environment

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Publishing In the Best Literary Journals for Poets

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Poets like to be published in literary journals, but there are some journals that are considered at the top and most poets would love to be in. Once they’ve got a few publications under their belt, they might have success with one of the following sites. A publication in any of these poetry journals could catapult your writing toward a larger, more reputable audience.

Best American Poetry is an anthology of the best poetry of the year. Each year, this series presents essential American verse and the poets who create it. Truly the “best” American poetry has appeared in this venerable collection for over thirty-five years. Get a copy of this and look at the journals the poems first appeared in. Robert Pinsky, the famous poet and literature professor, has called this annual anthology “a vivid snapshot of what a distinuished poet finds exciting, fresh and memorable.”

Among the literary journals often found the Best American Poetry anthology is The New Yorker, Poetry Magazine, The American Poetry Review, The Southern Review, The New England Review, The Harvard Review, The Cincinnati Review, Prairie Schooner, The Kenyon Review, Southwest Review, The Virginia Review Quarterly, New Ohio Review, the Paris Review, The Nation, The Georgia Review, The American Scholar, AGNI, The Literary Review, The Iowa Review, The Common, The Boston Review, Harper’s, Gulf Coast, Conduit, River Styx, Denver Quarterly, The Atlantic Monthly, Barrow Street, Cave Wall, The Alaska Quarterly Review, The Sun, New York Times Magazine, Black Warrior Review, The Colorado Review, The Carolina Quarterly, The Missouri Review, Pleiades, The New Criterion, The Hopkins Review, Image Magazine, The Southampton Review, The Sewnee Review, Birmingham, Massachusetts Review, The Sycamore Review, Terminus Magazine, Cherry Tree, Ecotone, Crazy Horse, Gulfshore Life, Hayden’s Ferry Review, The Hudson Review, The Iron Horse Literary Review, Naugatuck River Review, Maggy, The Manhattan Review, McSweeney’s, Michigan Quarterly Review, New South, New York Quarterly, PEN America, Poetry London, Poetry Northwest, The Rumpus, Southern Indiana Review, Vinyl Poetry, Buzzfeed, Mississippi Review, Cooper Nickel, Crab Apple Review, Copper Nickel and Brilliant Corners.

I have just signed a contract for a new book, Dread and Splendor: Paintings and Poems for a New Earth, with my artist colleague, Irene Christensen with Shanti Arts Press. It should be out in 2025. I will chronicle this experience to publication here on Thursdays. Follow me here.




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On Your Writing Space

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As a writer, I spend a lot of time in my study. This is a room that need only be inviting to one person—the one who inhabits it. I have a friend who has a very organized study with a clear desk. Unlike my desk, this one is s spacious and clear of the piles of work in progress that amass on my own. She recently pared down her book collection to fit on one small bookshelf. My office, by contrast, has four mismatched shelf units, each overstuffed with reference books, novels I hope to read one day, books on language and literacy, books relating to current projects, and stacks that I hope to get to “soon.” I love my office. Its creative chaos suits me and mirrors my writing process.

I find that writers have very different writing spaces that work uniquely for them. I know someone who works in a coffee shop in the town she lives in. She orders her favorite coffee and stays for the morning. Another friend writes in the library. She likes the quiet it affords her.

I can write in many different settings, at retreats, in my own studio, in writing groups, in the library, in coffee shops.

Where do you like to write? What fits your writing style, your process, your mood?
This study is where I created my latest manuscript, Dread and Splendor: Paintings and Poems for a New Planet. It’s my first collaborative manuscript with my Norwegian artist friend, Irene Christensen.

I’ll be blogging on Thursdays. Follow my blog here and the progress of my manuscript.


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Congratulating Yourself on Finishing a Piece of Writing

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As writers, we often feel that we don’t do enough. We don’t put enough hours into our writing,

we don’t do enough research before writing, and we don’t publish enough. When you finish a

piece of writing, give yourself a pat on the back: You finished a piece of creative writing—

something many attempt, but not quite as many achieve. I recently finished a manuscript called

Dread and Splendor: Paintings and Poems for a New Earth. I collaborated on it with the

Norwegian Artist, Irene Christensen. It’s a collection about the climate crisis and women at the

heart of it. I feel good about completing it.

