Burning the Nail Poetry Challenge – Poet: Robert Zimmermann

Welcome, one and all, to a challenge catered to inspire the poet’s heart in each of us.  A poem, any length and style, to be written about the chosen theme: Burning the Nail. So, what the heck does that mean? That is where the fun begins.

 

Thank you everyone that participated in our poetry challenge.  The submissions were amazingly diverse and deep, taking our theme in so many different ways. We are in awe of all of you.  We thought that perhaps it was time to give everyone a peek behind the curtain and tell you the story behind BURNING THE NAIL.  So, what does it actually mean? We have no idea.  Sheila’s youngest child came up with it.  It was a favorite lyric substitution to many different songs from lullabies to heavy metal.

“I think I heard it sung for a least a week straight, both whispered quietly while playing to singing loudly with the radio in the car.  The more I heard it, the more it called to me.  What could this really mean? ”

So, now you know the truth. The words of a child; molded and shaped into a series of incredible works of poetry.  Isn’t it amazing what such a simple phrase can be transformed into?

Eternally Grateful,

Sheila Hall and Robert Zimmermann 

Heated
by Robert Zimmermann

Flames reflect
in tears she’s
yet to cry.

The fires hide
his eyes behind
mirrored goggles.

He smiles.

She’s laid out,
bare,
over a long bench.

Wrists, ankles,
bound below.

Her back
exposed to the heated room

In heavy gloves,
goggles,
a thick apron,
he appraises his work.

The metal, curled
into letters, designed
to scar, to last…

Her eyes reflect
pain, anticipation
…pleasure.

The bite of a whip
is nothing but a kiss
when compared to
the burning she hates,
the burning she wants.

He turns,
facing her.
A tear falls,
trailing to upturned
lips.

It’s ready,
my mistress.

With the rest of the poems that will be posted for this challenge, Sheila and I will be including a bio for the poet, as well as few links so you can find out more about him or her. Today, the poet is me…and well, all that information can be found on this blog.

I hope you all come out tomorrow…and the next day and for many days after that, as we unfold a journey through many wonderful poets and poems during the Burning the Nail Poetry Challenge.

MY NEW RELEASE: Winter’s Homecoming and Other Poems

Through some delay and a good amount of hard work, I was able to finally release my newest book to the world. I’ve been wanting to give readers a small sampling of my poetry just for being as supportive as they are. And for future readers, who haven’t read my work, to get a glimpse into what they might expect for reading From Where I Stand or other future releases.

Winter’s Homecoming and Other Poems might not be as hard-hitting as From Where I Stand. It also might lack the personal narrative that those poems presented so strongly. But I think you won’t be disappointed in this somewhat new direction the poems take the reader. These are poems written many years ago, but with a great overhaul. Some are only slightly updated, while others took the haiku form and expanded itself to something larger.

The way I’d really like to say thank you to everyone is by letting you know that for the month of January, this chapbook will be FREE on Smashwords (and Kobo if I finally get it to publish there…still working on that. Possibly B&N as well). After this month, I’ll bring the price up to $0.99 to match what I have it for over on Amazon. So grab it while you still can!!!

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Before I share more about the book, I’d like to make mention of one thing: reviews. So far I’ve gotten a great bunch of reviews for From Where I Stand on Amazon, Goodreads, and Smashwords. I’d just like to thank everyone who’s left one for my début collection.

With that said, if anyone reading Winter’s Homecoming has the time, reviews on this collection are also greatly appreciated. If you post it just on your blog, or just one other channel, that’s still great! If you can get it everywhere else, that’s even better and more than expected. Just remember that reviews help some readers choose great books that they’ll enjoy. This goes for every book, not just mine.

So again, thank you to all the reviews to date, as well as all future reviews from anyone listening

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Winter’s Homecoming and Other Poems is an eight poem chapbook by Robert Zimmermann. In this insightful new collection, Zimmermann shares his love and appreciation for the beauty of nature and the changing of seasons, as well as the endless search for happiness.

     

Amazon (remember it’s not free here)

The Benefits of Reading Aloud & A New Video

As a poet, I have a strong belief that poets and writers in general can benefit greatly from reading their work aloud. For my recent blog tour, I wrote a post on this very subject. You can find my post “The Music of Poetry” on Kayleigh Grian’s blog. Because it’s all out there already I won’t bore you with bring it that up again.

What I’d really like to get into is the idea of public speaking in general for writers. I’ve never been great at doing this. I would do whatever I could to not do presentations throughout my years in school and I failed a speech class because I like to wing it way too often (keeps people on their toes…but also makes the speech way too short, haha). But once I found a topic that I know inside and out, I was able to break out of that shell. I was able to get up in front of an audience and do my thing.

What am I comfortable talking about in front of a crowd? My poetry! I was reluctant to do this until I NEEDED to in order to graduate college. In my last semester, when going for my creative writing degree, there was a course in which we created a manuscript all semester as well as organized a public reading for the group (half of the class) we were in. It was actually a fun experience to set everything up and market the event all over campus and the internet. It was during this reading that I realized that the audience  isn’t that hard to please. All that needed to be done was to stand up there, read my work, and be true to it. So that’s what I did.

