Rob Mclennan's Blog, page 403

nathan dueck, he’ll

            I WAS RAISED INDOORS BY PARENTS ATTEMPTING TO SPARE ME from developing allergies or asthma. Mother indulged my bookish inclinations, borrowing a shelf’s worth of hymnals in noble German alongside sheaves of humble English novels. Father assigned me a related duty: I was to translate sheets of Hüag’dietsch and Enjelsch lines into Plaut’dietsch, our mother tongue, a plain-spoken parlance with the cadence, intonation, and tempo of the Canadian prairies. Such a learned chore was common in Mennonite – ooda Mennoniet– households like mine, for we were formally illiterate, in spite of our fluency with a particular Germanic vernacular, yet in the first half of the twentieth century a daughter normally assumed that responsibility. (“A NOTE ON THE TEXT”)
And so begins Calgary poet nathan dueck’s second trade poetry collection, he’ll (St. John’s NL: Pedlar Press, 2014), a wonderfully playful book of anxieties surrounding translation, culture, punctuation (such as this poem, included recently as part of the dusie “Tuesday poem” series) and language. Constructed in the collage structure of the Canadian long poem, he’llexplores the anxieties, histories and contradictions of his Mennonite self. As he writes: “By the time you read my admission it will / be posthumous. So long I have suffered sin- [.]” In many ways, dueck’s he’ll seems influenced in form by Dennis Cooley’s Bloody Jack (Turnstone Press, 1984), among others, for his playful use of language (including the pun), wild collage of lyric and characters, and array of disparate sections. In many ways, dueck is applying many of Cooley’s poetic and storytelling structures and exploratory techniques to his Mennonite past, much in the way (via far different forms) Myrna Kostash and Andrew Suknaski did in the 1970s and 80s for first generation Ukrainian Canadians. At some points in the book, dueck utilizes the visual/concrete, sometimes the staggered lyric fragment, and other times, the book reads as straight documentary. “I cannot create / a tradition.” he writes, in the poem “EULOGIUM”: “I can only invent a new testament.” There is a lot happening in he’ll , and dueck’s is a rich, wide and varied canvas. As part of the poem “PROEM” reads:
He will quietly homily, you know. Eli will.                                                                   Peckkeys of a manual typewriter                                            over an ad from page656 of the 1979 Sears catalogue. Or a recipe onpage 13 of the Mennonite Treasury. Full stop –
Mechanical harmonics scale:                                                Tabs set →                                                                    Unclr.No space bar.                        Locked shift.
Appearing a full decade after the publication of his king’s(mère) (Winnipeg MB: Turnstone Press, 2004), which explored aspects of Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King’s life, beliefs and death, dueck appears to favour the book-length exploration subjects through the essay-collage of experimental and avant-garde lyric, and manages to create something entirely thrilling and unique, pushing in directions rarely taken in poetry. How many other poetry collections might include a clearing or two of the throat?
He will post quires. Testaments or testimonies.
Ice age glaciers carved Pembina Escarpment from prairies to shield, from tree to medicine line.
Lost my place staring at headstone posture of a church minus its steeple. Rows made from felled birchbark with plastic kneelers of summerfallow fertilized by formaldehyde. When Rat River runs off, pews embalm churchgoers in Sunday clothes.
Tangled keystrokes. Loosened carriages. Dirtied segments.

Touch the Donkey supplement: new interviews with Pirie, Clark, Carr, Holbrook, Dyckman + Wagner

Anticipating the release next week of the third issue of Touch the Donkey (a small poetry journal), why not check out the interviews that have appeared over the past few weeks with contributors to the second issue: Pearl Pirie , David Peter Clark , Julie Carr , Susan Holbrook, Susanne Dyckman and Catherine Wagner .

Interviews with contributors to the first issue, as well, remain online: Gil McElroy, Camille Martin, Pattie McCarthy and Eric Baus.

The third issue features new writing by Gil McElroy, j/j hastain, derek beaulieu, Megan Kaminski, Roland Prevost, Emily Ursuliak, Susan Briante and D.G. Jones. And, once the new issue appears, watch the blog over the subsequent weeks and months for interviews with a variety of the issue's contributors!

