Organizing your writing life

NOTES FROM UNDERFOOT: This weekend is shaping up to be quite busy, so I thought I'd post now about a few things, as well as some cheesy 80s music to send you dancing into the weekend.

First up, tomorrow night is the last Poetry at Portfolio Center event for 2006 featuring spoken word and poetry goddess, Dr. Madelyn Hatter. The evening is being sponsored by Poets & Writers Inc. (hats off to them for their continued support of Atlanta poets!). In 2007, we'll welcome back Cecilia Woloch on Jan. 5 and Louise Morgan Runyon on Feb. 2. The reading I'm most excited about will be a special Poetry at PC event during the AWP Conference featuring award-winning poets Peter Pereira and Ann Fisher-Wirth on March 2! Two brilliant poets on one bill! Pinch me. If you're in Atlanta for AWP, you won't want to miss this reading. For more information, visit my site at www.collinkelley.com and for directions visit www.portfoliocenter.com.

I'm on a performance hiatus through February, but my late winter/early spring calendar is already filling up quickly. Along with the Atlanta Rainbow Muse reading and Poets & Writers panel at AWP, I'll be doing a Late Night at The Academy reading in Atlanta on March 10, doing some "poetry in the schools" appearances and workshops, working with the national Poetry Out Loud project and then I'll be back in California for a number of readings including Poetry at the Loft in Redlands on April 11. This is just a few of the events...several others are in the works. Watch this space.

While I'm on my hiatus, I'll be working on new poems and, once again, trying to sequence the next full collection. I have stripped the book back to the essential poems that will create the "arc" -- which is about 20 poems -- but I've stripped the rest away. Recently published poems, ones I thought would certainly be included, may be left in the "homeless" folder for awhile. The collection still doesn't have a title, but I've got a list of six on my desk. Maybe I'll just throw a dart.

The Java Monkey Speaks Anthology Vol. 2 is being nominated for a Georgia Author of the Year Award by Poetry Atlanta Press. The book continues to sell. It's a great stocking-stuffer and you can buy a copy at www.poetryatlanta.com. How can you pass up a book full of fab poems by Thomas Lux, Patricia Smith, Maureen Seaton, Richard Garcia, Cherryl-Floyd Miller, Tania Rochelle (who was just featured in Ted Kooser's column...you go girl!) and many more for just $10.

Okay, that's all for the moment. I leave you with the music video for Kim Carnes' Invisible Hands. Yes, she did have other songs after Bette Davis Eyes. This one's so damn catchy, I want to put a fork in my own eye. And Kim knows how to work a silver jumpsuit. I love the 80s!