Back in 2015 I prepared a chapbook, drifter, which is still available on Amazon (or from me). What is a chapbook some of you might still be asking? Well it is typically a small book, about the size of a folded over piece of 8.5”x11” paper. (The same size as programs at the BeeKay.) And currently chapbooks are typically poetry, though some might be prose. (Some historical pamphlets might be considered chapbooks also.)

Last year I didn’t have another chapbook, at least in part due to spending so much time sending poems out to magazine and journal publishers. But this year I made the decision to try submitting some unpublished manuscripts to some poetry chapbook contests and I’m already getting results. While I’ve got a rejection for one, one has just won.

“Hour of lead” was the winner for the San Gabriel Valley Poetry Chapbook Contest for this year. It’s a short one, only 10 poems. It’s also much like chapbooks have been for a long time. A piece of heavier paper folded around folded letter paper. I’ve seen examples from the 60s that look much the same.

Part of the prize was 25 copies of the chapbook. Several were taken by the poets at the San Gabriel Valley Poetry event where my chapbook was announced as the winner. There were several of the other poets that submitted there, and I was in very good company.

But I still have a few copies, but hopefully I’ll need to figure out how to make more. (Demand being what it is, I’ll probably have a couple of years to figure that out.) But in the meantime, I guess I should start to think about working on another.

If you would like to let me know what you think, send me an email at mathnerde+loop@gmail.com. If you would like links to additional information visit my blog at http://mathnerde.blogspot.com/.