Juliet Cook's Blog

"An elementary school gym teacher
told all the girls to lie down
on the floor and lift up our legs.
He said he was inspecting our shoes
to make sure they were appropriate
for his class. One girl would be chosen
by him to stand on the stage and cheer."

in my poem "Another Broken Mirror", newly appearing In Conversation at The Literary Underground!

(This is another poem of mine that also appears in a new chapbook manuscript in progress too...)...

read more HERE - https://theliteraryunderground.org/blog/2026/08/26/another-broken-mirror-by-juliet-cook/

Approaching the end of summer and launching into the fall, a new issue of Thirteen Myna Birds has finally arrived!

This issue is brimming with birds. Rising, falling, burning, flying, screaming, offering warnings...

Twenty new feathers and beaks are all HERE (from Debrah Shenefelt - MISH - Merritt Waldon - Ken Poyner - László Aranyi - James Croal Jackson - Ann Randlette - Paul David Adkins - Daniel G. Snethen - A.J. Huffman) - https://13myna.blogspot.com/

Flaming fingers scratch the sky - The chickadees have stopped singing - the crows are hopping from branch to branch dropping closer waiting - to find a half-cherry in my cup of fruit cocktail - Ascending angel clings to shadows - unaware she is already melted and falling - Hollow sky - I could not count all the trees - It is more than a number of trees - a thousand bucks to screw her head onto a bolt - with needle-and-thread grass, hog-nosed snakes and sandburs - Birds pecked out the eyes - The mission of the Earth is fulfilled: the one who lands ashore is taken aim at - The altar, a split shell by a dying brushfire - The cats are out of the bag, and their fangs are mammoth - painted images in the reddened sky - staring at my near colorless fruit - How a window could frost and seal itself behind - what if some students can’t afford the book? - Songbirds screech to clouds in mourning - the doctor freezing pieces of me off - The whole place reeked of bleach - I vomit hearts drained of purpose...
Call off the dogs! by MISH

"Or I wasn’t yetable to express myselfthe way I truly wanted tounless I walked around in circlesin the basement, telling storiesinside my own head."the beginning of my poem "I Didn't Know Who I Was Yet", which appeared In Conversation at The Literary Underground on Sundayyou can read more here - https://theliteraryunderground.org/blog/2026/08/16/i-didnt-know-who-i-was-yet-by-juliet-cook/

"Can't open up
these eyes anymore
without unfurling 
bloody worm shapes,
semi-liquid spillage,
turning old pillows
into gore-hacked
remnants of consumed pupils"

in my poem "NIGHTMARE MACULAR DEGENERATION", newly appearing in Issue 137, August 2026 of Rogue Agent!

Read more here - http://www.rogueagentjournal.com/jcook-2

Check out the whole issue here - http://www.rogueagentjournal.com/issue137

Happy last day of July 2026. I have a short new poem up today at Drinkers Only.

Thank you very much to editor John Patrick Robbins.

Drinkers Only : Short and Not So Sweet By Juliet Cook - https://drinkersonly.blogspot.com/2026/07/short-and-not-so-sweet-by-juliet-cook.html

I am in the process of being overwhelmed by my own poems. Well not exactly the poems themselves, but organizing them/assembling them into collections (specifically chapbook manuscripts). I guess I've been writing more than I thought I was in the last few years and I guess I've somewhat drifted out of a sort of routine I had of tending to assemble new poems into chapbook manuscripts fairly quickly on an ongoing basis.

I haven't had a new chapbook published in over a year AND I haven't submitted a chapbook manuscript anywhere yet this year. For a while now, I've been working on and off on a small series of interconnected poems that I was thinking I might assemble into a chapbook manuscript and I finally made some significant progress on that this week. I also have a micro-chapbook manuscript that I assembled and submitted to one press over a year ago (from which it was rejected) and that I had been meaning to re-read/revise/add more poems to and so on. So I guess I have two different chapbook manuscripts in progress to an extent, but I've been focusing more on writing individual poems than organizing/assembling manuscripts.So this past week, in addition to trying to focus on somewhat organizing those two possible chapbook manuscripts in progress, I've also been trying to re-read and somewhat organize all these other new-ish poems of mine, in order to decide which ones to possibly incorporate into which manuscript in progress and now I'm starting to think I'm going to have to create AT LEAST 3 (quite possibly more) different chapbook manuscripts. Regarding the two chapbook manuscripts in progress, half the stuff I'm reading doesn't really seem to fit into either one. One of those manuscripts is focused on women's bodies and I want it to stay short, interconnected, and pretty specifically thematic. The other one is focused on feeling invisible, unnamable, unimportant and out of place, and that one doesn't have to be quite AS thematically linked, it has SOME flexibility, but overall, I do like my chapbook manuscripts to be short, interconnected, and thematically linked to a significant extent. Not just a bunch of different poems semi-randomly placed in a chapbook length manuscript.So some of my poems I'm reading might be able to fit into one of the current manuscripts-in-progress, but then I also have all these doll poems - dream/nightmare poems - seizure poems - death poems - and anti-AI poems. Some of these themes somewhat interconnect in certain ways and to certain extents, but not to the extent of fusing them all into two chapbooks. Again, I like my chapbook manuscripts to be short-ish, interconnected, and thematically linked in one way or another, so I'm thinking I need to assemble at least 3 (maybe more). Anyway, I am just taking a break from reading/writing notes on my own poems to ramble a bit about my current overwhelmed feelings about assembling the poems into various interconnected entities. Mind you, I've been working on this quite a bit this past week, and some progress has been made, but it feels like it's taking forever. I feel like I should have made more progress by now. But at least I made a little bit of progress and I'll keep working on it.To reiterate, the shorter version of this is dolls, bodies, brains, dreams, nightmares, seizures, death, invisibility, and being overwhelmed, which is way better than being replaced by robots.

