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Best of the Net
Tab Journal is pleased to announce our Best of the Net nominations. These nominations are always difficult decisions. This year, we were able to draw from three online issues in Volume 10 (2022).
We wish all these contributors luck!
“Talisman against Divorce”
Allison Blevins & Joshua Davis
Volume 10, Issue 4 (July/August 2022)
“Bucketsful”
Brenda Cárdenas
Volume 10, Issue 4 (July/August 2022)
“Glome”
Kazim Ali
Volume 10, Issue 5 (September/October 2022)
“How I Learned”
Shonda Buchanan
Volume 10, Issue 5 (September/October 2022)
“Ground”
Farnaz Fatemi
Volume 10, Issue 6 (November/December)
“What Can a Poem Do?”
Ronald J. Pelias
Volume 10, Issue 6 (November/December)
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Special Call for Poems
Tab Journal announces a Special Call for Poems for the print issue that will launch the 2024 volume. The Submissions page of the website has general guidelines, and the Submittable button there will take you to the submission form.
The first consideration deadline for this Special Call is July 18, 2023. The final deadline is September 10, 2023.
Each January, Tab Journal releases a uniquely designed print issue, which is mailed to all previous contributors, distributed at the Association of Writers & Writing Programs and other literary events, and sent to libraries and classes upon request. Past print issues have taken the form of a poster, a pouch, a set of postcards, and other innovative ways to consider the reading experience.
We’re looking for somewhat short poems that will fit the design-in-progress. In addition, while Tab Journal applies the print issue concept loosely and it continues to evolve, we’re looking for poems that have to do with twos, pairs, doubles, halves, dialogues, translations, couplets, and the like.
Tab Journal does not charge a submission fee.
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New Issue of Tab!
The July/August issue of Tab Journal is live on the Current Issue page.
This new issue features work by Muiz Ọpẹýẹmí Àjàyí, BEE LB, Frances Boyle, Hollie Dugas, Trish Hopkinson, Londeka Mdluli, Gary Mesick, Adesiyan Oluwapelumi, Patty Seyburn, Shannon Elizabeth Hardwick, Jessica Dawn Zinz, and a review of Vandana Khana’s Burning Like Her Own Planet by Ian Koh.
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AWP 2023 Recap
Panel proposals for the Association of Writers and Writing Programs Conference in Kansas City in 2024 are due on June 1, so it’s a good time to recap Tab Journal‘s exciting visit to Seattle this past March.
If you were there too, we hope you picked up the January “pouch” print issue of Tab Journal at this year’s AWP Conference. We had a wonderful time meeting many of you, both at the Chapman University booth and at our panels. Tab Communications Coordinator Lydia Pejovic moderated “Leading, Styling, and Other Navigations: Writers and Editors as Designers.” And MFA Graduate Programs Director David Krausman moderated “Foreseeable Futures: Equitable Access to Professional Trajectories for Students.”
Eighteen graduate students from Chapman University attended the AWP Conference. This was a great turnout for us and an opportunity for our burgeoning writers to network with industry professionals and attend a variety of enriching panels.
We left AWP without a single copy of the print issue to lug home. If you are a teacher or librarian and would like us to send you a batch, please use the Contact form and keep in mind that we slow down for summer.
Tab Journal will see you next year in Kansas City!
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Welcome New Tab Staff
Anthony Alegrete (he/him) is a poet and writer located in Orange, California, where he is enrolled in Chapman University’s MFA in Creative Writing program. He earned his BA in English and Communications at Santa Clara University. He has headlined and performed at spoken word events throughout the Silicon Valley area and is now performing in Orange County.
Anthony’s favorite book of poems at the moment: frank: sonnets by Diane Suess. You can read former Tab Staff Liz Harmer’s review of frank: sonnets in Vol.9, Issue 2 of Tab Journal.
He also shared that, if he could have any superpower, it would be shapeshifting: “Living through the perspective of something else sounds interesting.”
Miles Enriquez-Morales (he/him) is a writer and amateur boxer from Whittier, California. He is an MFA in Creative Writing student at Chapman University and earned his BA from Colorado State University. He is a member and facilitator of the all LGBTQ+ writing group WriteNow! He can be found on Instagram as @menriquezmorales.
Miles’s favorite poet is Claudia Rankine, and his favorite poetry collection is Duino Elegies by Rainer Maria Rilke.
Miles would also choose shapeshifting as his superpower, in part because you could change shape to fly or breathe underwater, thereby having bonus superpowers.
Henneh Kwaku Kyereh (he/him) is a poet and health educator from Gonasua in Ghana. He is the author of Revolution of the Scavengers, selected by Kwame Dawes for the New Generation African Poets chapbook series. His poems have appeared or are forthcoming in the Academy of American Poets’ Poem-A-Day, Lolwe, World Literature Today, Olongo Africa, Tupelo Quarterly, Agbowo, 2035Africa, Poetry Society of America, Air/Light Magazine, and elsewhere. He is the founder and co-host of the Church of Poetry. He is an MFA in Creative writing student and MFA program assistant at Chapman University. Find him on Twitter/Instagram via @kwaku_kyereh.
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Tab Journal at AWP
Join Tab Journal at this year’s Association of Writers & Writing Programs Conference in Seattle.
FREE copies of Tab Journal
2023 & 2022 print issues
AWP Bookfair Booth #903
Plus, Editor Anna Leahy and Communications Coordinator Lydia Pejovic will share Tab Journal‘s approach to design on.
