Gabrielle Brant Freeman

I do not belong here! If my thoughts were on a t-shirt, this would have been emblazoned across my chest during my first AWP experience way back in 2008 in New York. I was about a month pregnant with my second child, I did not yet really consider myself to be a writer, and I had absolutely no idea what I was getting myself into. The only thing I remember is hearing Galway Kinnell read his poem “Oatmeal,” which was fantastic. Everything else is a blur.

In about a week, I’ll be on a plane to Tampa on the way to my fourth AWP Conference. This time around, I’m much more excited than nervous, and I’m confident that I’m going to learn more than I can process and have a great time. If Tampa is your first AWP, let me help you out.

This conference is HUGE. It’s you went to Disneyworld during peak season huge. It’s you’re at the only Starbucks for 100 miles on a Monday at 9am huge. It’s the bread and milk aisles at the grocery store before a hurricane huge. You must prepare.

1. Use the AWP18 app to create your schedule.

You can read through descriptions of all the events going on, and you can sort by “time” or “tracks.” I use the “sort by tracks” feature to look through what’s being offered in pedagogy, readings, panel discussions, author signings, offsite events, etc. I don’t worry about putting multiple sessions in one time slot, and here’s why: You do not have to stay in a session the whole time. This is your time. If the panel you were stoked about isn’t living up to your expectations, go to the next one.

2. Plan out where you want to go at the Bookfair.

The Bookfair is a vast sea of amazingness and can be overwhelming. There are over 800 exhibitors. 800! Find out where the journals and presses you have submitted to/ want to submit to/ have work published in are and go meet them. (Bring business cards!) You can search for exhibitors by name or by category on the app and find where their table will be. There is a map of the Bookfair on the app. Use it!

3. Pack an empty bag for books.

Make sure you have a plan for getting all the books you’re going to buy at the Bookfair back home. (Bring cash!) Many people bring an extra, empty bag and check it on their return flight.

And speaking of packing, I have one word for you: layers. And comfortable shoes. Well that’s three words, but there you go.

4. Research the city.

Do a little research on the city, plan a short break between sessions, and go see something besides the inside of the convention center. Last year, my AWP buddy and I went to the National Air and Space Museum and saw the studio model of the starship Enterprise, the one they actually used in the original show. Yes, we’re geeks.

5. Plan to go to an offsite event. Or two!

Offsite events are terrific opportunities to meet up with interesting groups of writers. In 2015 in Minneapolis, I got to meet up with a bunch of other poets who had done the Found Poetry Review’s 30 day challenge at a repurposed mechanic’s garage full of art called House of Balls. So. Very. Cool.

While you’re at it, eat some local food! I don’t know about you, but I’m planning on getting some octopus and shrimp ceviche from the Taco Bus (about five blocks away from the hotel) and at least eight Cuban sandwiches. Mmmmmmm…

6. I lied! Here’s a final, bonus piece of advice: Make room in your schedule for the Dance Party.

Be there. Stay to the end. The DJ is AMAZING. Plus, you know you’re not going to make it to the hotel gym every morning. Dance Party = Exercise goals complete. Boom.

See you in Tampa!

Gabrielle Brant Freeman‘s poetry has been published in many journals, including Grist, One, Scoundrel Time, Shenandoah, and storySouth. She was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in 2017, and she was a Best of the Net 2014 finalist. Gabrielle won the 2015 Randall Jarrell Competition. Press 53 published her book, When She Was Bad, in 2016. Read her poems and more at http://gabriellebrantfreeman.squarespace.com/.

Featured Image Credit: Photo by José Martín Ramírez C on Unsplash

Aaron Dargis

https://youtu.be/m-m4yX3rv8U

It’s noon and eggshells are scattered about
the sink. I haven’t cleaned a pan in days.

I can’t think of a good reason to sweep the floors.
I won’t see him until he is drunk and pleased.

I envy shared glee for gardenias, like finding
a missing earring in the wash.

I lie in bed smoking, watching
a finch go to and fro her nest.

I want to sleep in. But, I have the afternoon
to fill the ashtray.

