The Artist's Pain

It was a bad day yesterday. After a great 3 month stretch winning fourteen publications, I came home from New York to a stack of rejection notices. How quickly did I lose all perspective? Oh, about 8 hours. Forgotten were the acceptances that I was so excited about: featured poet on PoetryMagazine.com, Poetica and StrangeRoad.com, the award won just last month, and the stellar endorsement I received from our California State Poet Laureate, Al Young - an endorsement I had pursued for over two years and was sure would change my life forever. In the middle of my bad day, I heard on "Fresh Air" an interview with Helen Hunt (WHO doesn't love Helen Hunt?). Hunt was describing her frustration with her inability to do a scene from her recent movie "Pay It Forward." "I just went into my dressing room and realized I'd let everyone down," Hunt reported. And, she talked about facing the daunting task of having to rewrite the screenplay for her newest movie, "Then She Found Me." Her honesty helped put things in perspective. And thank you to my husband and other dear friends' loving support who listened.

Authors, creative process, poetry, Writers