And of course, copies of both the first and the second issue are still available. Why not subscribe?

We even have our own Facebook group. Isn't that grand?

Donkey photo kindly provided by Deborah Poe.

a profile of Stuart Ross' Proper Tales Press, with a few questions

My profile of Stuart Ross' infamous Proper Tales Press (with a few questions) is now online at Open Book: Ontario.

12 or 20 (second series) questions with David B. Goldstein

David B. Goldstein is the author of a poetry collection, Laws of Rest (BookThug, 2013), and a book of criticism, Eating and Ethics in Shakespeare's England (Cambridge, 2013), which won the 2014 Shakespeare’s Globe First Book Award. His next chapbook, Object Permanence , is forthcoming from Ugly Duckling Presse. He has published essays on a wide range of subjects, including Shakespeare, contemporary poetry, translation, and cookbooks. Goldstein lives with his family in Toronto, where he is
1 - How did your first book change your life? How does your most recent work compare to your previous? How does it feel different?
Laws of Rest is my first book, and it is definitely changing my life. Having a book feels very different from not having a book. There are many ways to be a “writer,” including publication in journals, blogs, magazines. But the word “author” conjures the image of a book—a gathering of papers between covers that have been glued rather than stapled. Foucault made much of the “author function” as an ideological operation, but now I’m thinking that the function has a lot to do with the fact of the book itself, as opposed to more ephemeral instances of writing. It feels strange to have suddenly graduated from “writer” to “author”—I don’t know if I’ll ever get used to it.

2 - How did you come to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?
My parents tell me that I composed an impromptu haiku at the dinner table at age 4, but the first writing I remember doing was about 60 pages or so of a fantasy novel inspired by my Dungeons and Dragons characters, in which I was encouraged by my seventh-grade English teacher. I don’t think I’ve managed to achieve that quality or quantity of fiction since. When I was 15, I signed up for a poetry class in a summer arts program because I figured poetry would have the best female-to-male ratio. I chose wisely, both because I was indeed the only boy in the class, and because I ended up falling in love with poetry.

3 - How long does it take to start any particular writing project? Does your writing initially come quickly, or is it a slow process? Do first drafts appear looking close to their final shape, or does your work come out of copious notes?
The first draft of a poem usually comes very rapidly, in a few minutes or an hour at most. It’s often built from overheard conversation or other kinds of found language; I start transcribing what I’ve heard and the poem’s internal rhythms take over. Very rarely, I stick with the first draft after some minor tinkering. More commonly, the revision process can take months or years. I remember once hearing that Elizabeth Bishop would pin unfinished poems on her walls and would wait, sometimes years, for the right words to arrive to finish them. My process feels a bit like that.

4 - Where does a poem usually begin for you? Are you an author of short pieces that end up combining into a larger project, or are you working on a "book" from the very beginning?
I rarely realize that I have a poetic “project” except retrospectively, when I’ve sat down with a bunch of poems and noticed that many of them circle back to the same ideas, or address the same set of procedures. Laws of Rest was something of an exception, in that I realized after a few of those poems that I had discovered an iterable procedure and wanted to explore its possibilities. (My chapbook, Been Raw Diction [Dusie 2006], was also conceived as a project from start to finish.) Still, it took a while to realize the form’s parameters. For example, in the final revision of the book, I decided to make the poems more precisely square. This meant tightening the margins by a fraction of an inch, which necessitated deleting at least one word from each line. Suddenly I had to justify the inclusion of every word in the book. It was a wonderful exercise.

5 - Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?
I love giving readings and I love listening to good readers. My poetry is more auditory than visual—I am always thinking about the proximity of poetry to song. I read my work aloud when composing and revising, and the rhythm of a line is paramount. I empathize with Robert Duncan’s habit of conducting while he gave readings. I constantly find new meanings and connections in my poems through the experience of performing them.

6 - Do you have any theoretical concerns behind your writing? What kinds of questions are you trying to answer with your work? What do you even think the current questions are?
What does it mean to create “original” words in the context of a tradition? How does one make a form? What’s the relation between speaking and silence? How does one honour the dead in words? Small stuff like that.

