Imposter Syndrome and Publication

I woke up and checked my email today; I have another poem accepted for publication, in yet another foreign journal. This is a relief, as so many US-based journals send rejection after rejection. Yes, it's a numbers game, most of the time, but it's hard to believe in one's own ability sometimes.

I'm not seeking pats on the back or "there, there" moments at all. I just finished a series of wonderful chapbook-development classes with a cohort of dedicated and careful writers/readers. I know which of my poems have promise, which ones are flat as a pancake, and which ones feel "settled." Maybe it's that I've been working so long and hard on this project, and it's still so flawed, or so it feels. And I don't want to make the mistake of over-doing it; I used to try to draw with charcoals, and by the time I got done "fixing" a drawing, it was a dark smudge on the paper. Ruined through the efforts to improve it. Sigh. 

At any rate, another poem has found a home. It's not a big publication, though I keep trying for the "big name" magazines, just in case someone might like something. It's a tough line to walk, being open enough to write something honest and vulnerable, and then having the thicker skin close back over in order to send it out and face the rejections. I know that they are not personal; hell, no one knows who I am, and that's not likely going to change anytime soon, if ever. 

I'll keep working on my little book -- sometimes I feel a kinship with Anne Bradstreet, tugging and "rubbing off a spot, still made a flaw" in her little book of poems.

Have a good day!

C