Aaron Dargis grew up in Michigan and lives in the Piedmont area of South Carolina. He is currently an MFA student at Converse College and Poetry Editor for South 85 Journal. His most recent poem appearing Panoply Magazine, “Grey Partridge,” won editor’s choice. His primary focus is on identity of the self within a geographical location, isolation, and memory.

“Kitchen Sink” first appeared in Panoply Magazine: https://panoplyzine.com/kitchen-sink-aaron-dargis/.

Mel Sherrer

Leigh Statham, a writer who has served on South 85 Journal‘s staff, is currently touring with her new YA book, Daughter4254, which will officially be released by Owl Hollow Press on November 7.  We caught up with her for a few minutes for a sneak preview of the book and some insight into her motivation for writing it.

What was your inspiration for Daughter4254?

My inspiration came from a lot of different sources. I’m a big fan of classic dystopian literature (especially The Giver and Fahrenheit 451) and Chinese history. The Cultural Revolution, in particular, blows my mind. This was a period when the government, or more specifically, Mao Zedong, decided that all art should “serve the people” which quickly translated into “serve the state.” Many great artists were ridiculed and great works of art and literature were gathered and destroyed. It’s a crushing story and one that China openly regrets now. As a creative person, I’ve often wondered what it would be like to have your life’s work be illegal. Fast forward to American culture today and the educational budget cuts that force public schools in the poorest areas to cut funding for the arts at all levels of childhood development, and we’ve got a much quieter, however equally nefarious situation on our hands. I think it’s important to express in any way we can how important the arts are not only to our children but to humans in general. I chose a futuristic novel.

How do you feel this book reflects socially prevalent opinions of art and artists?

I hope it reflects them closely. I tried to highlight the feeling I think every creative person gets in their gut, that desire to create and appreciate and be a part of something meaningful, even if you don’t know what that something is going to be. Although the “Leaders” in my book don’t allow anything that isn’t of use to the community (harkening back to the days of Mao) I don’t think that’s a far cry from the powers that be today, especially in the US. With more and more emphasis being placed on physical accomplishments and STEM, art, music, literature, and even quality cinema are suffering for lack of respect. I’m not against sports or science, of course. But I think a truly healthy society incorporates all aspects of learning. It doesn’t take much research to discover the benefits of an arts-rich education. The greatest scientists all had creative outlets as well as scientific pursuits. You have to be able to think creatively in order to problem solve, and that’s where all great STEM advancements come from. You can’t nurture those kinds of talents using only one side of a child’s brain.

Would you say your characters are symbolic or realized? What I mean by that is, do you formulate characters based on ideals and values you want them to represent or are they based on archetypes of human character?

When I sketch a character, I start with an archetype, then I add all the layers. For Daughter4254, I began with your basic misfit and then tried to add layers. I don’t ever think about a character representing any one ideal or value, per se. I try to make my characters as well-rounded as possible. They have ideals they aspire to, but a lot of times they are far from achieving those ideals. Sometimes they aren’t the people they think they are. Sometimes they just aren’t good at communicating what they want. In Daughter’s case, she doesn’t know what she wants, she doesn’t even know if it exists, she just knows she wants more and she feels like she needs to fight to find that something. Her story ultimately ends up being a sort of hero’s journey gone wrong.

How does this book differ from your previous book in terms of your writing process?

My previous books are historical fiction in a steampunk setting. I did a lot of research on French Canadian immigrant history and piracy for those books. It was a lot of fun to let my imagination run wild while framing the facts of those stories. I was writing specifically for a younger teen audience and mainly to entertain and inform. Not many people are aware of the true story of The Daughters of the King. Kids are always surprised to hear that the basic foundations of the novels are true. For Daughter4254, I was writing from the gut. Again, it’s a completely fantastic dystopian setting that I have complete control of, but it was more of a visceral experience. All of my books deal with death and loss and coming of age, in a way, but Daughter4254 is a much more serious study of what our world might become if we continue devaluing the arts at the rate we are now. As far as actual process goes, whereas the other books came together quickly. Daughter4254 has taken nearly a decade of writing, rewriting, and deciding on exactly how the story is best presented. I finally settled on an alternating flashback style as a nod to the fact that hindsight is 20/20. We won’t know what we’ve lost until it’s gone.

