From the Archives: Ephemera 2023 Iss. June.1
(Creativity and Motivation Weekly)
Dear Readers & Writers,
It’s been three years almost since we started our letter! We’re looking back today at posts from June 2023 and wanted to share this one with you from the archives. The archives are paywalled unless you’re a paid subscriber, which we’d love for everyone to become to really help us focus on this endeavor, which is really meaningful to us. It’s sort of the culmination of a combined several decades of thinking about writing and creativity as well as working in and around the literary space as well as art-bathing and attending readings, taking and teaching classes, and trying our hardest to be for and live within the intersecting realms of literature and art.
Mini Essay
Music from Interpol
Sculpture by
Thank you for your presence and focus.
Merci. Danke. Kiitos. 고마워 Go-ma-wo. Cảm ơn. Xiè xiè.
From the past:
June, 2023
Welcome to the Ephemera Newsletter, Dostlar! (Azerbaijani for “friends”).
Our minds are of two these last few days, so to speak—although, really, they’re of many. We’re meandering, and hobbying, thinking and perusing, mainly pursuing, what our Interesante article describes as, non-instrumentality; in other words, we’re just being and being with a vague purpose unencumbered by the profit of that being. It’s the time of the year, right? We’ll get our summer legs. Our blood will adopt in short order to the bursts of heat. Like other transitions, it always takes a moment, however welcomed this one might be. What we’re finding is that’s okay. The article reminded us that we likely have a natural rhythm of functional work that apexes and then bowls into a period of pleasant tinkering or experimenting or sort of sensing and lazing that feels productive internally (though tell that to a non-writer, non-artist that you’re working when you’re clearly not and they’ll offer a scold or scowl for sure). Whatever. We need it. Everyone has their own wave function of productivity. There’s a bit of a contradiction in terms coming, but it’s useful to think of our forays into personal asides and randomly enriching hobbies or pursuits, to think of all this as a wing of the soaring beast of productivity. Anon, circling birds often roost.
“It's up to me now turn on the bright lights”
—Interpol, from the song “NYC”
Perhaps in these times of disorganization, or non-utilization of productive hours, we have the space to consider things nebulously or anti-linearly or randomly or in parallel or whatever our individual brains do (swirl? storm? nebula?). In ours, a common theme of late has been to take stock of the things we value and are happy for—the small and large, but mainly whatever we passively have found to cling about, whatever resists that relentless data shedding that doesn’t permit perfect memory of birthdays and anniversaries, names we want to recall in the moment, passwords and directions. With these scraps we organize odes, sometimes written out, often simple bursts of love, a little bitty zesty flair of the mind or humors that delivers the feels and goes unnoticed, unwatched (hopefully no one saw that mini-shake), a solitary plucked string in the eponymous theory, as it goes. Yet we marvel and baste. Our blood thickens. This is human. This is the creative process, or can be. To each their…Complaints! Oh let’s not forget those counter-weighting or quiet joys with blips of pity or despair, or, even, dirty relish—cuisine acknowledges the utility of a disgusting but acquired taste as a palate cleanse. Sometimes sweetness makes us sick. We dive deeply into and at all angles, good-good, good-bad, bad-bad, bad-good, sometimes in a mummed-out trance, others via loud ablutions, yackity-yuck! Odes and complaints and their half-siblings are integral to the creative process. Quietness. Meaningless pursuit of personal intrigue. Heat be our excuse. Oh-Ode, to simmering!
Təşəkkür!
(Gratitude)
~We’re so happy you’re here!~
Featured Music: Interpol
Odes and complaints are on our mind, on the minds of the four gentleman who make up the band Interpol (or once were on their minds, at least) as per their crooning, sometimes ironically versed yet delivered with much sincerity, ballad of a song “NYC,” which appears on their debut, much lauded album, Turn On The Bright Lights. Interpol was a slow-to-boil NYC band that launched in the early aughts that, when their album dropped, became an instant hit in that less poppy more sophisticated sense, amongst hipsters and critics and in-the-knows music-heads (first and foremost) and then reached more popular circles. Simultaneous, they were also surrounded by a lot of criticism from that same aforementioned ilk. Yin-yang, maybe. They had a strong followup album and then sort of fell victim to the regression to the mean phenomenon (to put it nicely), which is to say they couldn’t maintain a meteoric presence forever, much like nearly every other band/group/artist. One might also say Interpol fell in love with the idea of being a band and doing band things that a sort of prestige, infamy, and popularity permits to anyone willing to become a trope unto themselves. (Writers beware of the opportunities to become too much of a ______ poet/writer/novelist/academic).
Read the full essay behind the pay wall.
