I’m so honored to have recently been interviewed by Meg Hartmann, a poet and former Iowa Writer’s Workshop graduate who runs Ah – the Sea. Here’s an excerpt, and the full interview can be found here.
Meg Hartmann (MH): Over the past six months, I’ve had the pleasure of several conversations with emerging poet Ana Reisens. Her curiosity and excitement for poetry is so energizing, and her journey as a poet and her overall career is a little atypical. In advance of her teaching The Poet’s Guide to Submitting to Literary Journals over Zoom next month, I thought asking her to elaborate on her perspective and experiences would be interesting.
Ana has published in over 40 journals (and counting) since she started submitting in 2020, without a preexisting literary network. This past fall she was nominated for a Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net, and she’s also one of the readers who reviews work as part of The Mud Season Review’s submission process.
Below is a conversation we had over email. Our interview covered atypical poet career paths, Ana’s course on creativity that she teaches in her “other life” as a professor, poetry and social media, living in Barcelona as an American, and of course, submitting to literary magazines.
MH: Your background isn’t the most typical one for a poet in 2024, at least if one thinks of “poet backgrounds” in a more narrow sense (taking creative writing classes, likely having an MFA). You have a PhD in translation, not creative writing or English literature. How did you get started writing? You began submitting to literary magazines in 2020 – did this journey originate as a pandemic project?
AR: I’ve always been a writer. I wrote my first short story when I was five (a ghost story – fun stuff!) and poetry was a constant companion for me as I grew up. When I was younger, I don’t think I even realized that what I was doing was writing poetry. I just spent time spilling words and thoughts and feelings onto paper.
As I got older, this changed, and I found myself writing less. Looking back, I realize there were two reasons for this: first, I became busy. School and work and life felt big and heavy, and I kept finding more excuses not to write. Second, I believe this busyness silenced the sacred voice within me that always knew it was and had to be a poet.
Life continued; I kept pressing forward with more “important” pursuits. It had always been ingrained in me that English and Creative Writing were “impractical” studies but I loved working with words, so I veered towards translation. I got a Master’s. Moved to Spain. Got a PhD.
The strange part about all of this was that even though I convinced myself that what I was doing was more “practical,” my research focused on stories and how they cross borders as translations and film adaptations. Poetry and creative writing were still there with me, just in a different way. I developed a very logical, categorical approach to studying stories and let it drown out my inner poet. I discovered what it means to be a “shadow artist,” as Julia Cameron writes in The Artist’s Way: a person who abandons their inner artist but feels incessantly drawn towards having this art around them regardless.
And then the pandemic came. I think it was a time of reckoning for a lot of us, but it hit me like an avalanche. I was meant to be writing. Not only that, I was meant to be sharing my work with the world and helping others do the same.
So my path as a poet took me down a winding road, but it wasn’t without its benefits. It helped me develop a lot of different tools, including my rational, categorical academic side, which I’ve taken advantage of to its fullest when developing my system for submitting poetry.
It also taught me something quite beautiful: that no matter how hard you try to run away, you’ll always find your way back to yourself.
MH: What do you think you might do differently than other poets when it comes to submitting your work?
AR: I’m extremely methodological when it comes to submitting my work. I started submitting when I was compiling the corpus for my PhD thesis, and this rigorous, research-heavy approach bled into my approach to submitting. Spreadsheets, categories, subcategories, lists…I took to researching the literary journal panorama the way one researches a thesis, and began to discover a wide array of patterns and tricks.
I also adopted an approach that’s rather silly when I admit it, but is pretty unique: I only submit to paying markets. I know; it’s a bit ridiculous, especially considering how many incredible non-paying markets are out there (I’ve researched them, too!). But I’m a millennial; the notion of the “side hustle” has been drilled into me, and when I began submitting, I thought: wouldn’t it be lovely to earn a little extra from something that’s so sacred to me and that I will be doing regardless?
So I developed a system and sent my work to paying markets. As the acceptances came in, I enjoyed knowing that I was earning some money from my creative work, even as an emerging poet. It felt immensely fulfilling.
MH: You mentioned that you’ve helped friends with submitting their work to literary magazines. Can you talk about how that’s gone for them?
AR: It’s been an absolute joy to witness.
I started out on my journey to becoming a poet alone. I was living in Spain studying translation and did not have a single writer friend. It was a lonely time, now that I think about it, but I guess I really leaned into this loneliness and used it as a means of pushing my work forward.
Little by little, as I got my work out there, I began to make more connections. One of the most remarkable of these was a friend from my undergrad who contacted me when I had just gotten into a good groove when it came to submitting and publishing my work. We had been in a writing group together during the only poetry class we’d taken in college. He wrote me out of the blue in 2022 and the conversation soon shifted to poetry. We talked about the possibility of “getting the band back together” and starting a writing group. He sent me his solution to the Wordle for that day with a challenge: write a poem using these words. I did the same. We wrote the poems, met online, and have been meeting online once a week since then.
He’s the first person I shared my system with. It was such a fun and eye-opening experience to watch someone else use it and take the bold step to putting their work out there.
He got his first acceptance weeks after submitting, and little by little, more rolled in. His work has even been nominated for a Pushcart and Best of the Net (though his personal goal of appearing in Whiskey Tit remains unfulfilled). It’s such a privilege to witness this; it’s tremendously moving.
I can’t take any credit, of course – he’s a brilliant poet. But I do like to think that having this system really helped. I’ve also sent it to several of my students who are budding poets and gotten to share in their excitement at realizing that getting your poetry published is easier than most think; it’s very rewarding.
MH: What have you learned from being on the other side of the submission process at the Mud Season Review?