Daughter4254 delves into the intricacies of a mother-daughter relationship, can you talk about your inspiration for that theme; is there a personal narrative behind it?

Ahh… now we’ve come to the really hard question! Yes and no. I think every child feels the weight of their parents’ expectations most of their lives. My mother and I have a rocky relationship at best, but I still find myself wanting to please her. Daughter’s motivation for a lot of the choices she makes is to make her mother proud. There is something timeless about that. I know very few people who can honestly say they aren’t trying in some way to get their parents’ approval, even late in life, even when it doesn’t make sense, even when they are dead and buried.

Did you set out to explore this theme, or did it emerge as you were writing?

I try to let my themes emerge as I write. I concentrate primarily on character, plot, and setting. After all, my goal is to tell a good story. One of the last things I do before I send a book to my agent is to look for any themes that are emerging. If there is something there that is strong and begging to be pulled out, then I take it by the hand, spread it through the book, and dress it up a bit. I don’t think I could ever force a theme. It would probably come out feeling insincere and hollow. Themes have to be born naturally or for me, they ruin the story.

What do you read when you are working on a piece of fiction? Do you take the read everything or read nothing approach when it comes to influence and inspiration?

I’ve tried both methods, and for me, what works best is read everything, especially in the genre that I’m writing. I used to be afraid that I would accidentally rewrite what I was reading, or that my work wouldn’t be as original or might somehow be contaminated by someone else’s work. But I find exactly the opposite to be true. First of all, you can’t claim to be an artist if you never let yourself be inspired by other artists. Second, you need to know what’s being done in your field. What’s selling? What’s amazing? What’s not so great? Working under a rock is no way to work. Third, even if your plot matches that of a bestseller that you stumble across, chapter for chapter (true story, happened to me once) no one else is going to write it the way you write it. Your voice is uniquely your own, and it’s better to know that book is out there and to be familiar with it than to have your agent school you on it! Trust me on this one. Some of the greatest writers of our time base their novels on classic works or works they admire. The more you dig into your own creative dirt, the more of your own flavor will shine, and in time you will have a completely original piece.

What most excites you about Daughter4254? What should readers be anticipating?

In my wildest dreams, I’m hoping to start a creative revolution, complete with hashtags and bumper stickers and spontaneous works of sidewalk chalk art and impromptu public poetry readings. In reality, I’m extremely pleased with the work Owl Hollow Press did to make this book beautiful on the inside and out. There are all kinds of beautiful touches through the book, the chapter headings, the inside flap. I’m in love with the actual physical copy. I am also excited to share with readers my view of how bad it can get. That probably sounds crazy, but that’s what literature is for, right? To give you a glimpse of what’s possible, be it good or bad. Sometimes you have to look the bad in the face in order to appreciate the good. Make sure to plan a cultural outing as soon as you finish reading. Support your local artists, musicians, and writers. Go see indie films and make a little art yourself. God knows we need it now more than ever.

About the Author

Leigh Statham was raised in the wilds of rural Idaho but found her heart in New York City. She worked at many interesting jobs before settling in as a mother and writer.  She now resides in North Carolina with her husband, four children, eight chickens, a fluffy dog, and two suspected serial killer cats. She is pursuing an MFA in Young Adult literature with Converse College and has served South 85 Journal as a Fiction Editor under the name Gwen Holt. She is also the winner of the Southeast Review 2016 Narrative nonfiction prize for her short story, “The Ditch Bank and theFence Line.”

About the Interviewer

Mel Sherrer is a performance poet and teacher living in San Marcos, Texas. She is the Managing Poetry Editor for South 85 Journal.