7 – What do you see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Does s/he even have one? What do you think the role of the writer should be?
I think most writers are trying to get people to experience reality in a different way, to become attuned to new or overlooked aspects of one’s life and culture. I attempt to do this through language—I want my readers to experience language as lively, changing, strange.

8 - Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?
Essential. And wonderful. I don’t understand the fetish for thinking something has to be published precisely the way it was written. I think of writing as a collaborative project, and part of the fun is finding great editors with whom to shape my ideas and prose.

9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?
About any interesting new idea, my grandfather (a World War II veteran) used to say, “Let’s run it up the flagpole and see who salutes.” I take that as a credo for experimental poetry.

10 - How easy has it been for you to move between genres (poetry to journalism to critical prose)? What do you see as the appeal?
I find that different kinds of writing use entirely separate parts of my brain, and I’m rarely able to write more than one at once. Usually my brain will find a way to announce, “You should be writing poetry now,” and I will suddenly start to listen and read differently. But the same is true of criticism or creative nonfiction. A certain kind of listening overwhelms me and I am forced to follow it.

11 - What kind of writing routine do you tend to keep, or do you even have one? How does a typical day (for you) begin?
On a typical day, I get up with my kids, my wife and I get them ready, and I take my daughter to school. I’m glad I’m forced to get out of the house so early—otherwise I’d just mope about in my pjs. Then I come back and try to get started. That process can take a minute, or the whole day, depending on how deep in the flow of my work I happen to be. More often than not I need a lot of convincing before I am writing at a level I enjoy.

12 - When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?
By far my three most effective techniques are: picking up the phone and talking to a friend about whatever has got me stuck, reading work by other people, and going for a walk in the woods, in that order. Given that I live in downtown Toronto, I tend to rely more on the first two.

13 - What fragrance reminds you of home?
Garlic and onions frying in olive oil.

14 - David W. McFadden once said that books come from books, but are there any other forms that influence your work, whether nature, music, science or visual art?
Yes to all those. Poetry comes from everywhere. The chief goal of my poetry is to figure out how to get as much of experience as possible into the poetic line.

15 - What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?
It’s a very long list. Among the most important for Laws of Rest were Rilke, A.J. Heschel, Edmond Jabes, Francis Ponge, Augustine, Anne Carson, Louise Glück, and Fanny Howe.

16 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?
Go camping with my family in Algonquin Park. That should be doable, yes?

17 - If you could pick any other occupation to attempt, what would it be? Or, alternately, what do you think you would have ended up doing had you not been a writer?
I sometimes wish I were a naturalist, hunting for tiny frogs in Costa Rica.

18 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something else?
It’s often said that if you can do anything else, you will not become a writer, because it’s so difficult to make a living at it. I feel blessed to be sheltered by the university system, which is one of the few institutions in North America that makes it possible to be a writer. I don’t write because I don’t have a choice, I write because it is the most thrilling and gratifying thing I can imagine doing, though also among the hardest.

19 - What was the last great book you read? What was the last great film?
Can I choose two books? Rebecca Skloot, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks; Ronald Johnson, ARK. Movies: from 1:30 am-4 am of Christian Marclay’s The Clock.

20 - What are you currently working on?
My next poetry collection, Lost Originals, investigates the juncture between translation and metaphor.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

rob mclennan reads at Brickbat Books, Philadelphia, with Stephen Brockwell + Pattie McCarthy, October 4, 2014

The Hugely Popular Poetry Reading Series presents rob mclennan, Stephen Brockwell, and Pattie McCarthy at Brickbat Books, 709 S 4th St, Philadelphia, PA, on Saturday October 4, 7:00 PM, lovingly hosted by Jack Krick.


The author of nearly thirty trade books of poetry, fiction and non-fiction, Ottawa writer rob mclennan's most recent titles include notes and dispatches: essays (Insomniac press, 2014) and The Uncertainty Principle: stories, (Chaudiere Books, 2014), as well as the poetry collection If suppose we are a fragment (BuschekBooks, 2014). An editor and publisher, he runs above/ground press, Chaudiere Books, seventeen seconds: a journal of poetry and poetics, Touch the Donkey and the Ottawa poetry pdf annual ottawater. He spent the 2007-8 academic year in Edmonton as writer-in-residence at the University of Alberta, and regularly posts reviews, essays, interviews and other notices at robmclennan.blogspot.com

Stephen Brockwell is a Canadian poet and small business owner living in the national capital and dreaming of other places. His book Fruitfly Geographic won the Archibald Lampman award in 2005. His fifth collection of poems, Complete Surprising Fragments of Improbable Books was published in 2013. His poem "Sandbagging the River Before The Flood" is currently long-listed for the ongoing CBC Canada Writes prize.

