Online Magazine!

I have started an online magazine with my friend Sarah. The Stubbled Chin a literary and arts magazine, highlighting some events around Portland, and also featuring some work from my friend and me, as well as receiving submissions from others. The website is still in its beginning stages, but be patient with us and check it often. We'll be updating events and so forth.

Visit the site, comment on it; I'd love to hear from you! We're also on Facebook!

http://www.thestubbledchin.com

manda

Taking

a poetry class. It starts tonight. I am so entirely exhilerated.

Thinking

of poem-ideas always. Sometimes it's just a combination of certain words that ring in my ear, or a set-up of nature that inspires me.

Some ideas I'm juggling right now:
.Pieces of jewelry likened to a relationship. For example, a necklace is slow-dancing on the porch, with your arms around my neck. A bracelet is your hand grabing my arm telling me not to leave, etc.
.Queen Anne's Lace taking over the railroad track. I've always been fascinated by this "weed". My grandma had a shower curtain with flowers on it and that's how I first found out about Queen Anne's Lace.
.Peacock feathers as eyes. I talk alot about moths having eyes in my other poems, but today I realized that peacock feathers have eyes also.
.Turning the page of a book. In the poem, I refer to it as the "blade of the page", the very edge, where one small god walks. There's danger in turning a page.
.And always many others.

Doubting

whether this book will actually happen. Feeling this makes me sad.

Contributions?

Visiting

Oblation Papers and Press always makes me happy. Paper is really quite a lovely and beautiful thing. But it is also expensive. Oh, if I only had thousands of dollars and my self-published book would be lovely!

Inspired

by some of my poems included in the book, the title "It's Your Stubbled Chin: a book of Square Realities and Oblong Dreams."

"It's your stubbled chin"--
Comes out of the second section of the book, "Sylvania: of Class on Campus", specifically the poem "Mid[day] Terms." The stanza:

What is that quality that is so arresting?
It's swiftness.
It's the ordeal.
It's high energy.
It's your stubbled chin scratching the desk.

"...a book of Square Realities and Oblong Dreams"--
A major theme in the book is reality and dreams, which the third section, "Ugly Moths and Love", deals with. An excerpt:

"In mid-kiss at the front door of this yellow house,
I come to the realization that I cannot arrive at a place
I do not remember leaving.
The feeling in my lips turns numb as I put thoughts together
to create my departure from the yellow house.
*Yes, yes, I remember now, it was still daylight. We were in the backyard drinking chocolate milk, singing "Do Lord, oh do Lord, oh do remember me..." Then I realized I was almost late for an outing with my sister, so we ran through the house to the front door. He opened it to let me out. "Bye, Darling," I said, slipping through his loose grasp. Then right as the last strands of my hair slipped through his hand, he grabbed my waist with his other hand and swung me around to meet his lips. After what seemed like a timeless kiss, I snapped his suspenders--like I always do--and skipped down the stairs. "Bye, Lovely!"*
This was my departure.
The feeling came back to my lips with the sudden formulation and remembrance of my leaving."

Broken

into three sections:



"Half a Fortnight: Journal of a Week"



"Sylvania: of Class on Campus"



"Ugly Moths and Love: of Life and Relationships"