Featured Image Photo:  A crop of the cover of Daughter4254

Katie Piccirillo Sherman

During this past Converse MFA summer residency, nonfiction mentor Jim Minick asked students to write a letter revealing a secret they’d never told anyone. Minick provided a number of samples, one of which was written by all-star nonfiction student Cinelle Barnes. Cinelle’s “Letter from an Undocumented” was relevant and timely. Thoughtful and heartfelt.  Within it, she discussed her time as an undocumented resident and her battle for citizenship. In the interview below, Cinelle talks about that assignment and how it inevitable lead to her memoir, Monsoon Mansion, to be released in 2018.

S85: You’ve mentioned that your letter lead you down the path towards your memoir. How so?

CB: “Letter from an Undocumented” was nominated for the Journal Intro Award in 2013. It didn’t win and was never published, and so I explored what could be done to fix it. With the help of my MFA mentors, Jim Minick and Dan Wakefield, I found that my true writing voice and style were not coming through for “Letter” because there was still much to be hashed out from events preceding my years as a new immigrant. I remember Dan saying, “This isn’t done. It’s not ready to be written because there’s something else that needs to be written.”

At first I thought that writing “Letter” was such a waste of time and emotional energy, but now I understand that it had to happen. Some things you write because they’re meant to be shared publicly; other things you write to get around to the things that are meant for publishing. “Letter” was my jumping off point, and I think every creative nonfiction writer needs one. We’re all tip-toeing around THE story, and we need these little tippy-toes to inch us closer to the heart of memory and meaning.

S85: Surely you had other secrets to tell. It’s likely though that this was the most obvious and the most difficult. What made you take the leap to write about something so personal and impactful?

CB: I was in a safe space. Living as an undocumented makes you feel like you’re always being watched. But in Jim Minick’s nonfiction workshop, I met the kindest, most generous and loving people. I’ve been lucky to be a part of such amazing workshops, from my Converse College MFA group, to my Kundiman and VONA families.

S85: Was there a particular scene within the book that was more difficult than others to write?

CB: Everything was difficult to write. Every chapter involved an event that has led to my having PTSD. It was all also really difficult in that I was trying to push myself artistically in a way that I had never done before. I didn’t want to just write a trauma memoir for the heck of it, to glorify or exploit my most hurtful experiences or violence in general. I had this grand desire of creating art, of making beauty out of my ashes. For that, I had to train myself to think harder, to write descriptors with better precision, to use my training in dance and music to benefit my writing rhythm and cadence.

S85: What advice do you have for students who are also writing about a difficult subject matter?

You’ll be surprised at how many family members will cooperate and want to be interviewed. My father felt so much pride talking about all his experiences. My sister did, too. There were a few topics that were hard to talk about, but after my dad had his stroke, I remember him thanking me for having documented the good and the bad. He could’ve died or lost all his memories, but I had them recorded somewhere. Whenever it was time to get information from him again, I put on my journalist hat and forgot that he was family, that I knew the man. To me, whenever the voice recorder was on and the steno pad was out, I was no longer Cinelle, the daughter, but was Cinelle, the researcher.

S85: For fiction writers, it’s all about revealing a truth within a lie but within creative nonfiction, you’re recounting actual memories. What is the hardest thing about that?

CB: Memory can fail us. I had to do so much research to tell the story fairly and completely: vital records, photos, interviews, history books, newspapers, etc. The research itself was easy. It was in the discovery of what I didn’t already know that I cried the most. It was in the secondary trauma of reliving the darkness that I thought I would break. I had to go into intense therapy while writing the book, and I’m thankful that I did. If for anything, writing Monsoon Mansion has given me the chance to heal from memories I had repressed.

S85: Was there initially a layer of fear that held the writing back? If so, how did you overcome it?

CB: There was some fear but a lot more faith. I am also surrounded by people who never fail to pray for me, send me encouraging messages, and remind me of the power of the written word. Literature is a communal act. A writing mentor from VONA, Elmaz Abinader, once told me, “You can live a quiet life or you can do the work.” I definitely would rather do the work.

S85: You now have a very creative daughter. If you were writing a letter to her, what advice would you have for surviving a tumultuous (and somewhat anti-immigration) administration?

