A week or two ago, I received the newest issue of Main Channel Voices, which includes my poem "Movie Night." It's my second appearance in the publication; "Pausing for the Mission Mountains" was my first. It has been exciting to see both of those in print.

I like the quality of work in MCV, and I like the fact that the editors there put some editorial rigor into each issue.

I submitted a batch of poems to an online journal Saturday night and found a swift rejection in my e-mail this afternoon. That's a turnaround of less than 24 hours for six poems.

I know editors have to make snap judgments about the submissions they receive, but the quick reply on this one is giving me trouble. Maybe it's because the usual hope and confidence a writer has when submitting work is still so fresh. Maybe because it's clear this way that the poems were rejected not because they were competing with superior submissions but because the editor simply did not like them.

I researched the journal's website, did my homework by reading the poems posted there to become familiar with the style and tone of the publication. That's routinely recommended by editors, and I have followed the advice through the years.

But this episode has me wondering. Is submitting the type of work that an editor sees frequently really a good idea? Or would it be better to maybe submit poems that might strike an editor as something fresh?

I came across the following press release Monday. I wish I was able to attend. I've blogged about soldier-poet Brian Turner before. You can read a review of his book "Here, Bullet" at Bookslut. There's an interview with Turner here. And you can see and hear him read at YouTube.

Brian Turner, author of "Here, Bullet," a first-person account of the Iraq war by a soldier-poet, will speak at Augustana College in Sioux Falls at 7:00 p.m. Wednesday, April 16, in Kresge Recital Hall.

Turner, served in Iraq with the 3rd Stryker Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Infantry Division. His award-winning collection of poetry, Here, Bullet, explores what it means to be a soldier and a human being during a time of war. Turner has been published widely in a number of prestigious literary journals and he received a 2007 NEA Literature Fellowship in Poetry.

Turner earned a master's degree from the University of Oregon and lived in South Korea for a year before serving seven years in the US Army. He was an infantry team leader for a year in Iraq beginning in November, 2003. Prior to that, he was deployed to Bosnia-Herzegovina in 1999-2000 with the 10th Mountain Division.

His works have been published in Poetry Daily, The Georgia Review and other journals, and in the Voices in Wartime Anthology published in conjunction with the feature-length documentary film of the same name.