Anthology Update #3

Afaa and Tara have sent out the acceptance letters for BOP, STRUT, & DANCE. It was difficult to eliminate some poems, but the editors appreciated the diverse range within the hundreds of submissions received.

In the meantime,  the foreword, editors' notes, and gathering final details from some of the contributors is underway.  The editors are still seeking a publisher, and we have some promising possibilities.

In other good news, Afaa Weaver has published an essay on how to write the Bop poem in Wingbeats: Exercises and Practice in Poetry (Dos Gatos Press, 2011).

Anthology Update #2

Afaa and Tara are finishing up their semesters at Simmons College and Rutgers University respectively. They have both been doing readings, appearing at conferences, and doing new work of their own, so reading the submissions has taken a bit longer than they expected. The good news is that they expect to send out acceptance letters soon!

In the meantime, feel free to check out Demetrice Worley's "An African American Woman's Offering: A Bop" in her new book Tongues In My Mouth (Main Street Rag, 2011).

Anthology Update #1

The editors are reading the submissions during the Winter Break. We'll post a more specific date for when the acceptance letters will be sent via email. We received submissions from all over the country that represent a diverse cross-section of writers in terms of content, perspective, and aesthetics.

In the meantime, you may want to check out Pemba's Song by Marilyn Nelson and Tonya C. Hegamin. This YA novel might be an ideal holiday gift, but some of the poems that the main character Pemba pens in her notebook are Bop poems!

Thank you for your patience and sharing your poems with us.

Sincerely,
Afaa and Tara

ONE WEEK UNTIL THE DEADLINE!!!

This is just a reminder that there's one week left to submit poems to Bop, Strut, and Dance. Email submissions to webebop@gmail.com.

We wanted to share another example of a Bop poem as well: Venise Battle's "Bop Poem" in Gathering Ground: A Reader Celebrating Cave Canem's First Decade edited by Toi Derricotte, Cornelius Eady, and Camille T. Dungy.

ONE MONTH UNTIL THE DEADLINE!

If you haven't finished and revised your Bop Poems, start now! Afaa and Tara have been getting submissions from all over the U.S. from a diverse group of writers. They hope that you will join the growing mass of Bop poems that they will consider for Bop, Strut, and Dance.

In the meantime, check out this insightful essay by Meta DuEwa Jones in RATTLE. Jones examines poetic forms employed by African American poets, including the Bop poem and several other poetic forms.

Bop Sighting: Teri Ellen Cross

Another Bop sighting with Teri Ellen Cross on the TORCH Poetry edited by Amanda Johnston.  Here's a poem from the archives of TORCH entitled "Scar Tissue: A Bop".



Teri Ellen Cross holds a BS in Journalism from Ohio University and a MFA in Poetry from American University. She was a Ford Foundation fellow in 1997, a Cave Canem fellow, and attended the Soul Mountain Writer’s Retreat. Her poems have been published in many anthologies including Bum Rush The Page: A Def Poetry Jam, Poetic Voices Without Borders 2, and Gathering Ground: A Reader Celebrating Cave Canem's First Decade. She can be heard online in the 2008 Library of Congress series “The Poet and the Poem,” hosted by Grace Cavalieri. She is the Poetry and Lectures Coordinator at the Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington DC and resides in Silver Spring, MD with her husband, poet Hayes Davis and their daughter Zoë.

Bop Sighting: Bop Poems in MiPoesias

In the 2007 online edition of MiPoesias edited by Evie Shockley, there were two Bop poems published. The two poems are "A Bop: Blues Alternative" by G.E. Patterson, author of To and From (Ahsahta Press, 2008) and "Bop: Bop" by Brandon D. Johnson, author of Love's Skin (The Word Works, 2006).

To look at past and the current issue of MiPOesias, click here.