This week is the annual AWP Conference! It’s a massive literary and writing conference that features hundreds of writers from around the world giving readings and taking part in panels. Since Covid is, you know, still a pandemic and a crisis, they offered it virtually this year, which means that I can go and watch the recorded panels and take notes. This conference is hosted in a different U.S. city every year, which means unless it comes to my city (which it did two years ago), I’d have to pay hundreds in plane tickets and a hotel just to attend. So, I’m pretty thrilled that I can attend this amazing conference this year.

So far, the panels have been truly amazing. I’ve taken a lot of notes. I’m primarily interested in the panels that relate to poetry, although there are some that are more generally focused (like on publishing, for instance) that I’ve been enjoying as well. And the great part about the panels being recorded, is that if there are multiple panels I want to attend that are hosted at the same time, I can always come back and rewatch them as long as they’re available.

Today I supported a few of the presses/publishers by buying some books. (I’m never not buying poetry books.) As I’m getting farther into the semester, my goal is to kick up how much poetry I’m reading. My faculty mentor has said that she can see I’m honing my revision skills, that she feels I’m more and more connected to the page as well as to the content in my poems. This makes me not only want to write more, but to read more, to see what other ways I can work on my poems. My current thesis draft sits at about 50 pages, and I am very comfortable with that length. There are other poems I’ve written but haven’t yet typed up that will likely go into the first manuscript of my poems, but for my thesis, 50 pages is a great marker.

I’m already working on my third packet. I cannot believe it. And what’s more, I really do feel like I’m doing the work I need to do to feel confident as a poet leaving this program. It will definitely be an adjustment, having to revise and work on my writing without a faculty mentor to look it over and offer feedback. But I’m really lucky that there’s such an amazing community of writers in out M.F.A. that are supportive and generous in their feedback. I feel confident that I can trust them with my work. And I intend to stay in contact with all of my mentors. They’ve all been so amazing and have helped me in so many different ways, I can’t even begin to express my gratitude. The woman I was at the beginning of this program is not the same woman I am today, and that is beyond a good thing. I have, literally, written myself through so much trauma and into so much growth and healing, and this program has been the catalyst.

Today, I’m grateful.