah 3) “The Forgetting Episodes” by Justin Phillip Reed 4) “Menace” by Joy Priest 5) “a question of rain.” by Jayson Smith 6) “Meditation on a Poem about Glass Embedded in the Scalp after a Car Accident” by Jeanann Verlee We're continually humbled by the challenging and gorgeous work we get to publish at Muzzle. Nomination decisions are never easy, but they were especially difficult this year. Please join us in giving immense love and appreciation to these poets. We are doing our best to get their work out into the world because we believe that the world needs it. We hope that the good folks at Best of the Net will help with this important mission. Pushcart:
"Conjuring: A Lesson in Words and Ghosts" by Jacqui Germain "Dark Pairing" by Tarfia Faizullah "a question of rain." by Jayson Smith "The Body Knows" by Desiree Bailey "Hero(i)n" by Airea D. Matthews “The Summer A Tribe Called Quest Broke Up” by Hanif Willis-Abdurraqib Best of the Net: "for kendrik" by Amber Atiya "Leaving the Okay Marriage" by Marie-Elizabeth Mali "In a Bar that Burned Down a Year Ago" by Peter Mason "Hero(i)n" by Airea D. Matthews "A History of Manic Depression" by Raul Alvarez "Butthole Butthole Butthole Butthole" by Sam Sax *Note from editors: We published and adored "The Summer A Tribe Called Quest Broke Up" by Hanif Willis-Abudrraqib before he joined the staff. We're really excited to get to work with somebody so talented. Dear Readers,
Putting this series together has given me such faith in the poets in my age range. I was spoiled for choice when it came to finding poets who were both talented and hardworking - and I was amazed to discover how very humble nearly everyone I contacted was. Several brilliant poets even turned down my invitation to be on the list, on the grounds that they felt their current work wasn't strong enough. This project has humbled me, too: I agonized over which poets to include, whether or not I approached people correctly, and whether or not I did their work justice in my write-ups. But I'm happy with the result. I'm so glad so many of you read and followed this, and that you're as excited as I am to discover and celebrate the brilliant people in this field. Please keep it up: read these folks' books, read the awesome journals that publish them (including Muzzle, of course!), and go to their readings when you have the chance. It's my sincere belief that this is a crop of writers that will continue to grow in impressive ways. If you feel I missed someone I should know about or should better appreciate, don't hesitate to find me and point me towards her, or have the poet in question submit to Muzzle. We're always hungry to introduce our readers to new work. Below is a cheat sheet of all the listed poets' names. Their bios should enumerate recent or upcoming projects worth looking out for. --Laura Swearingen-Steadwell, Associate Editor * 1. Aricka Foreman 2. Traci Brimhall 3. Reginald Dwayne Betts 4. Tommye Blount 5. Jessica Helen Lopez 6. Sandra Beasley 7. Tarfia Faizullah 8. L. Lamar Wilson 9. Matthew Olzmann 10. Aimee Nezhukumatathil 11. Jamaal May 12. Kenyatta Rogers 13. John Paul Davis 14. Natalie Diaz 15. Roger Reeves 16. Jennifer Sperry-Steinorth 17. Jason Bayani 18. Bianca Spriggs 19. Tomás Morin 20. Nathan McClain 21. Nandi Comer 22. Ben Clark 23. Jonterri Gadson 24. Suzi Q. Smith 25. Nicky Beer 26. Rico Frederick 27. Nicole Sealey 28. Christina Olivares 29. Marcus Jackson 30. Aracelis Girmay |
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