Second Anniversary of Terrapin Books

October marks the second anniversary of Terrapin Books. It was just two years ago that I began the journey towards becoming a small press publisher of poetry books. In spite of my initial trepidations, I must say that it’s all gone quite smoothly. I love this new work. it keeps me out of trouble and gives me the joy of putting more poetry books into the world. Among the greatest pleasures is giving a poet a book.

There have been challenges, among them and top of the list was learning how to format a book. I really had no idea how to do that when I decided to do open a press, but I asked the right people the right questions and received the right answers. I then sat in front of my computer until I figured it out. Now I can do all kinds of fancy stuff like adjust margins, place page numbers at bottom right and left (instead of center), and design a cover. One step at a time and a belief that I could do it with patience and persistence—that’s what worked for me.

I could not be more proud of the books that Terrapin has thus far published. Terrapin now has 9 single author poetry books, two craft books, and two anthologies. Four additional titles have just been accepted for publication. I’ve held 5 open reading periods and have accepted 2-4 books each time. I am committed to taking only a limited number of manuscripts so that I can get the books out in good time and give each book the attention it deserves. There will be no cranking out one book after another.

I’m also proud to say that I’ve run no contests and don’t plan to run any. All of my authors are winners.

I’m proud, too, of the attention that the poetry world has been paying to Terrapin Books. We’ve had multiple features in Verse Daily, two in Poetry Daily, one forthcoming in Ted Kooser’s American Life in Poetry, and one in The Missouri Review. We’ve been getting some lovely reviews in such places as the Washington Independent Review of Books, Broadkill Review, and Rain Taxi Review of Books. More on the way.

Terrapin now has its very own online bookstore. Check it out. We pay shipping and handling. Our books are also available at Amazon, B&N, and lots of other online sites.

Look for our next open reading period January/February 2018.

My Poetic Sweet Tooth

I recently learned that on October 9, John Hewitt, at The Writer’s Resource Center, made me Today’s Recommended Poet: "Diane Lockward is a poet, teacher and an active blogger. Her poetry is feminine and feminist. She is smart and funny. Her poetry probes the politics of family, motherhood, and food with affection and a bit of exasperation."

Temptation by Water 2010

What Feeds Us 2006

Eve’s Red Dress 2003

"You might want to read her blog entries about voice vs. tone here and here. She also has a poetry tutorial: The Crafty Poet: A Portable Workshop"

Thanks, John, for that sweet recommendation!


Then on October 25, I had two poems, "Service for the Murdered Boy" and "A Murmuration of Starlings," featured in the Saturday Poetry Series at As It Ought to Be. These two poems are anything but sweet—they are quite grim, but relevant to current events. Thanks to editor Sivan Butler-Rotholz for choosing my poems.


Several years ago I began to submit poems to online journals as I came to believe that all poets should have at least some online presence. I began to understand the several advantages of an online publication, e.g., the possibility of a wider audience than a print journal has, the possibility of the work reaching readers in other countries, the long-term presence of the work in the online journal's archives.

As social media became more and more in use among authors, it became apparent that it could be used to multiply the online journal's reach as readers hit the Like button and the Share button for Facebook and/or added a link to Twitter. Still, many of us held onto our affection for the printed word, the pleasure of getting into a comfortable chair and spending a few hours reading poetry on the page.

Now we can have our cake and eat it too! A number of online journals have gathered the work first published online and put it into a print edition. Some of these print anthologies gather all of the work of several years; others do a best-of anthology.

The most recent of these anthologies arrived in my mailbox this week. Katherine Riegel, editor of Sweet: A Literary Confection, has just edited the journal's first anthology: All of Us: Sweet: The First Five Years.

Click for Amazon

Here's the back cover's list of contributors.

Some other online journals have also published print anthologies:

Pirene's Fountain—First Water: Best of Pirene's Fountain The best of the first five years, edited by Ami Kaye.

Valparaiso Poetry Review—Poetry from Paradise Valley. Selected work from the first ten years, edited by Edward Byrne. (currently unavailable)

Thrush Poetry Journal—Thrush Poetry Journal: An Anthology of the First Two Years. Includes all the work, edited by Helen Vittoria.


The Barefoot Muse—The Best of The Barefoot Muse. The journal has ceased publication but the best work of its five years of publication is preserved in this print anthology, edited by Anna M. Evans.


I like this trend and hope it continues.

Do You Recycle?

I'm talking about recycling your writing. I love it when I get a piece published and then later reprinted somewhere else. Getting that extra mileage is especially gratifying if the first publication source had a limited circulation or hit a distant part of the country. I also like to go from print to online and the other way around. Of course, opportunities to republish poems in journals are very limited, and I find that the number of journals that do republish tend to be, well, not so hot.

My favorite way to get a piece back into circulation is anthologies, maybe because I really like anthologies. I'm fussy, though, about which proposed anthologies I send to. I've had several experiences where I've submitted, had the poem or poems accepted, then waited and waited, only to learn that the project wasn't going to fly. Not much lost since the work had already been published. Still, it's annoying. So for the most part, I submit only to anthologies that already have a publication agreement or ones whose editors solicit my work.

My earlier blog post on obsession was originally written a few years ago in response to a call for brief essays on that topic. Each essay was to be accompanied by a poem that illustrated the obsession. Cool idea for an anthology! I wrote the piece, added the poem "Organic Fruit" which had previously been published in the Seattle Review, and sent in my submission. It was accepted. Then I waited. And waited. Queried and was told things were moving slowly, but moving. Many months later it became apparent that the two editors had never even gotten as far as completing their proposal. The project died. One dead essay. But the poem was reprinted in the 2009 Alhambra Poetry Calendar.

Then back in April another blogger invited other bloggers to guest blog at her site. I dug out the essay and the poem and sent them to her. She posted them but could not get the poem formatted correctly. Obviously, that's a poem where format is critical. We went back and forth a few times, but she just couldn't get it right, so I eventually asked her to just delete the post. Essay died again.

Then a few weeks ago Red Room invited their blogging members to post on the topic of obsession. They would then select a handful to feature. So I again dug out the essay and posted it there, but without the poem as I didn't think the poem would format correctly there. My piece was one of ten featured. Nice. Then I thought, hey, why not get a bit more mileage out of this piece and repost at this site. So that's the history of that bit of recycling.

Another kind of recycling that I like is when a poem of mine appears somewhere and some bloggers find it and post it at their sites. I know that not all poets like that. Some are offended if they are not first asked for permission. I don't mind at all as long as the reposter doesn't butcher the poem or mangle my name. Really, I think recycling is cool. What do you think?

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