CB: The day Trump was elected, she ran to our bedroom saying, “Who won, Mama?” I remember telling her that he [Trump] did, in fact, win, and that I had cried about it through the night. She asked me what we would do and if we would be okay, and I told her that as long as we knew who we were, and as long as we could express ourselves, we were going to be alright. The day DACA was repealed, I explained to her what it meant for some friends and family members. She asked me what we could do to help them, and I said, “If we have to adopt every one of them, we will.”

I think raising her to have a generous, fearless spirit is the best I can do. To some degree and in a way that is not psychologically damaging, we keep her abreast of the country’s political state. It’s important to trust her intelligence and to ask her what she thinks. That way she’ll always know that her opinion matters. And the next best thing is for me to encourage her writing, drawing, and painting. It’s good for her own mental and emotional health.

About the Author

Cinelle Barnes is a creative non-fiction writer and educator from Manila, Philippines. She writes memoirs and personal essays on trauma, growing up in Southeast Asia, and on being a mother and immigrant in America.

In 2014, she was nominated for the AWP Journal Intro Award for Creative Non-Fiction, and in 2015 received an MFA from Converse College. She was part of the inaugural Kundiman Creative Non-Fiction Intensive in New York City and is an alum of the VONA/Voices workshop for political content writing at the University of Pennsylvania. Barnes was a presenter and panelist on Diversity in Literature at the Creative Writing Studies Organization Conference in 2016 (Warren Wilson College, Asheville, NC).

Her writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Literary Hub, South85, Skirt!, West Of, Your Life Is A Trip, the Piccolo Spoleto Fiction Series, Itinerant Literate’s StorySlam, and Hub City Press’s online anthology, Multicultural Spartanburg.

About the Interviewer

Katie Sherman is a freelance journalist in Charlotte, NC. She is currently pursing an MFA degree at Converse College. She has an affinity for Southern Gothic literature, cider beer, Chicago, and morning snuggles with her girls — Ella and Addie.

Debby DeRosa

South 85 Journal is launching a YouTube Channel to help us promote contemporary literature.  Starting October 9, we will release one video poetry reading a month.  To get everyone excited (and to test some features), I created this video announcement:

https://youtu.be/uPDgMLH46tg

Now that I have thoroughly embarrassed myself, I’ll return to hiding behind my computer – as long as you will take a moment to make sure you don’t miss any of our readings.  You can subscribe to our YouTube Channel or blog or follow us on Facebook or Twitter.

Also, don’t forget to submit poetry, creative non-fiction, fiction, and visual art before November 1 to be considered for our next issue, which comes out December 15, 2017.  For more info, visit https://south85.submittable.com/submit.

I look forward to seeing you online!

Mel Sherrer

Caitlin Hamilton Summie’s short story collection, To Lay to Rest Our Ghosts, was released by Fomite in August. We sat down to talk to her about the writer/promo balance, novels vs. short stories, and the importance of place. Read on!

S85: How do you navigate being both a writer and a promoter?

CH: I have to fit my own writing in to my days, as I always have had to do, whether as a student or a publicist. I make time at night, on weekends, on a lunch hour.

Also, I don’t discuss my writing with my clients, unless they bring it up. Once or twice, I shared an experience I had. But when I’m working, I’m focused on promoting their work, and I keep a division in my mind. That is their time, for their work.

S85: Given your career as a publicist, how does the commercial or critical success of a particular piece impact your personal opinion of the piece and your writing as whole?

CH: Every year, there are beautiful books, small press or big house, which never receive the notice they deserve. It has been that way since the beginning of my career, and it will be that way long after I stop working. There are simply too many books. I am heartened by the wonderful critical reception my own writing has received, and I am glad it has received notice, given the tough fight small press titles have to get any attention. I love my book, and I would love it even if no one had noticed it. I’d have been disappointed in the market and book world if there had been no coverage for it, but I would not have been disappointed in my book.

But having it recognized is wonderful.

S85: In terms of fiction, what would you say are the fundamental differences between a fiction novel and a short story? What makes a great short story?