Pattie McCarthy is the author of six books of poetry : Quiet Book (forthcoming 2015 from Apogee Press), nulls (2014, horse less press), Marybones, Table Alphabetical of Hard Words, Verso, & bk of (h)rs. Recent chapbooks include x y z && (Ahsahta Press), scenes from the lives of my parents (Bloof Books), & fifteen genre scenes (eth press). She teaches at Temple University.

a week (plus) in the east; (part three,

For those sick of these missives, worry not: this is the final installment. Our trip was rather big, I know, and we are still recovering (see parts one and two). We drove and we drove and we drove, hours and days in a car with our wee babe.

Friday, September 19, 2014: Before leaving Beth Crosby's house and the Wolfville, Nova Scotia area, I packaged up about a dozen envelopes with review copies of our three new Chaudiere Books poetry titles (Kiki, Amanda Earl; Singular Plurals, Roland Prevost; Garden, Monty Reid). We'd been carrying a box of such for the sake of eastern distribution (copies were left with more than a couple of people en route), but we didn't want to have to cross the American border with such. Given the books arrived the day prior to our departure, we couldn't not drive around with copies to show off (and/or sell and/or give away).

 

We were heading back for another night with Anne in Saint John, before heading towards the American border (a far shorter drive than how we arrived). Before leaving the Wolfville area, we swung over to Hortonville for the sake of the Acadian Cross and New England Planter's monument. Horton's Landing, which became Hortonville, eventually evolved slightly to one side as Wolfville, and the landing at Hortonville is not only where the New England settlers landed in 1760, but the point from which the majority of Acadians were deported in 1755. Given that a number of the important families in the region (including a couple Christine is descended from, such as the Steeves) are descended from these New England settlers, it does remain a slightly unsettling series of memorials and episode of history. Important to keep in memory, and attempt to properly understand, as best as possible. Still, strange that one has to drive, basically, down a farmer's back lane to get to said monuments (we waved; he waved back from his tractor). And of course, the view (including of Cape Blomidon--which I'm learning to spell without having to look up) was spectacular.

From here, we made the Digby Ferry, to traverse from the north-western shore of Nova Scotia back towards Saint John, New Brunswick without having to drive the long way around. The ferry took about three hours, and allowed Rose to eat lunch, run around in the play area (while Christine knitted and I slept) and even nap for an hour before we had to return to the car.

But before the ferry: we managed two stops at a series of stores called Frenchys. Apparently they're famous here. I picked up a new jacket. Apparently we had no choice.

And on the ferry, when we did return to the car: we saw replicas (with Nova Scotia plates) of the General Lee and Hazzard County Sheriff's car from The Dukes of Hazzard , which was completely amazing. And yes, the driver of the General Lee did honk his horn as he drove off the ferry (people actually cheered, including myself).

Is it wrong to suggest that this might have been the highlight of the trip?

Saturday, September 20, 2014: Rose turned ten months old, and we awoke in Saint John, New Brunswick, before a six-ish hour drive west into the wilds of Maine (wishing we'd had the time to stop in at Orono, to visit with Ken Norris, but such wasn't in the schedule), for the sake of two nights in a house from 1790 with Christine's bookbinding pal, Stephanie Gibbs, who was good enough to drive the few hours north to meet up. And when I say "the wilds of Maine," specifically Dresden.

Exhausted from the drive, we lived with little-to-no internet (which had already been driving me mad for a couple of days), and Stephanie prepared the most magnificent meal for us, as we enjoyed a series of wines we'd picked up on our travels, as well as some she'd brought.

The drive was long. We were wearing a bit thin. After a week on the road, it was good to remain somewhere for two nights.

