Check this out! Freemont W Member received the following letter at my house today:

Dear Freemont,

After carefully reading and discussing your poem, our Selection Committee has certified your poem as a semi-finalist in our International Open poetry Contest. You poem will automatically be entered into the final competition held in August 2003. As a semi-finalist, you now have an excellent chance of winning one of 104 cash or gift prizes – including the $1,000.00 Grand Prize. You may even win the $10,000.00 Annual Grand Prize! We wish you the best of luck as you compete for these prizes in the coming weeks (a complete list of prizes is enclosed).

And that’s not all…

Freemont … Imagine Your Poem Featured

on a Page by Itself in a Beautiful Coffee-table Edition!

In celebration of the unique talent that you have displayed, we also wish to publish your poem on its own page in what promises to be one of the most highly regarded collections of poetry we have ever published …

Eternal Portraits

Library of Congress ISBN-0-7951-5227-2

Eternal Portraits is scheduled for publication in Fall 2003, will be a classic, coffee-table quality hardbound volume – printed in two colors on fine-milled paper specifically selected to last for generations. It will make a handsome addition to any library, a treasured family keepsake, or a highly valued personal gift.

….

Whoo-hooo! I'm going to be published and I may even win money for my poem! Wait a minute, did any of you guys and gals get a similar letter? Are these people pulling my mother's toe-less legs?

Oh, they're telling the truth. Of course, if you want a copy, it'll cost you much dinero. Likewise, if you want copies for your family, friends, dog, cat, etc., you'll be out yet more shekels. Of course, I would never stoop so low as to suggest that these goniffs are preying on the gullibility and emotional vulnerability of would-be poets to bilk them out their hard earned dollars for what amounts to a vanity press book. But Dave sure did - that's why he freeped them.

BTW, this the poem that Dave got into one of their previous "collections":

Thinking of You
At this special time
And hoping your organ
Removal went fine.

In brief, the distinction in the letter you got is as real as the $95,000 junk mail check that this guy received, but without nearly the humor potential.

Please don't think I'm attacking you; people like these jerks infuriate me because they make their money exploiting other people's dreams. It may be legal, but it's surely not moral.