The Micro Muse

C. Dale Young: I write poetry and short stories, and sometimes teach. I am the author of The Affliction, a novel-in-stories, and four books of poetry.

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by C. Dale Young

I have a new poem in POETRY magazine with audio file if you want to hear me read it.

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Claremont Graduate University (CGU) is proud to announce the selection of the ten finalists for the 2020 Kingsley and Kate Tufts Poetry Awards. One of the world’s leading annual poetry awards, the Kingsley Tufts Award provides the recipient with $100,000; the Kate Tufts Discovery Award provides the recipient with $10,000. This year’s five finalists in …

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Queen Elizabeth I was behind 16th-century translation of ancient Roman manuscript, experts believe

‘The higher you are in the social hierarchy of Tudor England, the messier you can let your handwriting become. For the queen, comprehension is somebody else’s problem,’ say experts

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C. Dale Young | Cancer

in memoriam Paul Otremba | One must be trained to locate it. One finds it / by finding the Lion first and then the Brothers. ❡

My poem in memory of my friend the poet Paul Otremba is out today in Waxwing.

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The 2019 National Book Awards Finalists Announced

Twenty-five Finalists to contend for National Book Awards in the categories of Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Translated Literature, and Young People’s Literature

Congratulations to the newly-named finalists for the National Book Award!

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C. Dale Young - Pastiche — Bennington Review

A poem from my forthcoming book Prometeo.

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"...when I was still editing poetry for New England Review, a poet whose poems I had rejected went on a screed online about how I was a dilettante. Why am I a physician? Why do I think I can write and do all these things? The answer comes from the fact that I almost died. I’m very aware that I’m on borrowed time."

Brian Rocha interviews me for BOOTH

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RIP Paul Otremba

CONSTELLATION

It’s the space between them we can count on, more constant than the light we claim our fortunes by, and because we’ve proved this janky wooden plank in the argument we can proceed another premise, one body’s-length farther along the surface. You could bet your hemlock on it, or the next timid step across the fogged-up mirror of the iced-over lake. The state is ill; therefore, I am ill. Hippocrates thought of the crab because of its legs reaching out like tendrils, like gossip’s sideways whispering through the crowd of swollen flesh.

Then leaving my surgeon’s office I had to step over the splayed fingers of a spidering slick of oil in the parking lot, which I tried to read like the lines in my palm. My dreams, too, have become nebulous, intense, and frequent, and just after waking they take on the blankness of the bayou’s face when the stars black out behind clouds. It’s like a joke from some low-grade and obvious comedy—how do you not get out of the way of an oncoming steamroller?

I am learning the difference between urgency and importance. Although, they often meet at the more accusatory places. To the monarch butterfly breaking loose of her chrysalis, the twitter of the state is urgent. The icy-blue eye of the flipped-over iceberg has been here long enough to know what’s important. I place my hand against the window and I’m met by the dark’s aged coolness. The light passing through me in many strands from the cluster of bees set in the night sky happened so fast and so many years ago, there wasn’t even a thought of me being born.

--Paul Otremba

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Joy Harjo Becomes The First Native American U.S. Poet Laureate

A member of the Muskogee Creek Nation, the 68-year-old poet and musician says she bears "the honor on behalf of the people and my ancestors," and aims to serve as an "ambassador" of the art form.

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Congratulations to the 2019 Guggenheim Fellows in Poetry and Fiction

POETRY

Cyrus Cassells

Thomas Centolella

Camille T. Dungy

Carmen Gimenez Smith

Joanna Klink

Robin Coste Lewis

Shane McCrae

Dean Rader

Lloyd Schwartz

FICTION

Edward Carey

Patricia Engel

Michael Helm

Catherine Lacey

Carmen Maria Machado

Helen Schulman

Luis Albert Urrea

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Are you or is someone you know eligible for a 2020 Vilcek Prize for Creative Promise in Literature? Check eligibility requirements, and apply online at Vilcek.org.

The Vilcek Foundation is currently seeking immigrant applicants for the 2020 Vilcek Prizes for Creative Promise in Literature from now until June 10, 2019 at 5pm EDT. Foreign-born literary artists working across a variety of genres are invited to apply, including fiction (novels, novellas, short stories, and graphic novels); nonfiction (memoir, creative nonfiction, general nonfiction, book-length journalism, and graphic nonfiction); and poetry. Applicants should have published at least one full-length book (not self-published), been born outside of the United States, and be 38 years of age or younger. Three winners will each receive a $50,000 unrestricted cash prize and will be honored at an awards ceremony in New York City in April 2020. If you or someone in your network is eligible, we encourage you to apply or share the opportunity to your contacts. Attached is the press release, and complete eligibility requirements and the online application can be found on www.vilcek.org.

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In Saint Petersburg, on an autumn morning,

A big thank you to Maggie Smith and The Academy of American Poets for publishing this poem of mine today.

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Congratulations to the NEA Poetry Fellows!

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The National Book Critics Circle, founded at the Algonquin Round Table in 1974, honors outstanding writing and fosters a national conversation about reading, criticism and literature.

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Enter Midway Journal’s -1000 Below: Flash Prose and Poetry Contest for a chance to win the $500 grand prize! See contest guidelines below.

Opens: March 1st

Closes: May 31st

Fee: $10 per entry (unlimited entries)

Prizes:

First Prize: $500 + publication in Midway Journal

Second Prize:$250 + publication in Midway Journal

Third Prize: $50 + publication in Midway Journal

Judge: C. Dale Young

CLICK LINK ABOVE FOR FURTHER INFORMATION

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RIP Mary Oliver

WILD GEESE

by Mary Oliver

*

You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert repenting. You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves. Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine. Meanwhile the world goes on. Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain are moving across the landscapes, over the prairies and the deep trees, the mountains and the rivers. Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air, are heading home again. Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, the world offers itself to your imagination, calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting - over and over announcing your place in the family of things.

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The National Book Critics Circle, founded at the Algonquin Round Table in 1974, honors outstanding writing and fosters a national conversation about reading, criticism and literature.