As well: Rose had been leaning towards walking for some time, and managed a series of half-steps while here, which Stephanie was enormously amused by (her first steps are American!). But nothing official, as of yet (it has happened since, though).

Sunday, September 21, 2014: Today was all about trains! We drove the hour or so into Portland, Maine, and visited the Maine Narrow Gauge Railroad Co. & Museum, where we saw some wee lad was celebrating his birthday (which was a slightly uncomfortable thing to walk through). There were ancient train cars, a history of the trains, and other things about trains. Stephanie explained that the rail system in Maine, when it was built, couldn't hook up with the other train lines throughout the United States due to the fact that the tracks (and, therefore trains) were far too narrow, so most if not all of the system was pretty much abandoned. Part of the museum included one of the trains still operating on a section of the track, which rolls a few miles down the track (with a beautiful view of the waterfront) before pausing (to allow photos, and a short walkabout) to return back to the station, clickety-clack, clickety-clack.

Clickety-clack.
"We can see all the way to France!" Stephanie said (which Christine didn't believe). We could, at least, see a fort in the distance...

Rose charmed everyone in our little car (of course), and waved to passing pedestrians (of course), most of whom even waved back.


Returning through Portland proper, we found a used bookstore, but Rose didn't really allow for much exploring (we did managed to pick up an item or two, at least).

And did you know Longfellow lived in Maine? I didn't. We went by the house and museum, but hadn't the time to wait the hour-plus for the next tour (you can only go in via the tour). We took pictures of each other out front, purchased some postcards in the gift shop next door, and wandered off, exhausted from the day. There was even a statue of him a few blocks away.

Oh, those winding Maine roads. The drive was short, but took absolutely forever.

Once back at the house, Stephanie left for her own drive back home.

Monday, September 22, 2014: It was sad, slightly, leaving our ancient house, but good to get back on the road. I think we were all eager to be back in our own space.

We drove and we drove. Rose woke from her morning nap, and cranked until we pulled over for lunch, managing to discover Portsmouth, New Hampshire and their magnificent Portsmouth Book and Bar, which everyone needs to go visit. How incredible was this store! I found a copy of a book of mine on their used book shelf (as well as other titles by Canadian poets Douglas Barbour and A.F. Moritz), and we not only spent a handful of our American dollars on their incredible selection of used books (and had coffee, as we fed Rose some lunch), but left a few copies of the new issue of Touch the Donkey as well (I produced a handful of copies of the third issue a bit early, especially for this grand trip of ours). I finally picked up a copy of C.S. Giscombe's legendary Giscome Road (for example), as well as a variety of other titles.

And the bookstore had free WiFi (glory be!). All was good with the world.


To break up the drive, we stopped for the night at a hotel in Burlington, Vermont, and I became convinced that I'd been to the city before, with my parents, on some mid-or-late 1970s family trip of some sort. Could this be true? I've asked my father, but haven't yet received a response.

The hotel was lovely (we spoiled ourselves, slightly). We even managed to have dinner in a nearby restaurant as well, which Rose allowed (helped by the fact that we were early enough for the dinner rush that the restaurant was mostly empty). She ate, tossed food around (as babies do) and waved and smiled at everyone. The sun, as you already know, shines down upon her.

We walked down by the water, to see what we could see, along the shores of Lake Champlain, named after that fellow who once wandered by our own little locale, and lost himself an astrolabe...

And once back in our hotel we showered, and slept. A king-size bed. Oh my.


Tuesday, September 23, 2014: Before leaving town, we wandered a few nearby shops, including a bookstore. Christine picked up some flannel (they had a flannel shop). We picked up a bacon-flavoured candy necklace for Steve Zytveld (how could we not?).

Outside the flannel store, a jazz-statue pointed at us.

We drove north, and north. Christine didn't want to utilize her cellphone for the sake of directions, so we used our gps (which had been invaluable over the past few days of lack-of-cellphone-service). Unfortunately, instead of the plan we'd had to drive through beautiful New England and cross the border at Cornwall (I'd really been looking forward to crossing the International Bridge there), the gps took us "the fastest route" (dammit) and we crossed somewhere around Sherbrooke, Quebec, having to make our way back west through Quebec and down Highway 401 (we were annoyed by this disruption to our little plan).