CH: That’s an interesting question for me because so many of my stories involve decades, whole histories, so for me, short stories don’t have to be a slice of life experience. They can be their own whole worlds. In my writing, it really comes down to length (some of my stories are long) and to finishing the rest of the story. For instance, I write some stories that link, so a novel will allow me to finish these characters’ stories. I am in fact one draft in on a novel-in-stories that includes three stories from my collection.

S85: What encouraged you to delve into writing and compiling your collection of stories To Lay to Rest Our Ghosts; what was the book’s genesis?

CH: The book began 25 years ago, when I was pursuing my MFA. Eight of the ten stories were written back in 1992-1995, then taken out, dusted off, and submitted with some minor edits. The last two stories were started after the program ended but took a long time to write.

Fomite editor Marc Estrin asked in 2015 if I had a collection. I told him thank you but no. It was so cool to be asked, but I didn’t think I had anything. But in June 2016, I submitted a story called SONS that was accepted for publication. After that, I thought, “Why not look?” I pulled out my stories, saw I had ten, and contacted Marc. Ten seemed a solid number of stories to have in a book.

S85: Your stories have a very strong conveyance of location.  Do you have any devices or methods for creating that intense rendering of geography and landscape?

CH: Well, I guess the answer is no. I think I am just particularly attuned to weather and landscape, to place, so they become part of how I see things.

S85: Are there books, short story collections in particular, which you are currently reading or have read that inspire you to write?

CH: No, though there are lots of writers in lots of genres I admire. I write because I feel compelled. That is always the way it has been, from when I was very, very little. My mom tells me that I used to bring her scribbles before I knew how to write letters. I would want her to read my stories. So I have been eager to tell stories since the beginning.

S85: Would you say your approach to writing is practical or purely artistic? Under which circumstance do you find your writing most fruitful or closest to your personal vision for your work?

CH: I write when I can, not on a schedule, so I consider myself a Carpe Diem writer. I find a moment or an hour or a few hours, and I go for it. I write whatever I want. Stories, novel, picture book, poems. I recently had a poem published, which was quite exciting. I hadn’t had poetry published since college. But I also give myself time in terms of years. I work, I have kids, I have volunteer responsibilities. It is a delicate balance—pursuing my writing career. I’m not sure when I best achieve my goals, but I believe it is when I trust my instincts and don’t overthink things.

Thanks, Caitlin!

About the Author

Caitlin Hamilton Summie earned an MFA with Distinction from Colorado State University, and her short stories have been published in Beloit Fiction Journal, Wisconsin Review, Puerto del Sol, Mud Season Review, and Long Story, Short. She spent many years in Massachusetts, Minnesota, and Colorado before settling with her family in Knoxville, Tennessee. She co-owns the book marketing firm, Caitlin Hamilton Marketing & Publicity, founded in 2003.

About the Interviewer

Mel Sherrer is a performance poet and teacher living in San Marcos, Texas. She is the Managing Poetry Editor for South 85 Journal.

Featured Image Photo:  A crop of the cover of To Lay to Rest Our Ghosts

Sarah Gray

Associate Director of the Converse College Low-Residency MFA in Creative Writing is a title that sounds far grander than the position it actually entails.  The truth is, come residency time my goal is to stay invisible because invisibility means everything is running smoothly.  Sometimes clichés stick for a reason, and in this case it holds true. No news is good news.

But before we get to the residency and all the work that goes on behind the scenes, we need to answer questions from prospective students.  Lots and lots of questions.  And that’s good.  We always have a smart group of applicants who ask intelligent and necessary questions to make sure that our program is right for them (which, of course, it totally is).

In the past, we’ve had information sessions on campus for prospective applicants to check out the place, meet some faculty, alumni, current students, and just generally get a feel for the program.  Unfortunately, this limited our info sessions to locals and people within driving distance.  So this year, we’re thinking bigger.  We hope you will join us.

Saturday, September 16, at 11 am, we will be holding our very first Facebook Live Event.  Part information session, part AMA, this is your chance to hear about the program and ask any questions you may have, no matter how big or small.  Our event will be hosted by me, Sarah Gray (Associate Director and a fiction alumna), Rick Mulkey (Director of the program), and Travis Burnham (fiction alumnus).  So if you’re doing the math, that’s two fiction writers and a poet.  We want to represent everyone that might be watching, so we can answer YA and nonfiction inquiries as well.

