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Editor Interview: Couplet Poetry

Q: Describe what you publish in 25 characters or less.

A: A "couplet" of 2 poems.

Q: What other current publications (or publishers) do you admire most?

A: Some very cool things seem to keep happening at Guesthouse Lit, Court Green and River Mouth Review. We're always fascinated by Guernica.

Q: If you publish writing, who are your favorite writers? If you publish art, who are your favorite artists?

A: We've been honored to feature Rosebud Ben-Oni, D.A. Powell, W. Todd Kaneko, Amie Whittemore, Diannely Antigua, Sandra Simonds, Anne Barngrover, Cole Swensen and more. While we're not formally an art journal, we have featured art by Summer Hart, and visual poetry by Avni Vyas. We're also very interested in poetry that plays with the concrete, such as Hafsa Mumtaz's recently featured "Death Subterfuges in the Double Helix of Life" (Issue 2), and erasures, such as H.E. Casson's "The Spaces Between Them" (Issue 1).

Q: What sets your publication apart from others that publish similar material?

A: The vision behind Couplet Poetry is that we publish two poems by a single author that are in some way "coupled" together. We only accept two poems per submission, so send us a pair that really work as a unit. In practice, we've been open to couplets that pair a poem and a piece of visual art (Sandra Simonds and Summer Hart's collaboration from Issue 1, for example), a pair of intentionally written poems by two authors (Jane Zwart and Amit Majmudar identically titled poems from Issue 2, for example), and translations (Cole Swensen's translation of Suzanne Doppelt's "Peche Merle" in Issue 1, for example). We're very interested in ways that narrative, emotional or idea driven arcs can move across two pieces.

Q: What is the best advice you can give people who are considering submitting work to your publication?

A: We're very open to styles, ideas, forms, and experimentation, so if there's something you've been censoring yourself from sending elsewhere because it's too weird or wild or out there, please send it to us.

Q: Describe the ideal submission.

A: Two poems that very obviously can't live without one another, and which spark for the reader a sense of immediacy.

Q: What do submitters most often get wrong about your submissions process?

A: We are very unlikely to publish instapoetry or haiku, so if this is what you're doing, you might have better luck finding placement at another publication.

Q: How much do you want to know about the person submitting to you?

A: We ask for a short cover letter in the body of the email and a brief bio. We read the poems before we look at the cover letters and bios, but we do consider them. Brevity is key as we get lots of submissions, but we do want to know what else you're up to.

Q: If you publish writing, how much of a piece do you read before making the decision to reject it?

A: We always read the entire submission.

Q: What is a day in the life of an editor like for you?

A: Issues 1 & 2 have come out on a skeleton crew, and a lot of the work has been done by me. I'm reading submissions, selecting final pieces, and formatting the journal online. For Issue 3, we're going to be expanding and adding in readers/co-editors, as well as an undergraduate intern to help with submission management and communication. Stay tuned to our masthead page for announcements of future staff.

Q: How important do you feel it is for publishers to embrace modern technologies?

A: We're an online journal because online means access. That works on both ends. I'd wanted to found a literary journal for over a decade, but the entrance costs for print publications are so high that it was out of reach. So, it's easier for me, as an editor, to have access to the wheels of publication because Couplet is online. For readers, our journal is free and can be accessed on anything that gets the internet. We've had over a thousand views for each issue, so we're clearly finding an audience, and our online medium helps with that.

Q: How much do you edit an accepted piece prior to publication?

A: I'm a big believer in the author's vision, and generally speaking don't accept a poem that I don't think is finished or a good fit for our publication--so, it's unlikely that we'd ask for substantive editing (so far, in our first two issues, this hasn't happened). I proofread everything, and ask for clarifications when needed, always with the mind of respecting the author's vision. All authors get to approve final drafts/proofs.

Q: Do you nominate work you've published for any national or international awards?

A: We haven't yet but only because we are very new. We intend to once we've been publishing for a full year, which is the minimum for many awards.