Leading, Styling, and Other Navigations:
Writers and Editors as Designers
Friday, March 10, 2023, at 3:20 pm to 4:35 pm
Rooms 333-334, Summit Bldg, Seattle Convention Center
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Tab’s Pushcart Nominations!
Tab Journal has nominated the following six poems for a Pushcart Prize. This list of poems isn’t what’s best or what’s most popular but, rather, represents the mix of voices and aesthetics of Tab Journal‘s range. Because we understand text in relation to how the reading experience is designed, we also considered the apparent constraints of the Pushcart Prize volume’s design. We have a terrific batch of poems here!
We’re grateful that each of these poets and many more trusted us with their work. Cross your fingers for a Tab Journal Pushcart win this year. And read the issues in Volume 10 for these poems and many others.
“Into Wildflower Into Field”
Kai Coggin | https://www.kaicoggin.com
Issue #2 (March; online)
“Still Life”
Jenny Qi | https://jqiwriter.com
Issue #2 (March; online)
“an essence always is lost in translation, but also an essence is thereby created:”
Ed Go
Issue #4 (July; online)
“How Not to Build a Model Rocket”
Orlando Ricardo Menes | https://www.orlandoricardomenes.com
Issue #4 (July; online)
“Glome” with Artist Statement
Kazim Ali | https://www.kazimali.com
Issue #5 (September: online)
“The Apiary Library and Falling Back in Love”
Alison Lubar | https://www.alisonlubar.com
Issue #5 (September; online)
Tab Journal has published one poem that’s won a Pushcart Prize. “Snow White” by Chloe Honum was published in Volume 2 (2014) and appeared in Pushcart Prize XL (2016).
#poetry #PushcartPrize
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Welcome New Tab Staff
Emily Velasquez has joined the Tab Journal staff and is now reading submissions. She earned her BA at Cal State Fullerton and is now a Dual MA/MFA student at Chapman University.
Emily Velasquez has written for Soapberry Review, an online journal dedicated to amplifying the work of Asian American writers and provide thoughtful critical analysis of their work. Soapberry Review was launched earlier this year by another Chapman MA/MFA student, Audrey Fong, with essayist and tech worker Sarah Sukardi.
Congratulations to Ada Limón, named 24th Poet Laureate of the United States. What marvelous news for poetry and culture.
In the Current Issue (July 2022) of Tab Journal, Ian Koh reviews Limón’s new book, The Hurting Kind:
In these poems, there is something in the reflecting and the reflection that is about resilience and healing, which are just as essential as sleeping and breathing. Change is its own process. It can seem chaotic, or it can be appreciated, seeing the miracles in the changing of the seasons, which is also how the sections in this collection are structured. To see change as miraculous is admirable because it nourishes appreciation of patience and love instead of revealing endurance as gullibility and foolishness.
Tabula Poetica hosted Ada Limón in 2017 for a Poetry Talk and a Poetry Reading. It was a memorable day with with an amazing poet, and we’re happy to have the videos to share with Tab Journal readers.
July 2022 marks 32 years of celebrating Disability Pride Month, which began after the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act. Tab Journal joins the disability community in appreciating and understanding the range of human ability and the diversity that can be found within the disabled community. We think it fitting to discuss the steps some of our staff are taking to create more inclusive experiences.
Tab Journal’s Creative Director, Claudine Jaenichen, piloted a course this past spring at Chapman University entitled “Disability, Accessibility, and Design.”
[This course] presents a body of work, methodologies, and creative scholarship from a diverse group of designers, creative practitioners, and researchers representing neurodiversity, sensory, physical, cognitive, and cultural diversity within the visible and invisible disabled community. The course uses project-based learning focusing on the foundations of design. Students learn the fundamental principles of accessibility and prepare for further study in inclusive and collaborative design work.
Designing for the disabled community is important for representation and understanding. The human-made world in which we live is most often built with normative bodies and abilities in mind. Claudine Jaenichen’s class is exciting because it challenges these assumptions. Students are calling for it to become a required course in the Graphic Design major.
Meanwhile, Tab Journal‘s Editor, Anna Leahy, has spent the last two years heading the effort to launch a Health Humanities program at Chapman University. The minor in Health Humanities complements the long-standing Disability Studies minor, and the college’s annual Engaging the World program will focus on health equity in Fall 2023. Leahy committed herself to this effort while working on her article for The Washington Post celebrating the 30th anniversary of ADA.
In addition, this year, Editor Anna Leahy and Creative Director Claudine Jaenichen have been awarded a Scholarly/Creative Activity Grant from Chapman University to explore “Crip Time, Poetry Curation, and Design Thinking: New Directions for Tab Journal” in 2022-2023. As part of this exploration, Leahy and Jaenichen are meeting with a disabled designer this month, considering how we can avoid putting time and effort into disability dongles (see Liz Jackson’s work), and investigating best practices for visual poetry. We’re also seeking out language and developing practices that reflect our varied abilities and schedules as staff, contributors, and readers.
Though Tab Journal has not explicitly recruited staff who identify as D/disabled, our survey last year indicated that many of our staff identify as having a disability. By representing the disability community in our staff demographics, we hope to ensure a range of perspectives and ideas at play in the literary community.
How are you celebrating Disability Pride Month?