LITERAL 01 "Have You Been Published?"

(L.I.T.E.R.A.L. is a weekly blog meme for authors hosted at Indie Books, created to serve as a support group for participants of the Author at Once workshops.  L.I.T.E.R.A.L. welcomes all writers (from anywhere in the world) who’d like to weigh in on the topics!)

Here's the first one--

Q. Has your book/story/epic been published? If yes, how was the experience, and where can we buy your book? If no (or not yet), why the delay? Is there anything you know you should be doing to make it happen?

Strictly speaking, yes, I have been published. Likely, so have you. Published plenty of times, if you keep a blog or say something regularly on Facebook or Twitter. I can say with a straight face that I've been published, in that I can slap a street thug on the back of the head with a copy of the hardcover anthology to which that one poem belongs. If said thug had a taste for foreign-made status symbols, he'd be in luck: my poem was published in the 'States.

Sadly, I doubt you'll still find it in print, as I can no longer find any trace of the --and I would learn about these people painfully-- infamous vanity publisher, The International Library of Poetry. The elation I felt at being "distinguished" by these people, being invited to participate in one of their annual poetry conventions in Washington, D.C. evaporated when, after I had purchased my copy of that year's poetry compilation, I  found out that my piece stood shoulder-to-shoulder with ham-handed high school verse.[1]

I've tried tracking it down. The ISBN (0-7951-5135-7) apparently belongs to more than one body of work.

Yes, there's a happy ending in this story. I have a beautifully bound hardcover book that will likely last a couple of generations. I can safely claim that I am "Published, In Hardcover, In the 'States." I won't need to grab my knives or my arnis sticks in case some nutjob tries a home invasion. I can literally throw the book at him, and beat him to death with poetry.  


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[1]  Everyone, who submitted entries for their poetry contests were sent the same letters, the same citations, the same  invitations to participate in the D.C. conventions as "semi-finalists."  Amid many earnest, if unrefined, attempts of writing well under the restraints of some sort of meter, were occasional flashes of brilliance. I wasn't alone, but this solidarity was not comforting.            

[2] I no longer remember how much that one copy cost my mother to have delivered to our door. I do remember the humiliation of being denied a US visa, one for every convention I tried to get to. .