Donna Donna Donna - My Garden - When Submitting to Online Lit Mags

Oof! Sorry for the blurry pic. As you know, I like to write at least a poem a day and post it to FB. Did this one minus a stanza.

DRINKING COFFEE WITH MY SISTER

What a surprise when her white SUV
parks on my street!
People will think I have friends!
She reports upstairs to my bed
where I hastily grab  my
book and reading glasses

In the morning she brews strong
Gevalia and we sit on opposable
red couches absorbed in chat

Her daughter has introduced
her to a new curseword I'd
never heard before

Her house is a "shit-show."

After I look in the mirror, I
ask, "I'm still cute, right?"
She agrees, and I "whew!" inside

She tells me she pulled out her
John Deere tractor from the
shed and rode around the acreage
in the gentle rain, a pint-sized
arboretum of
bearded iris, daylillies,
twin rosebushes, one thriving,
the other stillborn,
what's that about?

The day is perfect, clear,
she meets my family of birds,
the sparrow hovering atop
his house, and the flowers
that popped up from
last year, pansies whose
colors would make a marvelous
bedspread my cousin Mark could
paint.

Her leg's crossed,
with her odd-colored nail polish
a bluish-gray that gives her
toes an allure, rivaling her face.

***

 Lovely blue flowers from Pennypack. Will post this on FB for identification.

 Removed deadwood from this spot and replanted it with Sweet Woodruff, from my friend CC, that's a fast-growing and b'ful ground cover.

 In this empty spot I transplanted a - take a gander - heart, kidney, liver - or pansy.

 Pansies.

 Bc it's summer - planting time - I've gotta wear sunscreen since I take antirejection meds. There's a chance of getting skin cancer, which could kill ya.

Bring dem outdoor flowers inside. Peony and purple rhododendrons from Scott's backyard. When I first moved in here in 1989, I planted rhodos, but they kept dying, so I gave up.

My dappled akubas stay green all year long. Very important during the harsh winters.

Am drinking lemon water. I squeeze the lemons for my salad and retire them to the water glass. Very refreshing.

My fridge lost the ability to make ice in its old age.  Donna liked my Joplin photo on my fridge. Everything you look upon in your home should be pleasing.

SUBMISSIONS

The Compass is a gorgeous magazine, put out by New Directions. This is last year's issue. People are proud to have their work published in it.

Not so of the many lit mags I've gotten published in.

Sometimes my work - whether prose or poetry - is hidden inside. The whole point of writing is to be seen, not to be invisible.

I create lists of mags to submit to. First, there must be no charge for the submission. Second, my story should be visible to the public.

Am gonna goggle my name - and tell you what comes up.

Here tis. It's a terrific short story published in Writing Disorder. The sad thing is they've rejected everything else I've wrin. 

This is why it's important to find new sources to publish in.

Oh, the neighbor Don is just walking around the block. He had some sort of operation and looks down when he walks. Memories of Jean Valjean in French class I won't go into here.

My poem Ole Man Blank was published in River Poets. I can't even find the damn thing.

Bella Online is very good. See them here. They're much more than a publisher. They have chats with their readers.

Do you think I wanna spend my entire day on my laptop when there's so much to do in the real world?

See ya later!