I’m curious: what’s your
elevator pitch for your book?
From its readers: a scrap of linen, a
bone, “an oversized musical score,” with its “Southern cadences and at least a
decade of Texas“ in “rich, ever-focused poems,” with “such clarity and
emotional courage” they “hit the mark” in a “rich voice and discerning
sensibility,” a “lived past that invests worn objects with the sheen of
meaning”—a “luminescence.”
How did you come upon the
subject of your book?
Any poem I wrote always
intended to point to what’s in the landscape and the people and the birdsong
and every natural thing—the acorns, the orchid, the purple peas and
butterbeans, those “ameria maritime,
cleft-clinging, paper-thin pinks and stark whites”—a stubborn resilience to
shine, to plant in the world the mark of everything out there that made its
mark on me.
And the title? Sometimes,
it seems to me, titles can strike like lightning or can be extraordinarily
elusive. How did you go about finding your title?
The first iteration of
this manuscript was titled “in all this hurt air,” a line from the poem
“Mandatory Evacuation,” but as soon as I wrote “The Failure of Archaeology,” I
knew part of the world’s historical document was up to me, that
the scholars
will inch by inch
dig down
to a bracelet, a scrap
of linen, a bone and
write
the story without us—
and they would,
inevitably, of course, get it wrong. The day I put those words on paper, I scratched
through that other title and penciled in a
scrap of linen, a bone.
Tell us something about
the most difficult thing you encountered in this book’s journey.
The most difficult thing,
hands down, (and I bet you’ve heard this one before) was ordering the poems
which meant deciding what to leave in and what to leave out. There were those
darlings, of course, that I had to be convinced didn’t belong here, and I went down
hard on some of those decisions. I rearranged the manuscript a dozen or more
times, the pages strewn, as poets will do, all over the floor, the bed, the
kitchen table, and I sought the help of friends who had none of my prejudices.
Finally, when the book had an editor and I heard Tom Lombardo’s vision for the
book, I could see the book in a wider way. Tom Lombardo gets credit for shaping
what’s here.
And the most pleasurable?
Oh the most pleasurable
thing happened whenever an ending (or a title) that seemingly would not come
got dropped into my brain in the bathtub or during a movie or on a run, and I’d
scramble for some way to write it down. Hard to say how many perfect endings
and titles escaped because I didn’t write them down.
What’s the best and / or
worst piece of advice (writing or publishing or similar) you’ve gotten?
I remember the first two
pieces of advice I ever got. They came in the same sentence: “Read Triggering
Town” and “If you ever get a chance to take a workshop with Ellen Bryant Voigt,
do it.” I’ve done both and while those are both right up there contending for
the “best” advice I ever got, the prize for “best” goes to “Take out the last
three lines.”
I’d been a teacher for 31
years and, when I started writing, I knew how the poem would end before I’d
written the first line. I was still a teacher, now writing poems, so I
announced what I was going to say, said it, then summed up what I’d just said
in case you missed it. The result wasn’t a closed poem, but a poem with the lid
firmly nailed down, and every time I workshopped a poem, I heard, “Take out the
last three lines.”
One day after a workshop,
the light beginning to fall, I went through all my poems on the computer and
ripped off the last three lines. The poems just hung there, trailing off. . . .
Some of them stayed that way a long
time, but eventually, the teacher in me gave way to the poetry and the poems
started suggesting other endings. Getting the right ending feels to me like
winning the lottery.
I honestly can’t remember
ever getting “bad” advice.
Tell us one of your
favorite books you’ve discovered recently and say a little about why.
I love Rebecca Foust’s Paradise Drive. I was at The Frost Place
in Franconia, NH while she was Dartmouth Poet in Residence there, just after Paradise Drive had won the first annual
Press 53 Prize for Poetry. I loved her earlier book, All That Gorgeous Pitiless Song, poems that knocked on the door of
everything human in me, but Paradise
Drive is a life journey (the traveler is Pilgrim) written in sonnets. I was
halfway through the book before I realized I was reading sonnets, and I’m sure
the form, even its contemporary iteration, did something to shape the narrative—intelligent,
tragic and humorous social commentary that’s as much fun to read as a
sparklingly satirical novel.
A book--open on my desk
right now--that I read and keep re-reading is Kurt Brown’s posthumously
published I’ve Come This Far to Say
Hello: Poems Selected and New, poems with Kurt’s innocent, jaw-open
surprise of discovery. How can my own jaw not drop at the surprise? And the
craft! I’ve Come This Far to Say Hello
is my go-to-book anytime I want or need a workshop. Stop anywhere in one of
Kurt’s poems and ask: Why this verb? Why here? Why this line break? Why this space,
this shape on the page? Everything I need to know is answered in the poem. As
generous as Kurt was in life, his poems keep on giving.
Can you share an excerpt
from your book? Give us a taste.
Sure. Here’s a quiet lyric
poem titled “Evening”
At this angle of
hours,
the orchestra all
oboes—
blown goodbyes
through the sea
oats—
the windfall pears
have mostly gone
to ooze
seeped into the
earth,
all these trees
unclothed to cold,
the last of the
shining
downstream by now.
Slow hungers
breathe
beneath leveled
dreams,
the muscular
sky
painted over now,
paler blue.
What’s a question you
wish I asked? (And how would you answer it?)
What would I tell someone
starting to write at a later age like I did?
Read, read, read
contemporary poetry. Go to readings and buy the books. Every book I have has
something to teach me. so never read a poem just once. Read like a writer. Ask:
How is this different than the same idea or story written in prose? If I like the poem, what did the poet do in
the selection of language and its placement on the page, in the tone, in the
tempo, in the music, in the images to manipulate my feelings? I am intellectually
moved by what the poem says, but the art of the poem is in how it was said. What craft is at work here that viscerally made
the poem move under my skin? Keep reading until you figure out what that is.
Read The Cortland Review. It’s free at www.cortlandreview.com. We’ve published amazing
poems in audio and text for 20 years and, for the last 5 years, our Poets-in-Person
features in HD video. Use our pages to see what poets are writing today. If
you’re interested in publishing, find a poem you like. If you feel something as
a result of a poem on a page, check the bio to see where that poet has
published. If you respond positively to a piece, chances are those publications
might be interested in your work, too. Never take a rejection personally. A
rejection is an invitation to question the poem, rethink, revise it and send it
out again. Never give up on your poems. They are your children. Some behave
better than others and most require a good bit of attention before they come to
their full potential.
OK, we’re smitten. Where
do we go to buy your book?
It’s also available
from amazon.com. If you buy the book from amazon, you are eligible
to write a review. I hope you do.
No comments:
Post a Comment