Happy Thanksgiving!

I am thankful for one of the greatest poems ever written.

Keep Fishing!

We've all done it. We all do it. We just have to add that one last line. You know, the line that tells everyone what we're doing, really drives home the point. As a poet, I have done this many, many times. As an editor, I have seen this done many, many more times than I can count. As a poet, I don't recognize it until many, many drafts and rejections later. As an editor, it's the giant blue whale in the room. I can't ignore it, but I want to. I want to ignore the added line because your poem is so darn good. But I can't. I can do one of two things. 1) Reject your poem; 2) Ask you to remove that last line. But you know I can't do that. That's a lot to ask of a poet, like asking them to remove their left arm. You see, if we just take the left arm, the rest of your body will look so good. Really, trust me. And so, your darn good poem is thrown back into the ocean. But someday, sooner than you think, you'll fish it out, read it, and realize that the last line is redundant, over explanatory, unneeded. You'll sever it. You'll resubmit. And your poem will become its own glorious and glistening whale, something no one will ignore. So don't lose faith. Keep fishing.