The other evening at a writers’ meeting, one of our members, who is also a reader here at EEOTPB, asked if I had any new writing projects in the works – apart from the sporadic poems that I post. I told her that in recent months, my day job as a technical writer had left me creatively drained, and that the last half of 2014 had been especially demanding. For that reason, I hadn’t been able to spend as much time on some of my personal writing projects as I’d liked. Several projects that I should have completed by now have languished — sunk into the proverbial electronic dustbin, now  nearly beyond retrieval. Even blog posts that I wanted to write – intended to write – have grown stale under the heavy foot of “The Man” who puts food on my table, gas in my tank, and keeps my golden retriever Bailey supplied with expensive ‘all-natural’ dog food. I mean, even blogs I want to read I haven’t gotten around to reading.

Then my friend told me that although she had enjoyed reading some of the poems on EEOTPB, she was a bit confused by my blog’s title, as there appears to be nothing about Ed, nothing about the end of the planet, and nothing at all about books.

I replied by saying that there is a great deal about Ed on this site if you read the poems carefully, and although there has been very little about the end of the planet (since that Mayan calendar scare that was freaking us out back in 2011 turned out to be pure rubbish), there is a bit about books…here and there…

It was at that point that I mentioned that I had collected about forty or so of the poems (many of which have appeared here), into a small volume of poetry, put a cover on it, and made it available to the reading public for a nominal fee. The name of the book is “outrunning the storm” and I shall provide a link here. But hold on! You needn’t rush to buy a copy. I’m going to give it away…right here…well, at least I am giving five copies to the first five people who email me at wepatt@hotmail.com. No postage necessary. I’ll foot that bill. Just put “ED – SEND ME THE BOOK” in the subject line, include a mailing address in the body, and I will send you a copy. And don’t worry, on down the line I won’t spam you with any ads or gimmicks, or give your email address to some shady internet marketing scammer who wants to sell you a time-share in Belize. In fact, you won’t ever  hear from me again!  And don’t think I’m going to ask you to write some flowery, fancy-pants book review either (unless you want to). I don’t work that way.

So back to my friend who congratulated me on the book, but then politely shook her head and told me that it was unlikely that I would sell any copies.

“Poetry does not sell,” she said flatly.

I nodded, recalling how few six figure positions for “Poet” I’ve seen listed on internet employment websites.

After that I left and went home and did a search for the 10 top selling poetry books this week. Without giving you a glimpse into my next blog, I will leave you with this teaser.

The top 2 are:

“I know Why the Caged Bird Sings” by Maya Angelou

AND

“The Odyssey” by Homer

…and they say poetry isn’t selling.

–ED