Writers' Bloc - Creative Writing Off Topic Thread

Looks like this forum (like many others on this once-great site) has died a death.

Anybody here still writing away? I got some good news recently anyway. It looks like I'll have a second poetry collection published in the spring.

Expecting to have approximately 10 Irish language poems published in the winter, too (some in an annual journal, some in a monthly magazine).

2 poems published in Comhar this month. Pretty happy with that. Hoping to see 5 more in another annual journal before Christmas.

Two pieces away from finishing the first draft of my second published collection as well. Aiming to get that out in April.

I've finished a second full book in English but a chunk of that is going into a bilingual collection - it all needed a bit more work/feedback/critique but at least I know some of it will be out next spring. Ditto two full collections in Irish that I put together between 2021 and 2023. With any luck I'll get a few volunteers to give me pointers on the dual-language book before the final draft goes to print.

Getting more publicity than I expected!

https://x.com/ansiopaleabhar/status/1778135138167038363

Anyone still reading this forum these days? I remember when I first signed up to Boards and started sharing the poems that I had written in supervised study, getting ready for my Leaving Cert. Pickarooney offered some feedback, critique that I wasn't ready to read, but I think I was 30 before I was ready to start taking constructive criticism properly. 😝

I suppose I opened this thread tonight to show off a bit and to keep a record of some of the progress I've made since those early drafts in the pre-2010 days. This year I've had poems published in Comhar, A New Ulster, HOWL, The Waxed Lemon, Lothlorien Poetry Journal, The Galway Review, The Honest Ulsterman, An Gael, Drawn To the Light Press, Aneas (the Irish wing of Southword) and I'm due to have 2 pieces in The Hong Kong Review. I got 2nd place in the Gaeilge category at Ballybunion Arts Festival this year, and won 1st place in Drawn To The Light Press ("Hold Fast To Dreams") and Comórtas Filíochta Fhéile Raifteirí, Baile Locha Riach 2024.

I've helped edit 8 published collections by other writers, with 10-12 more to come in the first half of 2025. I got to be a judge for a written poetry competition in April, and again for the Munster Poetry Slam later in 2024.

My goal for the next couple of years is to have pieces in Banshee, Crannóg, The Stinging Fly, Poetry Ireland Review, The Four Faced Liar, Skylight 47, Cyphers, The Wexford Bohemian, Ropes, and Ragaire. I also want to get to more festivals like Listowel, an tOireachtas, Éige Michael Hartnett, etc. It would be great to win more competitions, but I'd rather get another English language collection together and do my first full collection in Irish. It would be lovely as well to start giving workshops to emerging writers, but I think I still have some way to go in my own journey before that's a realistic possibility.

On the road to Dublin this morning for the first workshop in the Poetry Ireland "Introductions"/ Éigse Éireann "Céadlínte" program. Fantastically excited to be part of the lineup this year. I brought a bag full of journals and magazines to read on the way, but I'm too full of nervous energy to focus on any of them! >_<

Edit: Two years since anyone other than myself posted here. /sigh 😔

Congrats! What kind of writing have you been focusing on in your books/scripts?

I had a weird moment with a book today, a publication that I had really been looking forward to reading. The author is a fantastic individual on multiple levels, and has been held in high esteem for their varied works for years now.

This book, however, if full of unnecessary punctuation. It kills the flow of almost every piece within. There are commas everywhere which probably served well in drafts as reminders to breathe at live readings, but which interrupt phrases and clauses in really jolting places. I know the words themselves are the most important thing. I just wish they didn't feel so awkwardly separated!