How to Get Curated in Poetry
Real Talk
There are a lot of Medium articles about how to get curated. Tips, tricks, ways to follow Medium’s own handy guidelines. I must admit, I don’t spend much time reading these articles. They mean well. But you see, I’m a poet, mostly. I write poems. Every day. Rain or shine. Come what may. I write poems and post at least two a day, usually three, sometimes on a Sunday, maybe one as a way of taking a nice break and of letting Poetry Sunday with PS I Love You shine.
A recent curated poem of mine:
A recent non curated poem of mine:
Where did I go wrong? What could I have done better, or differently? Should I wring my hands and feel badly? No. There’s literally no way to tell, nothing to do, little in terms of tips and tricks, and no way to know what went ‘wrong’ because in truth, nothing went wrong.
Both poems are pretty nice. I worked equally as hard on both of them. I like them both in different and sweet ways. And both have the same amount of fans/claps/stats etc. So, try figuring this one out, guru’s of Medium. And wouldn’t you know it, the non-curated poem is my favorite of the two. I really love that one! Geez, we can love our own poetry right? Yes, and we should. And that is an article for another day, I am sure.
Poetry is not given the same amount of attention, value, care, concern, insight, appreciation, and love and we get that. And we are growing more and more okay with that as many of us are seeking other venues and ways to keep going and growing.
Of course, all while hanging on, hanging out, standing by our Medium family and community, because of the love and because of the safe space for experimentation, and because the platform is really neat and nice to look at, and really neat and nice to pay us anything at all for our talents and passions.
I have had many poems curated. I have had many poems not curated. What is the secret? Literally not expecting curation at any time in poetry. That’s the secret. Some of my best poetry — last week’s You, At the Temple, for example, got a big nope from the curators. Some of my so-so poetry, last week’s I Gambled on Existing and Mansplaining Happened, bam!, a double curation in humor and poetry. There is literally no way to tell, no way to prepare, not best foot forward, give it your A game, that will ensure curation in poetry on Medium.
Poets of Medium (we are a FB collective, a family, a support group, a team) discuss this often. Some poets are curated each and every poem they put out. We do not know how they do this, but bravo for them. Some are never curated at all. Some, like me, are randomly curated when we least expect it, or sometimes, when we really for sure know we have a good thing on our hands here and that it should be given whatever this esteemed status means — curation, distributed in topics, seen by more people. Maybe, just maybe these things are true as in more people see your curated poems, as in they mean something about quality, as in they have some sort of status that is elevated.
But most likely, not really. I have curated poems that still get some hits in terms of wow, I wrote this a few months ago and someone just clapped for it, cool. But in poetry it is not like the floodgates of fame and fortune opened up and everyone and their mother is seeing your poem and reading it and you can sit back and bask in the glow of feeling seen and rewarded for something.
When I look at some of the poems that are in the ‘topics’ aka ‘curated’ spot on Medium sometimes I admit, I shake my head with wonder. Some of them are really … not that great. Some of them are amazing. There’s no standard or theme or topic that any of them share in common, there’s no formatting or way of using images, or insights into titles and headlines that work. There’s just poetry that got picked that day, and we go with that. We all just go with it. It feels nice to be ‘chosen’ but most of the time, down here in the poetry mines, we choose ourselves and we choose each other. We, as Walt would say, celebrate ourselves.
Which brings me to the moral of this piece: curation does not mean anything about your worth as a poet, about your talent as an artist, about your gifts as a writer. It’s nice when it happens but with poetry as any poet on Medium will tell you, it is random and it is unpredictable and it is rare for most of us. It is not something to pin a dream on, fam. It is just something to be surprised by.
The dream is in the poetry itself. The dream is in writing poetry. The dream is in feeling good with what you write. And it is in improving as you go on, as you spend time here with other poets, learning from them, reading more poetry, reading more things about writing poetry, writing more poetry. Growing as poets and people is what we are all about in the end.
Curation is not a stamp of ‘you did it, you’re done, you’ve grown.’ It’s nice when it happens, but it is equally fine, equally as nice, really, believe me, when it does not happen because the curation is here in our own museum of poetry, our own profiles, our own chapbooks and books, our own groups and collectives of poets and readers writing and reading and giving support.
As I write this I have about three poems that are hanging out in that “hang tight” limbo zone. Now, I feel that one of them is really great, I like it a lot. The other two are okay, honesty is the best policy, but I worked hard on them too.
Check them out and place some bets — which will be curated, if any, which will not, if not all of them?
Poets on Medium know that writing poetry on Medium means making peace with some degree of obscurity and uncertainty. And now it means being somewhat in acceptance that we exist here without much equity in the potential for economic earnings. It means being okay existing in the realm of mystery and being fine walking the road less traveled. And really, what could be more poetic than that.
Jenny Justice is a poet mom who longs to bring poetry to life in ways that spark empathy, connection, joy, and feeling. She loves writing love poems, climate change awareness poems, poems for kids, and of course, poems about poetry and poets. You can follow her on Medium and at Jenny Justice, Writer. You can support her on Patreon. You can follow her poetry at Justice Poetic.
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