Cotton Xenomorph\u2019s \u201cCryptids and Climate Change\u201d issue continues, with \u201cLos N\u00edmbulos\u201d by Angie Loveday<\/a> trying to get people lost in our literary <\/em>Nostromo just for fun. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n This is not Jordan Belfort asking you to sell me this pen. This will be me talking to myself. Hopefully it maybe helps you, too. We\u2019re not talking about money, though let\u2019s not downplay it\u2014most artists don\u2019t make enough to live off their art, and that sucks. No, we\u2019re going to explore something less measurable: when do you feel like you have what you want? <\/p>\n\n\n\n How many M names can fit in one paragraph? I was lucky enough to get coffee with Matt Sigur recently, and at one point, I said that my biggest goal was being a poet\/novelist with a blog\u2014to which Matt said \u201cyou are.\u201d Rewinding back to AWP, I mentioned to Maya Williams how Bob and I really try to keep The Line Break<\/em> from being a cis-straight white boys\u2019 club\u2014to which they said something encouraging and something along the lines of \u201cyou have a platform.\u201d Rewind all the way back to 2022, and something Matt Bell said in Kathy Fish‘s blog with a similar theme<\/span><\/span><\/a> has stuck with me ever since. Here\u2019s Matt\u2019s full answer:<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n MATT BELL: \u201cLong ago, I decided success would be getting to live a literary life. To write books or edit them or teach them. To be surrounded by people who made art and cared about it. To try to think deeply about stories. I\u2019ve had all that for a long time now, no matter what else happens.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n It often feels like, in the day-to-day bustle of school dropoff, work, school pickup, parenting, cooking dinner, then watching movies with my wife until we fall asleep, that I lead a more dad<\/em> life than literary<\/em> life (that is not a complaint about my family, my family rules). Maybe I don\u2019t feel like a poet\/novelist because I don\u2019t have a book out (non-self-published division<\/a>). Or maybe I don\u2019t feel successful\/like a I have a platform because I don\u2019t make money off of my work yet\u2014but we said we weren\u2019t going to talk about money. Maybe it\u2019s that the Shipwrecked Sailor blog and The Line Break<\/em> podcast hasn\u2019t yet cured every warmongering bigot in the world of the violence and hatred in their hearts and brought about a lasting peace where the government gives out free small press subscriptions every year after you file your taxes<\/a>. That\u2019s achievable, right? <\/p>\n\n\n\n Nah, the year 2020 disabused me of any notion that writing or podcasts can bring about the kind of revolutionary change the world needs. That\u2019s okay! You know what else is okay? Putting your art out into the world, using that to bring you into conversations with other artists, and nurturing the relationships you all form until something like a True Community emerges. Because Maya and the Matts (free band name) are right\u2014I might not have reached the bestseller list or created my own little version of the Combahee River Collective<\/a>, but I do feel like I\u2019ve been living a literary life these last 3 1\/2 years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
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