Soon to Be Out with JAKE

lornawoodauthor

February 13

Violin keyring, with keys. Taken by me.

If I were single, I believe JAKE is the one of the last people I would want to be out with. Here's how his own people describe him: JAKE is the punkest little shit you know. He doesn't want to eat his vegetables, he doesn't want to wake up for school, he doesn't want to follow the established trends of what makes good literary writing good and bad literary writing bad. Also, Poetry longer than [10 pages] scares him, since he doesn't actually know how to read.

By contrast, I never cared for "punk . . . little shit[s]," even back in the day; I never objected to vegetables (except lima beans and sometimes Brussels sprouts); I often woke up early for school to practice my scales and arpeggios; and I read so much they gave me a Ph.D. in English literature. Yet turns out, JAKE and I share a rebellious attitude toward "established trends of what makes good literary writing good and bad literary writing bad." For example, I think we both believe that talking about one's literary magazine in the third person as though it were a dysfunctional character named JAKE (of course he spells his name in all caps) is fresh and funny. And neither of us appears to believe that a poem isn't worthy if it doesn't engage in sophisticated language play. We seem to think voice, imagery and, yes, story or situation, can also do the job.

At least, this is the conclusion I came to when I received this report by Heather Ann F. Pulido, one of JAKE's poetry editors, on JAKE's reactions to my poems "When I Retire" and "VIOLIN": "JAKE really dug the overall vibe of your submissions, particularly the crisp images. He wants to know if it's cool to run them on the site on March 6?"

Thanks for passing that on, Editor Pulido. Actually, I am really starting to warm to this JAKE guy. I not only said "Yes, please," I've decided to stalk JAKE online by reading more works he's liked. But I don't want to have him all to myself--you guys can stalk him, too. Just keep it on the down-low. Public popularity might ruin JAKE's rep.