The lure of the Red King

Art by Kim Vanderheiden.

Here is just one of twelve works
made by artist Kim Vanderheiden
in response to a single poem from The Book of the Red King. 
Am I astonished? Yes, I am astonished.
Where possible, readings
will be accompanied by images of art-in-response 
by Kim, Clive Hicks-Jenkins (my longtime book-illuminator),
and Mary Boxley Bullington.
What a deeply touching thing to have serious artists 
surprise me with wonderful pictures
before the book even appears
from Phoenicia Publishing of Montreal,
under the guidance of Elizabeth Adams,
publisher of beautiful books.
What a marvelous
and joyful 
and entirely unexpected
gift.

The Red King approaches.
The Fool is singing on his journey.
And Precious Wentletrap is wandering the moon path.

Pub date comes near! 
TBA

Ditherings (in lieu of New Year's resolutions)

Detail from one of Kim Vanderheiden's pieces
for a poem in The Book of the Red King. It's interesting to have
an as-yet-unpublished book that already has art made
for some of its contents by several artists.
I don't think that has ever happened to me before.

I seem to be full of ditherings rather than resolutions, so I thought that I would make a list of my dithers.

Dither no. 1: I have broken with all novel-writing tradition (all of mine, that is) and stopped writing a novel on p. 145. For months! Usually I am a raging maniac until I finish. (Quietly a maniac, though. I keep it to myself. Also the related dithering. I'm still a good wife and mother and All That.) But. What is going on? Am I caught in a dither-quagmire? Do I even remember what the book was about?

Dither no. 2: That zany y. a. book I wrote years ago for my youngest, the one that needed about a two-week polish. Why don't I get back to it and spend two weeks? Or should I?

Dither no. 2: What on earth should I talk about at the Buechner Workshops at Fuller? I have come up with a remarkable number of topics, all highly ditherable and even dirigible in a few cases.

Dither no. 3: What is going on with The Book of the Red King? Is it accepted or not? (This is not my dithering, but there is dithering--or at least methodical tortoiseosity--involved.)

Dithers no. 4-5: Where should I send Rave, the collection of unleashed praise poems? Where should I send the new manuscript of formal poems? Dither, dither, dither... To my surprise, I have sent each to a contest (how resolute and surprising and anti-dither), but that's just spitting in the dark along with a thousand other poets, so what's the point?

Dither no. 6: Should I do something with my tiny stories? Should I not bother?

Dithers no. 7-8: What about the short stories? And the ones for teens? Yes? No? DITHER!

Dither no. 9: Should I bother to go back to having an agent? Yes, probably! No, I simply hate doing things like looking for an agent, and my first two (one deceased, one parted-from-amicably) just fell into my lap (in the usual manner of hackneyed speaking--nothing literal there) so really I don't hate looking for an agent because I have never done it. But I have heard rumors. Dark rumors. Nasty rumors. Rumors of woe and discouragement and despair. And so forth. Also on the no side: I am too agreeable. Too easily persuaded. Too n-i-c-e.

Dither no. 10: I've turned down some reprint offers and want to do my own reprints for a few books for which I hold rights reversions. However, this involves a good deal of research and work, and as a result, a mountain of dithering about many little decisions. Nevertheless, dithering surely will not last forever, right? Lemme dither about that a minute.

About dithering.... Do I dare to eat a peach? Yes, I do, thank you, Mr. Eliot, and I'm fine with mermaid songs. What I'm not good at is quarrying time, marketing, keeping my writing room tidy, and juggling-and-balancing all the demands of motherhood, wifehood, cleaning-the-house-hood, and all other relevant and irrelevant but needed hoods on the very tippy-tip of my nose.

And this is the end (or is it?) of the Dithers.