THIS WEEK, SOMETHING A LITTLE DIFFERENT
A GUESSING GAME AND A PRIZE FOR THE WINNER!
Instead of waxing on about some topic du jour this week, I thought we’d play a little game. A matching game.
Participate in comments below; the one who guesses the most correctly will win an anthology, specifically, one of the volumes of Anthology of Appalachian Writers, as detailed further down the post.
The game is in honor of my being featured next month on The Salon For Creative Expression, the brainchild and creative endeavor of poet Diane Melby.
You can check out some past issues here, and sample some of the work by other poets, writers, and artists Diane has featured since the inception of The Salon.
THE RULES OF THE GAME
I’m only going to give you the title of the poems. You’ll find them below, numbered one through five. Below that, you’ll see some photos (there will be more than five) for you to choose from. I’ll caption each with a photo “title” for the purposes of our little game.
After reviewing them, scroll down to where you see the tab to “leave a comment,” and click it. When the comment box opens, make a list numbered 1 through 5 (the numbers to correspond to the poem titles), and after each number put the captioned “title” of the photo you think will be used to illustrate the poem in next month’s Salon.
Comment entries have to be made, of course, prior to June!
When the June issue of The Salon drops, I’ll let you know, and we can all visit it together to see the poems, their accompanying photographs, and congratulate the winner of the anthology.
WHAT’S IN A NAME?
What’s in a name—or a title? Perhaps not always what you might think, right? So, here are the names of my poems you’ll be able to read in full in the June issue of The Salon For Creative Expression (not necessarily to be published in this order):
1. Holler
2. Buried Buckles
3. Ghosts of the Potomac
4. Empty Vessel
5. Hive Mind
A PICTURE IS WORTH A HUNDRED WORDS
I know, I know. But for our purposes, a thousand words is a bit overkill, since I tend to write short form poetry. Many of my poems are even shorter than a hundred words.
So, which hundred-word photo below do you think matches each of the poems above?
OK, COOL. SO WHAT DO I WIN?
Here’s the payoff. Get the most matches correct, and win an autographed copy of your choice between two of the more recent volumes of The Anthology of Appalachian Writers.
You can choose either Volume XIV, the Marie Manilla edition, or Volume XV, the Barbara Kingsolver edition.
Vol. XIV (published 2022) contains both author D.W. Gregory’s story, Mr. Kindness, and my own story, Vanity. Mr. Kindness won the 2021 West Virginia Fiction Competition (1st place) and is also published in Coolest American Stories 2024, edited by Mark Wish and Elizabeth Coffey.
Vol. XV (published 2023) contains two of my poems: From Time To Time and Ancient Mounds. The Poet Laureate of West Virginia, Marc Harshman, chose From Time To Time to be among those he read to an audience assembled at Shepherd University in Shepherdstown, West Virginia, which was a happy honor for me.
TURN UP THE VOLUME
If you can happen to get ahold of a copy of Volume XVI of the Anthology of Appalachian Writers (published in 2024), that’s the Ann Pancake edition, which features my short story, Mother, May I?. Mother May I? also won the West Virginia Fiction Competition (second place)—in 2023.
Not to risk being outdone by her little sister, D.W. Gregory AGAIN won the West Virginia Fiction Competition (first place) in 2024 with her short fiction, Moving Day. That one you’ll find in Volume XVII, the Marc Harshman edition, the final installment in the Anthology of Appalachian Writers series, lovingly overseen by managing editor, S. Bailey Shurbutt.
Also in the Marc Harshman edition is my short fiction, Home Free, and five of my poems: Swallowed Glass, Still Life, Walls Do Talk, 70 X 6.5, and Still Stories.
You may have noticed two of those poems employ the word, still. In the former case, it’s “still” as in not moving; in the latter, it’s “still” as in how’s about we distill us some corn squeezin’s, y’all?
BETTER TO BE GAME THAN GAMY
So who’s game? Wanna play?
No matter which volume you select, should you win, you will be treated to some excellent and award-winning writing. Here’s just a sampling of the authors whose words you will be treated to:
E.J. Wade Pat Donahoe Marc Harshman Marie Manilla Barbara Kingsolver S. Bailey Shurbutt D.W. Gregory Jane Ellen Freeman Julie Shehan Randi Ward Torli Bush Lisa Taka Younis Nadia Madenspacher Noche Gautier Ben Trogdon Tom Donlon Kari Gunter-Seymour Karen Spears Zacharias Leah Rampy Ruth A. MacQuade Sue Silver Sean Patrick Duffy M. Lynne Squires
Thanks so much for reading another issue of Monday Morning Literary Bric-a-Brac! I hope you’ll like, comment (especially this week!), share, and subscribe (it’s free—unless, of course, you want to generously support my work with a paid subscription that starts as low as $5 a month!).
Now here…log your guess using this comment link: