Michelle Garren Flye's Blog, page 11

I’m a Bookmaker

I often get questions about getting published. My answer?

I have no clue. I’m definitely not an expert.

But you’ve been published. Look at all those books. And you publish a literary magazine.

And I do. And I admit I’m a little surprised when I look at my backlist. Because, yes. I have a lot of published books. And I’ve learned a lot about how to publish them. I know how to format a manuscript, how to upload it to Amazon and Smashwords, I’m usually able to edit my own stuff, and I’m slowly learning the ins and outs of designing my own cover and illustrating my books when necessary.

I try, very hard, to explain that my path to being published isn’t really going to work for everyone. I’m self-taught, but I know my limits and I know when I need to consult an expert. I’ve hired developmental editors, for example, because I know that’s not my field of expertise. I often hire someone to design covers for me, or at least I used to, back when I wrote novels. If I ever write another one, chances are I’ll hire someone for that, too.

With all that said, I have one bit of advice for new writers who want to self-publish. Don’t go to a self-publishing publisher. Do as much as you can yourself. And take an a la carte approach to the rest. Chances are very good if you go to a publisher who charges you to publish your book, you’ll be overcharged and your book will not be a quality product. You’ll make less on royalties from your book because the publisher will take a cut, and you’ll be overcharged for author copies of your book, making it difficult to sell them yourself and make a profit. (I know books are overpriced, but nobody really wants to pay $20-plus for a paperback book.)

And so…I’ve finally broken down and put all my knowledge into a short (about four and a half minutes) presentation. I may eventually start giving this presentation in person, but I’m not a great public speaker except when it comes to reading my poetry (and so far nobody’s wanted to pay to hear that). Plus, as I said, I don’t really consider myself an expert.

But I am a bookmaker.

Sum total of my knowledge about bookmaking, also available here: https://michellegflye.com/self-publishing-from-a-bookmakers-pov/

Silence (a poem)

Poetry continues to be my main objective in spite of a couple of ideas I’ve had about novels. If I hear about a new form of poetry, I have to try it out. And then I have to stretch it. Remember Stretch Armstrong? How you would stretch and stretch him to see how far you could stretch him and he’d still go back to his original form…until he didn’t.

I sort of feel like I did that with haibun. Haibun is the combination of a haiku and a prose poem. Matsuo Basho wrote them. I discovered them relatively recently and decided to give them a try. And stretched the form a bit. What do you think? Is it still a haibun at its heart?

Silence
By Michelle Garren-Flye

it’s awkward, silence,
because it wants treasuring
and I reject it

laying too heavy on my ears in the dark, begging to be broken, shattered against the brick wall, revealing the death of sound ringing in my ears, spilling out like the yolk of an egg until the utter madness is stunned by a brief click in the wall behind the thermostat as the furnace breathes life into our emptiness…

don’t rejoice too soon
complete silence verges on
total perfection

you will seek it again, want to crawl into it, feel it envelop you in velvety warmth as if it can never break because it always always bends and that’s why you can never make friends with silence, why you can’t love it even if you want it, you will always seek release from it, but…

the birds will ghost you
the wind and waves will give up
leaving you…awkward
November flower. Photo by Michelle Garren-Flye

Poem: Loud (a poet’s wish)

This weekend, I saw the Taylor Swift movie with my daughter. It was fun and a little awe-inspiring. One of the first scenes was this little tiny woman standing on top of a lighted podium in the middle of a huge stadium absolutely full of people shouting and crying and singing along.

Now, I love music. It’s been a big part of my life for a long time. I’ve been to several concerts, including legends like John Denver, Robert Plant, and Bon Jovi. More recently, I’ve seen several K-pop concerts with my daughter, including Stray Kids and Twice.

All of those experiences were wonderful, but seeing this woman (who really is still human, no matter how great her talent) standing on that podium made me so envious. Wouldn’t I love to be able to do that? To get that immediate feedback from a crowd hanging on your every word.

But that’s not my life. My life is to write and doubt and hope that someone out there reads and finds meaning. What Taylor Swift has in excess, I undoubtedly lack.

Maybe we all have to give up whatever that is in order to have performers like her? If so, it’s definitely worth it.

Loud (a poet’s wish)
By Michelle Garren-Flye

Sometimes I wish I could be a bit loud,
proclaim each verse and be proud!
But I’m doomed instead
to be great in my head.
In the face of the crowd, I’m just stoic;
my voice comes out less than a croak.
(Can you hear in the back?
Forgive my panic attack.)
My confidence is next to none.
(As in, out of ten, about a one.)
So I’ll just continue to write,
convince myself it’s not trite.
I may wish to throw my head back and rage—
But instead I’ll whisper my words to the page.
A bit of fall color. Photo and poem copyright 2023 Michelle Garren-Flye

Poem: One Minute

There are so many things to wish for. What’s your wish?

One Minute
By Michelle Garren-Flye

It’s 11:11, what’s your wish?
Is it love…money—or a bit of peace?
Go ahead, speak it and be selfish!
You’ve spent your whole life trying to please.

Whisper it to the first sparkling star…
Watch it drift away on dandelion fluff.
Pray for relief from your past life’s scar…
Hope a simple wish will be enough.

But just one single wish may not suffice!
I tell you what I think we must do:
in order to fulfill your wish’s price,
I’ll pledge mine to benefit you.

Hurry before the minute hand turns!
Tell me the passion that in you burns.

Self Portrait in 30 Years (a poem)

Self Portrait in 30 YearsBy Michelle Garren-FlyeShe sits on her porch as people go past,
taking notice of what they bring into her past.

Little bits of their lives that pepper the now…
a tired mother…a crying child…now it’s all past.

Her son mows the lawn now every two weeks.
She likes it best when one week has passed,

when the grasses breathe rustles and chirps
echoing in her heart like songs from the past.

Those days when everything hurt so much—
if only she’d grasped that one day they’d be past.

Her daughter brings groceries, unpacks them inside:
“mom, come in, the summer’s heat is long past.

You’ll catch cold out there in the autumn breeze.
What keeps you outside when supper time is past?”

She smiles and takes her daughter’s dear hand,
hopes she’ll never know this longing for what’s past.

She could have dreamed up a magic spell back then
and stopped precious time before it had passed:

when she was a happy, tired mother of three…
now a lonely woman thinking only of the past.

She searches the stars for Orion’s sword belt,
Longs to fly to their light, leave this ache in the past.

Congratulations, it’s a ghazal (pronounced “guzzle” not “gu-ZAHL”, much to my disappointment).

Ghazals are hard to write due to their rhyme scheme, which involves repeating the same rhyme over and over. It can sound monotonous or forced. I’m just getting started playing with ghazals, so if it sounds monotonous or forced, I apologize.

The inspiration for this poem actually comes from a house. I used to walk by this house and see a little, old lady sitting on the front porch. I often wondered what her story was. I waved at her a few times, but before I got the nerve to stop and speak to her, I saw an ambulance there in the middle of the night. And then the little, old lady was gone.

I have no idea what happened to her, but her house is going through a major renovation. The porch is still there, though. I like to think she was lucky enough to spend her last days sitting on her front porch, maybe thinking of her loving children and eventually slipping away into her memories of past glories and loves.

Maybe that will be me someday. Because even if it’s painful to remember past sweet memories, it’s definitely better than not having them.

Selfie portrait by Michelle Garren-Flye

I saw the Milky Way! (with a picture and a poem)

I first found out about the power of retrograde Mercury in 2021. Last night to celebrate the ending of the most recent Mercury retrograde, I went to the beach. It was the new moon, so the stars were bright. I laid on my back in the sand and looked up at the sky and after about half an hour, just as I was preparing to leave, I realized I could see the Milky Way, that elusive cloud of hundreds of billions of stars that is so seldom visible in the sky that I’ve never actually seen/noticed it before.

Part of me wanted to stay all night looking at that misty cloud, but at least a portion of this poem is somewhat true. And so I left. I did manage to (surprisingly) capture some of what I saw in a few pictures, though. And today I wrote a poem to go with one of them to share here.

Retrograde Mercury
By Michelle Garren-Flye

My first time seeing the Milky Way, Mercury was in retrograde.
Everything went wrong, and I couldn’t linger long—
the cat was sick, the car failed to start, the restaurant I picked
had a two-hour wait, so I gave up, surrendering to my fate.
As the sunset faded, the stars above me played,
and I only spared them a glance, in no mood for a dalliance.
Yet later when my belly was filled,
I thought about the way they spilled
through the sky…
down into the sea…
and wished
(oh wished)
that sight had held me
in place for a bit…
In the face of their beauty…
why couldn’t I just sit?
Milky Way during Mercury Retrograde by Michelle Garren-Flye

Celebrating Endings (with a poem)

I used to panic whenever I’d draw the Death card from a Tarot deck. How could that possibly be a good thing? Even if it’s just the end of something, if it’s the end of something good, it’s gonna suck.

That’s why we as humans tend to celebrate beginnings. Birthdays, wedding anniversaries, the New Year. But we don’t really acknowledge that with every new beginning, something ended. The carefree life of a non-parent, the single life, the old year.

Today I pay respect to an ending in my life by celebrating what it was and what it brought me. It’s bittersweet, but I know that this is a new beginning, too. I’m ready for what’s ahead.

Let’s go.

Loop
By Michelle Garren-Flye

You left me once in the middle of a rainstorm,
I was tying my shoe, concentrating on each loop, and you
took the umbrella and wandered away
because something else caught your eye.
I finished my task
but I was soaked to the skin
and even though you gave me my own umbrella,
I never really forgave you for taking ours.
I doubt I ever will.
I’ll bring it up at family gatherings
and every anniversary
as if you could go back and change it,
hold the umbrella steady above me.
Turn back the clock
because without that,
the end will never change.

Fortune Cookie Poetry

Almost every night I have a fortune cookie with a cup of tea. It’s become my ritual. They are sometimes funny, sometimes uplifting, sometimes philosophical, sometimes almost a little spooky in the way they apply to my life.

I’ve been doing this for a couple of years now. I try never to throw them away. It seems sacrilegious. I do lose them sometimes, but I try to take a picture if it’s something I want to remember.

Here are a few I memorialized:

This one came along when I was floundering, trying to convince myself I could still write:

And then there was the time my fortune seemed to be hitting on me:

And finally, there was this one. It struck enough of a chord to inspire a poem. I thought it was a riddle, but when I did some research, I found it’s more of a philosophical conundrum. Fun stuff.

I have no idea what wisdom you can actually find in fortune cookies. Though Chinese restaurants adopted the cookie to appease Americans who wanted something sweet to finish off their meal with, no one actually believes they’re Chinese. In fact, though I did find some evidence in a quick Google search that fortune cookies originated in Japan, I’m pretty sure my fortune cookies are very American. And yet, I’ve found that the Universe can speak in many different languages, and English is definitely one of them.

WHAT HIDES IN AN EMPTY BOX?We puzzled over the fortune cookielong after dinner was done and the dishes taken away;the check was paid and you and I were on the way home.Darkness, you said, that’s what hides thereand I figured you were rightbecause if you open the boxand let the light in,the darkness can’t be seen.But later still, lying awakewith darkness pressing on my facesmothering melike your apologiesI wondered if we had been wrong.Maybe the darkness didn’t hidewhen you opened the empty box.Maybe when the light chased it outit roared and screamedand lashed about.Maybe what hid there in its placewas my heart.

It is done.

Yep. I had my live this morning at 11 a.m. I had a couple of people on it. I read a few poems. I mostly embarrassed myself. And to make it all better, I have preserved said live as a reel on Instagram. You can view it here: https://www.instagram.com/p/CvC2kWGuEQY/

Enjoy.

Where the Sidewalk Begins is also still free for one more day. So go get a copy if you want one. You can find a copy here: https://www.amazon.com/Where-Sidewalk-Begins-Love-Poems-ebook/dp/B0C8DP1N12/

And that’s it from me. I’m going to go work on my novel. Or submit a poem or two somewhere. I don’t know.

Let’s just see.

Photo by Michelle Garren-Flye Copyright 2023

It is what it is.

Poetry can be difficult to sell. I understand that. It took me years to realize I not only love reading it, I love writing it. And when I buy a book of poetry, it’s most likely going to be a book of classics. Old favorites like Robert Frost and Emily Dickinson. Although there are still some living poets who can tempt me to read their work.

These are the poets who are famous in their own lifetime. I’ve read their work, and it’s terribly good, enough to make me feel inadequate in a truly awful way I don’t feel when I read my old favorites. I think that’s because my old favorites are legends and my new favorites will be legends. Seeing that happen is like witnessing something being born. Messy. Beautiful. Frightening.

I read my poetry and I know I’m not there. Maybe someday though. Until then, it is what it is.

You’re wearing the white dress you could never afford until you thought you were too old, with lacy sleeves and frills and pink ribbons.

From Mama’s Daffodils by Michelle Garren-Flye

Photo by Michelle Garren-Flye Copyright 2023