In one of my first real jobs after college, I worked as a copywriter for a small marketing firm. I’d never had anything published by that point so, at the time, seeing a line I’d written on a billboard gave me a little thrill.
One of the clients was a global company that was taking quite a beating in the press for some seedy tactics in the ag world. I always felt conflicted about writing their ads or press releases. But I was the only copywriter in the shop, so I knew I could either write it, or they’d replace me with someone who would.
The colleague who managed the client confessed he had mixed feelings too. But he assured me they’d done right in this instance, which was a big mining reclamation project - he’d even gone and toured it. I had no reason to disbelieve him. He had a decade of experience and I was in my early twenties. I think about this sometimes, though I still don’t know what I’d do differently.
Our theme this month is reclamation. The idea or hope that we can regain something once lost. “The only thing that can save the world is the reclaiming of the awareness of the world,” Allen Ginsburg said, adding “That's what poetry does.”
It’s the first week of November and we’re hearing writing along the theme of November this month. Today, Mitch Wieland reads “Even If,” a poem by Lee Upton. A writer and a poet, Upton’s most recent novels, both released in 2026, are The Withers and Tabitha, Stay Up, the sequel to Tabitha, Get Up, a semi-finalist for the Thurber Prize for American Humor.
Something I Heard is supported by Idaho Commission on the Arts and the National Endowment for the Arts.
