Image: Glittersmoke image via amazon.com
For West Chester University graduate student Sarah Mengel, poetry isn’t only about what lies on the page but rather what is expressed between the lines. Mengel will present her recently published chapbook, “Glittersmoke,” at the Phillips Autograph Library on March 3 as part of a WCU Creative Writing Department event. Poetry has become more than a creative hobby for Mengel as she celebrates her journey from aspiring writer to published author.
Mengel always had an affinity for writing and began writing stories in childhood. However, for every story she started, she struggled to finish it. “I would sit down, I would start writing a story, I would have all my characters and everything, and then I would just stop,” she said. Now, she is doing more than just finishing her stories, she is publishing them. While “Glittersmoke” is her first published chapbook, she has many other individual poems published. For Mengel, an introduction to a creative writing course at her undergrad university, Kutztown, bridged the gap between writing as a hobby and pursuing it as a career. “That was kind of the class that sort of pivoted everything for me. After that, I started taking more creative writing classes… and then I was like, okay, yeah, this is something I really want to do,” she said.
Poetry is Mengel’s primary focus as a writer as she enjoys the image-based aspects and the density of its impact. The phrasing, structure and punctuation of a poem are all chosen carefully to reflect the themes and messages the author is trying to get across to the reader. “I think what I love about poetry is that what isn’t there on the page matters just as much as what is there,” she said. The experience of writing poetry compared to prose allows the writer to utilize more creative freedoms and use more than just words to convey feeling, tone and messages.
However, more creative freedom can lead to varying challenges for authors, especially during the publishing process. Mengel explains that one of her toughest challenges in creating “Glittersmoke” was keeping a common theme. She explained the process of compiling her poems by keeping a balance through “placing things in certain themes and finding encompassing themes that also weren’t too copy-paste… like it wasn’t too redundant or boring or not complex enough.” “Glittersmoke” focuses mainly on the themes of feminism and resistance to heteronormativity. While there are other concepts and themes represented through her work, these encompassed most of the poems from her book, with a consistent focus on nature.
Another struggle she encountered was the lengthy publishing process of revisions for her chapbook to be published. She began her first drafts for the book in her junior year of undergrad, but it was recently published last October. The total process of creating and publishing the book took about four years for Mengel. Yet, with patience and diligent revising, she had an overall smooth publishing process with Alien Buddha (publishers of “Glittersmoke”).
Despite the success Mengel has accomplished, she had her fair share of rejections. While many of the arts and humanities degrees offer various career paths for students, rejection is often a consistent aspect they will have to deal with, especially in writing. “You will get a lot more rejections than acceptances … that doesn’t mean that you’re a bad writer or that you don’t have potential, it usually just means your work doesn’t fit with whatever they’re trying to publish, and that’s okay,” she said. She also stresses the importance for new writers to read pieces from authors that inspire them, “It’s more important to read rather than write… it can be whatever creative genre you work in. It could be just a novel or a short story or something that can inspire you to some degree, I think it’s invaluable.”
Mengel does not plan to stop at “Glittersmoke,” as she hopes to continue her education and get her Ph.D. in English with an emphasis on Creative Writing as well as publish a complete collection of poems. This West Chester University graduate student proves that unfinished drafts can still lead to extraordinary destinations. Through carefully articulated themes and messages, Mengel displays talent as a writer and a deep passion for the literary world of poetry.
Grace Powell is a second-year Media and Culture major with a minor in Law, Politics and Society, gp1019074@wcupa.edu