5 TCE‘s or my own defense and write him an equally insulting letter in return. Actually, I was too busy working on the magazine to do more than laugh in shock at the first reading, and then I sent it to a couple of writers and an editor, all from whom I wanted to get a little feedback; I felt it fair that Chris be taken seriously enough (at least a little), and that I consider his opinions before dismissing his statements completely. Later, when I had a few moments to relax, I sat back and examined his letter for any possible truths within. I‘m known for my objectivity — sometimes people wish I‘d be more subjective and show a little delicacy. I don‘t believe in speaking delicately, but I do embrace compassion and diplomacy, and make great efforts at self-examination. I won‘t put someone else down intentionally, and especially if I haven‘t taken the time to look at myself first before making value judgments about others. I think TCE‘s contributors and readers are a pretty savvy bunch of people. What they‘ve told me in their many complimentary letters over the years is that, in the main, they disagree with Chris. He seems to think that themed magazines are an affront to all good writers and literary journals, and that real writers never write to prompts or take assignments. I didn‘t long ponder the value of this philosophy of artistic exclusivity that denies credibility to journalists, for example, and assumes that creative challenges are demeaning and somehow akin to being ―told what to do,‖ let alone suggests that poems with any sort of subject matter can‘t possibly be crafted with quality. With clever, contemporary language, Chris said, ―Centrifugal Eye sucks,‖ implied and assumed that I hung out in bars to drown out the misery of my uncreative and wasted life, brain all a‘swirl with booze and horrible poetry subs, and that, most emphatically, nobody liked what TCE has been producing and showcasing for the past 3½ years. I‘ve never met Chris, nor had any previous conversations with him and am unfamiliar with what he does, but I do respect that he represents a minority of writers who seem to feel
threatened by the concept of writing for or submitting to journals with themed issues. But here‘s what I have to say to these writers: No problem. Submit elsewhere. There are hundreds of journals that will gladly take a mishmash of unrelated material. Submit to these markets instead of mine. If you can‘t find anything to write about (or haven‘t already written about) subjects that someone else suggests may be interesting to readers, that‘s perhaps your own short-sightedness. I understand that not all of your recent poems have anything to do with toilet paper, confetti, or fog — but maybe a poem you wrote last year did, and it‘s a really great poem that no editor has shown any interest in to date because of its specificity. So why stick your nose up at the journal that might have a place for it? You don‘t even have to try to sit down and rack your brain for a new good poem. But if you‘re not interested in a particular theme, skip it. Don‘t bother the editor with your complaints of why you don‘t like themed issues/journals. Here‘s what most long-time writers will tell you, Chris and Chris-ites — when they began writing with any regularity, they wrote about . . . drumroll . . . themselves. They wrote love poems and hate poems. They wrote about their family, about their lovers. Their pains. Their joys. About death. They wrote about everything they thought had significance. And then they wrote fewer and fewer poems, because they‘d exhausted their internal catalog of me-ness. This isn‘t a crime, of course, but rather the typical poet‘s-life-cycle. If they were great writers by the time they finished churning out their me-ness and they still wanted or had to write, they then turned outward to look for new subjects of interest. Here we go! Do you see where I‘m going, Chris-ites? The Centrifugal Eye is a market for mature writers — ones that are not only fabulous at their craft, but also those who have written so much that they‘re eager to write about all kinds of inspiring things.