I know that it sounds easier than it is, I admit that. But it gets better. It also helped that I had a good amount of my friends in the crowd of maybe 30-40 people. There were also a few viewers watching the live stream we set up on a laptop. It added a little pressure to have that. This was also the first time I was to read these poems out loud. It was the first time many people would hear some of the subject matter instead. But you just have to stand up there and be true to it. Let your work speak for itself. If you haven’t watched that reading, you can do so here:

You can watch the entire event (mostly short fiction, I was the only poet in the group) here: COMP 490 Reading

That was my first real public reading, so it could only get better for there right? Well I hope that’s the case. I haven’t done a real public reading since. Despite not reading in public, I’ve been reading and rereading and reading some more, all out loud ever since. It’s been a great thing to practice throughout the entire writing process. I think it’s benefited my poems and my confidence in reading them in general. I strongly suggest that more and more writers consider reciting their work along with writing it.

I had a discussion this morning about how many things about a piece can be improved through just one reading. I find that I can catch mistakes better, work on making a poem flow smoothly, and find unnecessary words to pluck out easier. Try it some time. The next time you think you have a poem or a story perfect, read it out loud. Then ask yourself if you can make it even better. Nothing’s ever perfect anyway. I’m always finding ways to improve “finished” pieces. It’s the beauty of writing; there’s always another way something can be written.

In closing, I’d like to share my latest “public reading.” As many of you know, I had a poll up last week asking everyone to vote on a poem for me to read in a video. Well there were  a total of 10 votes, so there wasn’t much variation among the totals for each poem. I decided instead of picking one or two poems, I’d read the top four and make it a longer video. It’s also a nice teaser for my book, From Where I Stand.

I hope you enjoy this little video. I’ve gotten great response since I uploaded it yesterday. Please feel free to share it all over the place , comment on it, and simple stare in awe at all the books behind me. That’s maybe a 5th of my collection.

FROM WHERE I STAND IS PUBLISHED!!!

That’s right….before bed last night I hit publish on Amazon for my first book, From Where I Stand. When I woke up…there it was all purdy and published.

After months of putting the book together, and YEARS of writing each poem, and through all the support of every one on this blog, all the authors I’ve gotten to know, and all the friends I’ve made…it’s all done. I couldn’t have done this without the support and help with formatting, learning from the trail and errors of others, and a kick in the ass every now and then.

But I want to get to the point soon, so just a special thanks for Amber Jerome~Norrgard for helping me with making sure this book was as perfect as I could get it to look, and I hope that our hard work lives up to the standards of my readers

So here’s where you can find the book, it’s only on Amazon at the moment but I’m going to do my best to get it on Smashwords soon for those without a Kindle.

From Robert Zimmermann comes From Where I Stand, an emotional debut poetry collection. Zimmermann explores strained parental relationships, loss of life, and the despair associated with grief. Alongside these darker themes, he delves into the small areas of life that often go unnoticed but become the hope we are searching for.

AMAZON

Want to know what else is cool? You can get your ebook SIGNED…by ME!!!! Head on over to the Authorgraph site after you buy it, and send me a request! Find book here

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What else is happening with From Where I Stand, well I’ll be going on TOUR in a few weeks. From December 2nd through the 8th I’ll be doing a blog tour. It’ll include over 10 blogs with interviews, reviews, and a few guest posts as well. I hope you’ll all join me for that. Click the banner below for more information on that.

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Thank you again for everyone who has helped out and to those who’ve already bought the book (eager, you all were). And thank you to those who check it out soon, as well

I’m Going On Tour!!!! From Where I Stand Blog Tour December 2nd – 8th

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For my first book, From Where I Stand, I’d like to take a trip around the internet for a week. Thanks right…I’m going on TOUR!!!! From December 2nd until December 8th, I’ll be roaming around many different blogs of all shapes and sizes. Some days I’ll be busying doing two stops. Crazy right? I’m going to be a busy man, but I’d still like you all to come see me during tour. I’ll make time for you

During the tour I’ll be having a variety of interviews, many reviews, and a few guest posts. Also, I know you’ll all love this…I’ll be holding a giveaway of my book as well. 5 lucky winners will get an ecopy of my book (I’m still working on getting it up on Smashwords. If I can’t get that done it’ll only be in Kindle or PDF for, sorry)!!! All you’ll need to do to enter is to comment on a post. If you comment on two different posts, that’s two entries…comment on all the posts, that many more entries. (One comment per post counts though ) Entries will be pooled together at the end of tour and winners randomly selected from that.

I hope you will all join in the fun and welcoming my collection of poetry into the world. If you’d like to mark your calendars, here’s a list of all the stops:

Dec 2
Guest post – CL Raven
Interview – Charity Parkerson

Dec 3

Review – Rebecca Hamilton
Interview – Cinta Garcia de la Rosa

Dec 4

Guest post – Kayleigh Grian
Interview – Amber Jerome-Norrgard

Dec 5
Guest post – Miranda Stork

Dec 6
Interview/Review – Tara S. Wood

Dec 7
Review – Pereza Thompson
Review – Rachel McClellan

Dec 8

Review – Jessica Fortunato

Interview - Jen McConnel

*note, schedule may be changed if needed