Since January 2021, I’ve been keeping a list of my writing activity for each month (here’s last month’s). I do so partly as a form of encouragement for myself to show that I am still able to do some writing despite the energy-sucking terrors of the pandemic (Which is still going on! Keep wearing masks!), and partly as an archive that I can look back on in the future. As such, I will include negative happenings (e.g., receiving rejections), not just positive ones.
I think that it is important for me to share my list publicly as a queer disabled Latinx writer because mainstream discourse tries to either pretend voices such as mine do not exist or actively tries to suppress them. Whether one is part of a marginalized group or not, writing is an essential act of resistance in these terrible times, so I hope that my list offers encouragement to others.
The list is basically in chronological order. Despite being the shortest month, it was a productive one!
1. Wrote a haiku or senryu on most mornings.
2. Updated the Mennonite/s Writing Bibliographies.
3. Received and responded to copy edits from my publisher for my forthcoming book Ethics for Apocalyptic Times: Theapoetics, Autotheory, and Mennonite Literature, which is scheduled to come out in November.
4. Worked on my MFA thesis with my advisor and had a chapter workshopped by my classmates.
5. Submitted ten poems to Kingfisher and had one accepted for the April issue.
6. Had a haiku published in the Winter-Spring 2023 issue of Modern Haiku: “leaves turning another medical bill.”
7. Had a paper proposal I sent to a conference rejected.
8. Submitted a short story to a journal.
9. Looked over proofs for a forthcoming personal essay.
10. Submitted an abstract for a hybrid essay to a proposed essay collection on autotheory.
Daniel Shank Cruz 
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