During this session, we also plan to discuss the amazing online literary journal that is affiliated with our program, South 85 Journal.  Prospective students are always asking about writing and publication opportunities within the program, and South 85  is our shining star in that department.  Students who work on the journal learn editing, publishing, and marketing skills.  There are even possibilities for those who have interest/experience in graphic design.  And best of all, Editor-in-Chief Debby DeRosa is a joy to work with and is passionate about the journal and its high standards.

If you’re still reading, go right now and “Like” our Facebook page.  Once you do, you’ll automatically get notified on your smart device when we go live.  Get your questions ready, and maybe set up a drinking game for every time I say “Um.”  On second thought, don’t do that.  You’ll be too drunk to make it through the session.  Either way, tune in to our Facebook Live on Saturday, September 16, at 11 am.  We can’t wait to meet you.

Sarah Gray graduated from Converse with a BFA in Creative and Professional Writing in 2009 through the Converse II program and stayed around to earn her MFA in Creative Writing (Fiction) at Converse as a member of the program’s very first graduating class in 2011. She founded the MFA program’s literary journal, South 85, directed the Converse Young Writers’ Workshop for two years, and served as an adjunct for three years before stepping into her current position as Associate Director of the MFA in Creative Writing program.

M. M. Adjarian

People who glamorize the writing life should be hanged, drawn and quartered for their demon-spawned lies. Writing is unsexy dog work, a ceaseless plodding of word after blasted word. And it’s unforgiving. Progress for most comes in stingy half-inches rather than expansive miles. Joyce Carole Oates and Stephen King are among a tiny handful of individuals as famous for their prolific output as they are for the hypergraphia — a kind of verbal OCD —that drives them to the literary excesses behind their fame.

I’m still quite not sure why I do it; maybe I’m an undiagnosed masochist. Or maybe it has to do with an addiction to the writing process itself. When I try to describe that addiction to friends, they smile, as if to humor an idiot child or a woman too far gone to listen to reason. No person in her right mind would hunker down alone in her apartment to sit in front of a computer for 10 to 12 hours at a stretch; or just to get neck cricks and cause more damage to half-blind eyes that have made a mockery of five different bifocal prescriptions in less than 10 years.

But what do they know? Sitting in my black IKEA recliner, laptop perched atop my thighs and locked into focus mode, I can stare at the screen and let my gaze turn inward rather than react to the endless stream of fuss and noise around me. My heart rate slows, beating in time to the slow-pulsing cursor on my screen. I go into a kind of trance where the only way I can tell the time of day is by noting the changing pattern of light and shadow outside my window. For a short time, I know a rare commodity: peace.

Psychologists would characterize this relaxed alertness as the alpha wave state associated with waking dreams and meditation. Synapses fire in the synchronic harmony of identifiable patterns; the alpha state is just one of them. What I actually experience is a corporeal forgetfulness where eating, breathing and even excreting don’t seem to matter. Those body parts engaged in the writing act — eyes, arms, fingers —become appendages of a consciousness seeking expression through the medium of language. I am blissfully, gloriously, canceled out into temporary non-existence.

The best part of the process is what Robert Olen Butler calls “dream-storming.” That happens at the beginning of almost everything I write, when I just let images, voices and/or memories, however faint or fragmentary, rise up from the primordial stew of my unconscious. Listening to instrumental music like jazz — which I’ve always loved for its improvisational nature — helps. What I eventually manage to set down often make no sense, even to me. But dream-storming is the best way I know to access material that my snippy inner critic might otherwise sniff at because it’s just not good enough…or is just too weird for anyone else to see.

The hard part is actually trying to make sense of that surrealistic tangle. The first thing I typically do is to take that material and distill it into a brief opening sentence/paragraph that offers insight into a narrator, character or situation associated with whatever it is — an essay or story — that I’ve decided to write. After that, I let my imagination take over and use dream-stormed material to structure the narrative. Because my notes are so fractured, it sometimes it feels like I’m using broken crutches and a lunatic map to hobble along into oblivion. But it’s a method that has yet to fail me.