I am in the process of being overwhelmed by my own poems. Well not exactly the poems themselves, but organizing them/assembling them into collections (specifically chapbook manuscripts). I guess I've been writing more than I thought I was in the last few years and I guess I've somewhat drifted out of a sort of routine I had of tending to assemble new poems into chapbook manuscripts fairly quickly on an ongoing basis.

I haven't had a new chapbook published in over a year AND I haven't submitted a chapbook manuscript anywhere yet this year. For a while now, I've been working on and off on a small series of interconnected poems that I was thinking I might assemble into a chapbook manuscript and I finally made some significant progress on that this week. I also have a micro-chapbook manuscript that I assembled and submitted to one press over a year ago (from which it was rejected) and that I had been meaning to re-read/revise/add more poems to and so on. So I guess I have two different chapbook manuscripts in progress to an extent, but I've been focusing more on writing individual poems than organizing/assembling manuscripts.So this past week, in addition to trying to focus on somewhat organizing those two possible chapbook manuscripts in progress, I've also been trying to re-read and somewhat organize all these other new-ish poems of mine, in order to decide which ones to possibly incorporate into which manuscript in progress and now I'm starting to think I'm going to have to create AT LEAST 3 (quite possibly more) different chapbook manuscripts. Regarding the two chapbook manuscripts in progress, half the stuff I'm reading doesn't really seem to fit into either one. One of those manuscripts is focused on women's bodies and I want it to stay short, interconnected, and pretty specifically thematic. The other one is focused on feeling invisible, unnamable, unimportant and out of place, and that one doesn't have to be quite AS thematically linked, it has SOME flexibility, but overall, I do like my chapbook manuscripts to be short, interconnected, and thematically linked to a significant extent. Not just a bunch of different poems semi-randomly placed in a chapbook length manuscript.So some of my poems I'm reading might be able to fit into one of the current manuscripts-in-progress, but then I also have all these doll poems - dream/nightmare poems - seizure poems - death poems - and anti-AI poems. Some of these themes sometimes interconnect in certain ways and to certain extents, but not to the extent of fusing them all into two chapbooks. Again, I like my chapbook manuscripts to be short-ish, interconnected, and thematically linked in one way or another, so I'm thinking I need to assemble at least 3 (maybe more). Anyway, I am just taking a break from reading/writing notes on my own poems to ramble a bit about my current overwhelmed feelings about assembling the poems into various interconnected entities. Mind you, I've been working on this quite a bit this past week, and some progress has been made, but it feels like it's taking forever. I feel like I should have made more progress by now. But at least I made a little bit of progress and I'll keep working on it.To reiterate, the shorter version of this is dolls, bodies, brains, dreams, nightmares, seizures, death, invisibility, and being overwhelmed, which is way better than being replaced by robots.

Check out this new review I wrote about Pella Felton's new uniquely wonderful poetry collection, {f}ragile Nests (published by Roadside Press) and then consider buying a copy of the book if you don't have one yet.

Thank you to The Literary Underground for publishing my review.

Here is a link to the whole review, followed by a few snippets from the review - https://theliteraryunderground.org/blog/2026/07/23/juliet-cook-reviews-fragile-nests-by-pella-felton/

***

"The beginning of the book involves an interesting and multifaceted Prologue, which expresses, among many other contradictory complexities, “I co[m]e fro[m] a box that should not exist”. But Pella’s box definitely does exist (within many different facets and interconnections), definitely deserves to exist, and definitely deserves to be viewed, heard, read, and explored."

one snippet from the review; read more by clicking the link above

***

"...poems within this collection include more elements of amusement, and sarcasm, and anger, sadness, loneliness… —trying one’s best to become one’s true and genuine self (even if people who were a significant part of your past cannot entirely understand or accept who you truly are and despite other people’s disapproval and discomfort). What if the real true you is invisible to others? What if the real true you is ignored by others? What if the real true you is disliked or disregarded by others?

How does one deal with feeling invisible to parts of one’s own past (including some friends, family members, significant others, your past spouse), because they don’t understand the real you whom you are transitioning into, and they would rather disassociate from a reality they don’t personally relate to? This collection addresses and explores some of these kinds of thoughts, feelings, questions and pain."

another snippet from the review; read more by clicking the link above

"My brain is a terrible rainbow obsidian with cracked edges
covered up by dark glass.
A strange combination
of natural and unnatural
elements fused together."

in my poem "Rainbow Obsidian"

I am delighted to have another poem newly appearing in The Rye Whiskey Review!

Please feel free to read more here - https://ryethewhiskeyreview.blogspot.com/2026/07/rainbow-obsidian-by-juliet-cook.html

"Now I often process inside my own head,
which turns me into a warped internal garden
growing dreams filled with hissing insects,
bittersweet birds, melting branches, conflicted
roots ripped out of the ground and thrown
in different boxes, bedroom drawers, body bags."

some lines from my poem "Damage Control/Internal Doll House"

I am delighted to have another of my "Damage Control/Internal Doll House" poems appearing in the new Volume 17 of Trailer Park Quarterly! I'm also excited to read all the other poetry in this issue and check out the art!

Here is a link to my individual poem - https://trailerparkquarterly.com/volume-17/juliet-cook/

Here is a link to the whole issue - https://trailerparkquarterly.com/volume-17/