Writers Submit: Three Magazines
The once in-print magazine went online a few years ago, and continues to publish the same high-caliber work. They are reading fiction and nonfiction. They offer other genre opportunities throughout the year. Deadline June 30
Published online by the Black Earth Institute, AP is reading poems, prose & essays for the theme “The More-Than-Human World.” The guest editors write, “we as humans have used plants and animals just as we saw fit…as two-dimensional props, as background figures denied their own sentience and emotion.” Deadline August 1
As the name suggests, they are reading for poetry, and year round with free submissions for all. The only caveat is that submitters should not have more than two full-length books of poetry published at the time of submission. Deadline Rolling
Weekly Artist: Maya Lin
Maya Lin is an artist and architect, a scientific and data-driven thinker as well (go figure), whose work is seen by millions of people per year, though she has flown under the radar reputationally speaking. The Yale School of Architecture graduate was first recognized for her now famous design of the Vietnam War Memorial in Washington, DC, which she submitted when she was a student and which we don’t feature here but encourage you to view (as we also encourage thorough perusal of Lin’s website and all of her work). Decades later, with installations that incorporate natural landscape work as seen in Storm King in the form of waves (see below), and Madison Square Park in NYC, as well as at Chief Timothy Park and many others, her orientation towards contributing to the public experience of everyday life remains significant and she continues to be prolific.
Early in her career as a professional architect, with a sincere focus on public-facing concepts and less practical more artistic projects, The Southern Poverty Law Center recognized her work, and commissioned her to create a large piece for the entryway to the institution that commemorates civil rights victories (see above). Each of her works manages to produce a type of thoughtful stoicism in us, like these waves built from mud and grass, placed to interact with the surrounding hills, the lows, light and air. Lin’s Storm King installation stands out in many ways as an important monument that speaks to us now but, considering the many earthworks of our ancestors, links itself to the human past.
“And I tend to almost sketch an idea sometimes with text. I’ll write. I’ll sit down and I’ll just write what I think I want, what I want to say here. What needs to be said, how to do it. I find it the most difficult thing for me to do, but when I’m done I am unbelievably just at peace. I would say sometimes if you think about art as being able to share your thoughts with another, it’s totally pure.
BILL MOYERS: Writing?
MAYA LIN: Writing, in a way.
BILL MOYERS: Is the purest of the arts?
MAYA LIN: Is one of the purest. Not to say that sculpture isn’t — but the medium has no weight. The medium is a word on a page. Because everything else sort of translates through medium. This one is just my thoughts to yours. As whether it’s the purest of the arts, I don’t think I’d say it that way. But it’s so direct. And it’s also so integral to how I make things.”
—Maya Lin, Interview with Bill Moyers
We’re interested in many aspects of Lin’s work, including teasing out how she plays with form, function, and artistry across disciplines, no less, however, what stands out most to us is how she conceives of the work to be affecting, that she’s attempting big-picture, large-scale influence and always for improved awareness, both social and personal, proving a keen eye for how to interact with people. Perhaps related to her architectural training, she works at the intersection of public and private wanting individuals and society to become more thinking, at least that’s the way the work speaks to us and begs us ask, in what ways does the work we do as writers build something significant that contributes to the literary and wider landscapes? What are we doing to incorporate the environments of modernity into our words and messages? Are we also asking large questions, considering the space outside of our writing nooks, outside of the immediate affect on readers? It’s okay for us to do this. Some might say we ought to. We’ll say, let’s consider how our work branches out beyond what we intend, how we might make pleasant waves, and how our words might ultimately help enshrine the good works of our species, past and present. Let’s allow ourselves to think publicly, think big, and act out with precision and expertise through our creations.
Interview with Bill Moyers.
Decoding the Tree of Life, 2021, The Pavilion at Penn Medicine, Philadelphia, PA
Interlude: #Friend of Ephemera
Prizes/Awards/Stipends Spring ‘23
Library of Poetry Award gives $1,500 and publication to a full-length book of poetry with Bitter Oleander Press. The series has published eleven books, and offers other opportunities throughout the year. $1.5k + Pub. $28 fee. Deadline June 16
Anthology Short Story Competition gives €1,000 and publication to a short story, with honorariums going to two runners-up. Anthology magazine is based in Ireland & features art, essay, and design. €1k + Pub. €18 Fee. Deadline August 31
Gloria E. Anzaluda Poetry Prize awards $1,500 & 25 copies & publication of a poetry chapbook by Newfound. The publisher also publishes other types of work throughout the year in all genres. $1.5k + copies + Pub. $15 Fee. Deadline September 17
Bookstore: Guides, Gifts & Classics
Buy books, please. It helps us and others! Bookstore via Bookshop.
On Richard Serra:
Bookstore: Guides, Gifts & Classics
Please consider supporting our letter and literature by buying books. It helps us and others! Bookstore via Bookshop.
Apropos Books: Lost in Thought
Last Week’s Rec — George Saunders:
»»»Remember last week’s letter has urgent deadlines!«««
Thank you for subscribing to Ephemera. We appreciate your support very much. It means a lot to have you as a reader. We look forward to growing the letter and bringing you new content and conversation along side our staples. Let us know if you have any ideas on how we can improve.
~~~Əlvida~~~
(Farewell)
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A Poem From The Archive
Poetry by Ann Huang
Meteor
At present moment
I sit somewhat weary under the moon,
Somewhat weary under the cold lonesome minute—
That harsh ways of the ocean bed
Strolled by; a hummingbird perched by my toes
Believing them for a petal.I always bathed in your light,
So wonderful it was, so wide—
When the cold water brushed in your shape like whisky,
The water that had melted through,
And I woke up—shaken by you.(Originally published by Barnhouse)