Emily Dickinson’s Guide to the Act of Self-Promotion
American green tree frog, with distended vocal sac
I’m Nobody! Who are you?
Are you — Nobody — Too?
Then there’s the pair of us!
Don’t tell! they’d advertise — you know!
How dreary — to be — Somebody!
How public — like a Frog —
To tell one’s name — the livelong June —
To an admiring Bog!
Fewer than a dozen (some sources put it between seven and ten) of Emily Dickinson’s nearly eighteen hundred poems were published during her lifetime.
John Madera is the author of Nervosities (Anti-Oedipus Press, 2024). His other fiction is published in Conjunctions, Salt Hill, The &Now Awards 2: The Best Innovative Writing, and many other journals. His nonfiction is published in American Book Review, Bookforum, The Review of Contemporary Fiction, Rain Taxi: Review of Books, The Believer, The Brooklyn Rail, and many other venues. Recipient of an M.F.A. in Literary Arts from Brown University, New York State Council on the Arts awardee John Madera lives in New York City, Rhizomatic and manages and edits Big Other.
haha i love it! i like the idea that you don’t have to publish to be a writer… f creddddd