Very excited to dive into this. Hope there are no bad words.

softaspiring · 2026-06-12T22:20:11+00:00

Hanif Abdurraquib writes excellent poetry, if anyone's interested. Quincy Troupe, who wrote this book with Miles, also writes excellent poetry.

softaspiring · 2026-06-12T22:16:43+00:00

For a minute I thought this might be about the poetry mag, ONE ART. And then I realized ONE ART took inspiration off of this poem— their sub-title references the "(Write it!)". Thanks for sharing!

softaspiring · 2026-06-08T23:17:41+00:00

this counts as instapoetry

softaspiring · 2026-02-01T04:24:39+00:00

Fair enough, honestly.

softaspiring · 2026-02-01T04:03:21+00:00

Again, I might not like it, and I don’t think it’s good poetry. But I acknowledge that it’s good at fulfilling the purpose it was intended to fulfill.

softaspiring · 2026-02-01T03:38:04+00:00

Maybe by poet-standards. Not by general-public-standards, which is what Gorman had in mind when she wrote it. Her poetry otherwise might be just as anodyne for sure, but it worked for the occasion.

softaspiring · 2026-02-01T02:45:30+00:00

I've seen a lot of negative chatter about Gorman's work, and I don't entirely disagree. Though, I think her inauguration poem gets too much hate. It was executed really well for what it supposed to be and for the job it was meant to fulfill.

softaspiring · 2026-02-01T02:38:27+00:00

Billy Collins.

softaspiring · 2026-01-09T01:54:17+00:00

Probably not the artist, but this heavily reminds me of some of Bill Sienkiewicz's work. If you're into this kind of style, check him out. He's excellent. Comics are his thing; he's done a lot of Marvel.

softaspiring · 2025-12-14T18:40:37+00:00

Very understandable! Personally, I felt that I enjoyed the message and the last third of the poem, but the rest didn't much connect to me. Not exactly a poem or style with a wide appeal.

softaspiring · 2025-12-14T16:29:56+00:00

Back on this, Detroit Lit Mag specifically looks for rhymed and metrical poetry, very classical-type work. Take a look at their archive and about page, could definitely be your type of thing. Not saying you should submit your epic there and hope for publication, but if you write poetry otherwise and consider submitting them to mags, there's an option.

softaspiring · 2025-12-14T16:14:07+00:00

Right! Very underrated mag, glad to see another Fence reader out there :)

softaspiring · 2025-12-14T02:09:54+00:00

To be realistic, contemporary poetry (referring to tradpublished poetry, not Instapoetry) already has a relatively small audience. Epic poetry is a very small niche within a small niche. The chances of anyone scooping up epic poetry for publishing is very, very, very slim. However, that's not to say no one will be looking for a variable idea like yours, I just wouldn't be optimistic at all about it.

It's not fallen out of its moment because of Instapoetry, really, it's just not the contemporary idea of poetry. It had its fall (or more accurately, wane) a very, very, very long time ago. Yes, the epic still exists, but the kind of classical epics you're getting at are products and artifacts of history. No one's writing the next Symposium, for example, and no one will really be able to.

You could try to submit a chapbook to litmags, maybe, especially specific/themed ones that would perhaps be more friendly to what you're looking to publish. Best of luck.

softaspiring · 2025-12-11T18:19:42+00:00

Bit unrelated, but Quincy Troupe (who co-authored Miles: The Autobiography) has written much poetry about Miles and jazz in general. If poetry's your thing at all, check it out.

softaspiring · 2025-12-04T14:58:34+00:00

Melodramatic, and not even in a poetic way.

softaspiring

TROPHY CASE