Having finished my second chapbook not well, which delved into the topic of mental health, I’m eager to start the next chapbook. But this one I want to write more intentionally. I want to write the poems together. I want to know the theme before I write. I want it to be hopeful.

you think I’m serious, but I’m joking was serious and nihilist, so is not well — which I sent out to competitions recently. While those are the chapbooks that I needed to write at the time, my personal happiness is much better now, and I feel the need to let everyone know that it’ll be okay, if they hang on long enough.

As I anticipate crafting this collection, I find myself stumped on where to start. Before I just wrote poem after poem until enough of them would form something cohesive. I actually love putting together poems I wrote a while ago; there’s a distance that allows me to evaluate them rationally. But I worry that if I use this method again, I will wind up with a nihilist collection of poems again. Maybe that is all I am? I just don’t want to be that. I want my poetry to evolve. I want a full garden of blooming metaphors and winding thoughts.

Maybe I should resolve the first two chapbooks? Wrap them up with the ending I’m ready to give them?

This is hard. I hope to resolve it soon, because I’m aching to write it.