A request

Hi (and happy Fourth) friends, 

This post isn't a poem but an open invitation to everyone who is kind enough to read my blog. In a couple of weeks, I am planning on entering a few of the poems on this blog to a contest that a literary magazine called The Narrative is holding. This is the first poetry contest that I will be entering, and I'm very excited about it. However, I need your help.

The contest asks you to submit five poems for consideration (part of the intention being to illustrate the diversity of your style). As I think is the case with many writers, I am a very poor judge of which of my poems are the "best." As such, I am very invested on getting input on which of the poems that appear on this blog should be subject to revision and submitted to this contest. 

What I'm asking, then, is that all who are willing leave me feedback (whether in the comments section of this entry, or if your viewing this through Facebook as message sent to me) as to what your favorite of my poems are. It would be most helpful if you gave me a list of five poems, but if you just want to put a good word in for one or two that would also be extraordinarily helpful. 

Of course, I understand this could be a time consuming process, because I don't expect any of you to be intimately familiar with my work. With that in mind, if you are going through the trouble of trying to genuinely discern which of these poems you like best you probably shouldn't bother reading before the first entry in July 2011 ("A Month") because I think there's a pretty steep drop off in quality before that time. Similarly, if you just want to read some of the more recent entries and see which ones you enjoy out of those that would also be lovely because hopefully those are better than many of the poems I wrote last year. 

Really, I would treasure any input you would be willing to provide.

Similarly, after I select which poems I will be submitting I'm going to ask anyone interested to offer their opinions on how those poems should be revised. If you would like to be included in this process, let me know and I will include you in that conversation (which I plan on having, either in an email thread or through Facebook messages). 

Of course, in recompense I would be thrilled to offer any input on the writing of any of my reading and friends. I view this, not only as an opportunity to improve my own writing, but also as a way to open communication between the writers I know about writing--something I think would be extraordinarily valuable. 

I look forward to hearing from any and all of you.

Thank you and much love

Ben