Some writers consider the worth of their writing in the published pieces, but others don’t even

attempt to publish. The reward for them is in the process. You can share your writing at an

open-mic reading. You can post it online or bring it to an in-person writing group for

constructive critique. You can send it to a friend.

You can send it to a literary journal or an agent for possible publication, but that’s a topic for

another blog. As writers, we need to acknowledge our accomplishments for ourselves.

I’ll be blogging Thursdays about the writing process. Follow me here.

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The Journey of an Eco-poetry Manuscript

Dread and Splendor: Paintings and Poems for a New Earth

Manuscripts are not easy to put together, especially when they’re a collaboration. I have a new manuscript of eco-poetry that I am collaborating on with the Norwegian artists, Irene Christensen. I would like to write about the different stages of developing and publishing a manuscript.

The project started one winter at an artist colony, The Julia and David White Artist Colony, that sits on a naturally spectacular 17-acre rain forest, is in Costa Rica.  We both shared a love of this beautiful country. I was drawn to Irene’s evocative full-color paintings. Irene expressed admiration for my poetry.  I gave Irene a copy of my second poetry collection, Touch My Head Softly (Finishing Line Press, 2021) and she gave me her painting, “Volcano Flower.”  This interaction started a conversation that over a two-year period developed into the manuscript, Dread and  Splendor: Paintings and Poems for a New Planet.

The current collection comes from our common interest in natural beauty, the complex relationship between living things and the atmosphere, stopping exploitation of the earth that spans geographical and historical borders, and the feminine care at the center of environmentalism.

Irene worked on a series of art pieces  about women at the heart of the environmental justice movement.   I observed the creation of many of these remarkable paintings and wrote a series of ekphrastic poems, or written responses, to them.  We nurtured our creativity and friendship through this process.

Irene’s paintings unfold as the world heats up and becomes more and more unlivable. She creates images through the eyes of children,  mythical characters like trolls and goddesses, and the lenses of women witnessing the dying globe.  I reinforce this journey in words, giving verbal credence to Irene’s vision, and mine, of the future.

I hope to blog about our journey as the manuscript goes through different stages and if we can even find a publisher. Follow me here on Thursdays to continue this journey.

I Feel Close to Nature Too. Acrylic, 22” x 30” by Irene Christensen

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I’m Grateful to Starry Starry Kite for Publishing Three of my Ekphrastic Poems that Responded to Three Paintings by Irene Christensen. Here’s One:

I Feel Close to Nature Too

I feel close to nature too

earth moves in the hot sky

green leaves grow my hair

mountains erupt my skin

when you step on me I cry

I feel close to nature too

my eyes wash blue seashells 

my face erodes sand from the shore

ground has no home for living

suffocating in a polluted candy corn sky 

I feel close to nature too

writhing, dying in the heat

a red leaf dragon swallows

the trees growing in the night forest

I must preserve the charging planet beast

I feel close to nature too

About the Poet

Eileen P. Kennedy is the author of two collections of poetry: Banshees (Flutter Press, 2015), which was nominated for a Pushcart Prize and won Second Prize in Poetry from the Wordwrite Book Awards, and Touch My Head Softly (Finishing Line Press, 2021) which Literary Titan has described as “emotionally-charged poetry that explores life with observant poems that will appeal to anyone who loves inspired poetry.” It was a finalist for the International Book Awards in General Poetry. She lives in Amherst, MA with the ghost of Emily Dickinson. More at www.EileenPKennedy.om. 

About the Artist

Irene Christensen’s art is about painting as a magical act. Her images repeat and are transformed, as words and images in poems. She likes to maintain a sense of wonder in her art. That life is strange and quirky, and contradictory, that tragedy and comedy are not played out in separate theaters, but co-exist, side by side. More at ireneartster.wordpress.com

Check out the poems on Starry Starry Kite https://www.lindacastronovo.com/theonlinejournal