AR: From the publishing side of things, it’s staggering to realize how much work goes into a literary journal. It’s unbelievable. Every submission period, a wave of manuscripts comes in. Hundreds of them. Then it’s up to the readers and editors to filter through them and select a single one for publication.
Some are (subjectively) weak; some are (subjectively) strong. And every now and then, there’s a gem that takes every reader’s breath away.
As a poet, it’s been truly illuminating. It’s taught me what makes a good manuscript. It isn’t just about strong writing; it’s about how that writing is presented.
MH: I’ve been taking notice lately of the paths different poets have taken in their “careers”: in August and September I went through a period where I read up on the lives of a number of well-known poets. There are many interesting stories there, ones that contradict our contemporary ideas of what an aspiring poet “should” do. Is there a well-known poet past or present whose career inspired you (as distinct from their poetry itself)?
AR: This is such a fascinating topic and question. I remember recently discussing this with a poet friend of mine who’s an operations manager and a major Bob Hicock fan. Hicock first worked as an automotive die designer and computer system administrator. Now he’s got an MFA and teaches, but it makes one wonder: what does one need to become a professional poet?
In this sense, Maya Angelou’s career (and work) has always deeply inspired me, since she went from working a series of odd jobs to get by to making such a profound and lasting difference in the world through multiple art forms and her activism. I think that is what inspires me about many professional poets: the multi-faceted nature of their lives and careers.
MH: In your academic career you teach a course on creativity. How does that connect to your writing? Have you found looking at the academic research on that topic helpful to you as a poet?
AR: The course was born from an inner need to understand where the creativity that fuels my writing comes from.
I’ve learned so much from it. Creativity is such a baffling and elusive subject; so many value it, but few understand it. When I planned my course, I wanted to demystify it in a way that not only seeks to understand it better, but revels in its magic and mystery.
I knew that it would take me on a very unique academic journey; what I hadn’t expected was to have so much fun with it. We laugh. We play. We explore. We create.
Meanwhile, the research is fascinating. I learn so many things that I carry into my writing. The value of humor and silliness and randomness. The benefits of a healthy routine. How to carry on conversations with the subconscious. And lots of strange little tidbits that I find comforting. For instance, did you know that the majority of what are considered writers’ and composers’ best works were produced during the most prolific times of their careers? It’s not about “holding out” for that one great piece; it’s about producing as much as you can and knowing that something great may come of it. If anything, teaching the course has taught me the value of persistence and playfulness and the fact that creativity is not a limited resource. It’s boundless; we are boundless.
MH: The idea that “holding out” is a myth reminds me of advice I once heard the poet James Galvin give as part of a talk. I’m working entirely from faulty memory here, but he said none of us ever know if we’ll be blessed with an idea for a great poem: what the muse gives us is out of our control. But, it’s important to stay in the habit of writing, to build one’s craft, so that if that moment ever does come, you have the skill to execute on the idea.
In addition to frequently submitting to literary magazines, you also are active in the Instapoetry world and seem to have insight regarding how social media is changing poetry. Where do you think literary magazines are going given how we have changed and continue to change? …If they’re going anywhere at all. Maybe the real question is: “How is curation, the function that literary magazines fulfill, changing?” So many newer poets on social media seem unaware of literary magazines.
AR: This is such a great question. I think the gut reflex is to assume that literary magazines may experience a decline as art democratizes itself. They are no longer the sole gatekeepers; this power has been stripped away.
But I think it’s precisely because of this that they will find new and unique ways to transform and adapt. What makes a journal special? Is it its reputation? Its history? The power it has to publish your words in a tangible form and distribute them to thousands of readers?
I think we’re in a time when many editors are being forced to ask themselves these questions and develop new forms of engagement in an increasingly complex landscape. There are so many fascinating examples of this, from journals like Only Poems which are very active on Instagram to The HTML Review (a journal made to exist on the web) to initiatives like Spark to Flame, which seeks to reimagine poetry as a collaborative experience.
Meanwhile, I find it fascinating that – as you said – so many newer poets on social media seem unaware of literary magazines. What will this mean in the long term? Will it create two different “bubbles” – two different kinds of art (as it already seems to be doing)? And what will happen if one of those bubbles bursts, or becomes oversaturated?
I think it’s a very interesting time for poetry. There are more ways to share our work than ever before, all with their unique limitations and merits. This is why I enjoy keeping one foot in each door – I like seeing what’s going on and forming a little bridge between the two worlds.
MH: To help me think of questions for this interview, I did some reading on “the state of literary magazines,” and as you’d probably guess, I came across a lot of doom and gloom. Relatedly, the news that independent book distributor Small Press Distribution had very suddenly shut its doors has been showing up in my feeds and inbox in the past week. Yet the first time you and I talked, one of the things I noticed was your optimism about the poetry world. Would you say you’re optimistic about the future of poetry?
AR: I would say I am. While it’s clear that things are shifting and becoming a career poet is no easy path, I believe there are more opportunities to get your work out there and “break out” than ever before.
I think social media plays a major role in this. I can’t help but think of Maggie Smith’s poem “Good Bones” here. Smith had been publishing traditionally and shared her poem on Twitter after the 2016 Orlando shooting. It went viral and brought a sense of solace to so many.
One never knows when something like this may happen, when a single well-placed spark will ignite a fire. And that, I believe, is the beauty of sharing our work: it allows us to reach others who may need it. It’s easier to do this now than ever before, which is what makes me optimistic.
For more of the interview and to sign up for my upcoming workshop “A Poet’s Guide to Submitting to Literary Journals,” you can visit Ah – the Sea.