Maybe it’s just the need to see something — anything — on paper and realize that all those voices, images and memories in my head don’t necessarily mean I’m crazy. Or as crazy as I thought. When I’m not busy climbing the walls at the start of a project, it’s actually kind of exciting not knowing where I’m going. Ray Bradbury never knew where any of the narratives he started would end up. And he did just fine.

Of course, when the process of deciphering, reorganizing and revising goes too slowly, I want to rip out my eyeballs by the roots and throw my computer out the window like a titanium Frisbee. Instead I go into my kitchen and bake bread. Pounding dough can be quite therapeutic and far less expensive than paying therapist or making Apple even richer than it already is.

When I have to leave my trance to take care of the tedious business of living, the mood shifts and not for the better. Like a she-bear roused prematurely from hibernation, I can become sullen and cantankerous. No matter how few kinks I’ve managed to unbend in my writing or how much hair I’ve yanked out in frustration, I have no wish to emerge from my alpha wave cocoon.

Writing is a tortured nirvana. But it’s one I wouldn’t give up for anything in the world.

M. M. Adjarian has published her creative work in such magazines as the Baltimore Review, Verdad, South 85 Journal, Eunoia Review, The Missing Slate, Serving House Journal, Crack the Spine, Vine Leaves, and Poetry Quarterly, Grub Street and Pif. When not blogging at her website, austinwritinglife.net, she  engages with Twitterdom under the name @palabrist.

Featured image photo credit: Photo by Dingzeyu Li on Unsplash

South 85 Journal‘s staff is gearing up for our next issue, Fall / Winter 2017, which we will release on December 15, 2017.  Usually, we open our reading period for the Fall / Winter issue on September 1, but we are trying an earlier schedule this time.  We are accepting submissions starting today!  As our journal grows in popularity,the number of submissions grows, and we feel a modified schedule will allow us to give each submission the attention it deserves.

Go to our Submittable page to submit today through November 1.

Since our reading period is now open, we would like to announce who will be working on the upcoming issue.

Returning to Staff

Thank you to the following staff members for continuing their involvement with South 85 Journal:

● Melissa Sherrer (Managing Poetry Editor)
● Anthony Reese (Managing Prose Editor)
● Aaron Dargis, Russell Jackson, Reed McFarlin, and Chris Menezes (Poetry Editors)
● Shianna Whitner (Fiction Editor)
● Courtney McQueen (Artistic Director and Poetry Editor)
● Jonathan Burgess and Samantha Moe (Non-Fiction Editors)
● John Newlin (Review Editor)
● Stephen Gray (Webmaster)

Joining Our Staff

We are always excited to welcome new staff to the journal because this means new ideas and fresh perspectives.  We would like to welcome:

● Zoraida Pastor (Poetry Editor)
● Ashley Sfeir (Fiction Editor)
● Sarah Gray (Contributing Editor)

Of course, Sarah Gray isn’t really a new staff member.  She is the founding Editor-in-Chief of South 85 Journal! With Rick Mulkey on sabbatical, she is serving as the Associate Director of Converse College’s Low-Residency MFA Program and our Contributing Editor.  You can read more about her position in a past blog post.  We are excited to have her back, and we look forward to her fresh ideas as well as her wisdom and experience.

Leaving Staff

We’d like to wish those staff members who aren’t returning the best in their future endeavors. I am sure they will be successful in whatever they do.

● Monica Torres (Non-Fiction Editor in 2015 and Poetry Editor since 2016)
● Gwen Holt (Fiction Editor since 2016)
● Susanne Parker (Fiction Editor for the Spring / Summer 2017 issue)

Now that you have all the updates, thank you for continuing to support our journal – by reading, submitting, and telling others about it.  We look forward to bringing you the next issue.  In the meantime, write like mad, and if it’s good, we want to see it!

Sincerely,
Debby DeRosa
Managing Editor
South 85 Journal

Featured Image Credit: Photo by Mari Helin-Tuominen on Unsplash