ATPO 2 put to bed, ATPO 3 revving up

As you know, we've faced some technical issues with Atlas Poetica 2 on account of our print on demand publisher no longer accepting Mac files, your fearless editor having a Mac, his Mac dying and getting replaced, finding new software that would convert his Mac files into something that the printer would accept, reformatting the journals because half the formatting was lost, rescuing my son's virus infected computer with a very stubborn and horrible virus, saving his files, using his machine to edit Atlas Poetica, and finally getting it all sent to the publisher, Modern English Tanka Press . . .

In the midst of all this, other complications came to pass. My autistic son came to live with me full time. He's a lovely young man that is quite easy to live with, but that means I've been spending my days off work organizing his education and medical treatment and teaching him new skills (like how to ride mass transit to get to his new school), and related complications.

Nonetheless, Atlas Poetica is done and has been put to bed. I am waiting for the galleyproof. Assuming all is well with the galley, ATPO 2 will go on sale on September 1 as planned. (This is exactly why there is a long lead between close of submissions and public sale. You never know when disaster will strike.)

The reading window for Atlas Poetica 3 is September 1 to December 31. ATPO 3 will go on sale on 1 March 2009. Planned topics for topical tanka include 'autumn' and the 'urban/suburban/built environment.' As always, we are open to sequences up to forty tanka in length, but prefer to be queried on longer sequences, tanka prose, individual tanka, announcements, international news, book reviews, articles, and other items of interest to an international readership of tanka poetry of place.

In a change, we will be publishing an e-book as well as print, and we will begin excerpting some poems to our website. Therefore, we will be acquiring international English-language rights to enable us to do this. Our new guidelines will conform to the general guidelines of our publisher, Modern English Tanka Press, and will be comparable to other recently published guidelines for METP journals. The website will be revamped over the coming weeks to reflect the changes and post additional information.

We do not accept art, and refer poet-artists to our sister publication, Modern Haiga, for illustrated tanka. Our covers are drawn from repositories of public domain satellite art illustrating different areas of the Earth in all their beauty. ATPO 3 will feature a satellite image of Gosses Bluff, Australia. Previous covers have included the Dasht-e Kevir (valley of desert) in Iran, and the Anti-Atlas Mountains in Morocco.

As always, we welcome poetry from around the world written in any language accompanied by English translation. International announcements do not need to be accompanied by English translation, although they are welcome. Announcement can include book notes, event flyers, contest announcements, or any sort of item of interest to our readers. However, they MUST be germane to tanka poetry of place. Haiku-only announcements will not be published.

Thank you for your interest and support. We at Atlas Poetica hope that you enjoy issue No. 2, and look forward to your continued participation and appreciation for No. 3.

Cordially,

~K~

M. Kei
Editor, Atlas Poetica : A Journal of Poetry of Place in Modern English Tanka