There were, admittedly, cute little houses and cute little farms along our Quebec drive.

Another highlight: stopping for lunch along the 401, I realized our options could include the Dairy Queen in Lancaster, Ontario (the south bits of Glengarry County), where I convinced Christine we should stop for a while. Even though it might be considered slightly early, we gave Rose her first tiny taste of ice cream after a short lunch (she liked it, but didn't seem particularly overjoyed; perhaps when she's older we will attempt this again). I enjoyed this immensely: this is where my other daughter, Kate, had her first taste of ice cream (with her mother, her granny and I) some twenty-some years earlier. (I have spent much time in this Dairy Queen over the past thirty years.)

There are some traditions that should very much be held.

We were home by 4pm, relieved and exhausted. After this, I don't think any of us ever wanted to get into a car ever again.

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Paige Taggart

Paige Taggart is from Northern California and currently resides in Brooklyn. She is the author of five chapbooks: Last Difficult Gardens, DIGITAL MACRAMÉ, Polaroid Parade, The Ice Poems and I am Writing To You From Another Country; Translations of Henri Michaux (forthcoming). Her first full-length collection Want For Lion (Trembling Pillow Press) was published in March 2014 and her second Or Replica (Brooklyn Arts Press) later in 2014. She has her own jewelry line ( mactaggartjewelry.com ) that specializes in blinging-out poets.

1 - How did your first book or chapbook change your life? How does your most recent work compare to your previous? How does it feel different?
My first book allowed me to change my life in a really personal way (it's really too personal to explain and I don't want to talk all in metaphor) but I will just say that it did provide me with a crucial exit point at a time when I needed a change and a point of escape. The book opened up doorways for me to strategize ways to change an existing mode of living and live in a freer way.

I think my most recent work aligns itself with my past, present and future work, and that it all shares a "language first" sensibility. Although I am always trying to invent new parameters and a system that governs each body of work, in every possible mode that I find myself working in I always face the same call to judgement. Where I try and decide if something is working and if not why and what can I not see?

2 - How did you come to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?
That baby carriage metaphor! Language pulls me around and I follow it to wherever it leads me, and that I find myself at poetry is because poetry is more able to swell and recede with the overall meaning of each word, whereas fiction and non-fiction tends to be much more focused on creating meaning in a clear narrative that exercises language’s' everyday tendencies; whereas poetry pushes the limits of language, spinning miter into the abstract and strengthening the raw artifice of desires unseen to everyday humans.

3 - How long does it take to start any particular writing project? Does your writing initially come quickly, or is it a slow process? Do first drafts appear looking close to their final shape, or does your work come out of copious notes?
I work really quickly, in bursts, usually I won't be writing for a bit and its like I'm letting it build up in me so that I can get to a point where I can exploit myself and use all the energy and built-in inertia to deliver something quickly and spontaneous. Often it relates to where I am in my life- be it a wild state, a ponderous state, a language driven state, or a loving state. I try to give all I can in the moment of writing and shred like a snowboarder in the perfect snowy pipe. The thinking is the pushing through time to create a momentary world with which to consider and let that be amplified. It's not a slow process, it's always taking its final shape and I don't work with any notes. I am not a line-by-line poem, I don't even know how to think: "well that's a great line, I'm going to save that and use that later," that perception isn't something that drives me, if I get a line, there's always the next, and the next, and the next, and I have to follow it. If I don't have the right time or space to work like this, then I won't even let myself travel there. I will resist, create a dam until I ready the flood.

4 - Where does a poem usually begin for you? Are you an author of short pieces that end up combining into a larger project, or are you working on a "book" from the very beginning?
In headspace, usually I think up something and follow it into poem land, and end up compiling a bunch of pages in a notebook, which I later type up and adjust the poems to either fit already existing projects or else I find a thread and work with that until it becomes something. I have a document that's a bunch of different style poems where I toss one-off poems into it and it's a mixtape style format. I'm most often working on multiple pieces at once and am always already arriving towards composition of a book.

5 - Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?
I do really like giving readings and I certainly see this as a part of my process in that I write poems that beg to be read aloud.

6 - Do you have any theoretical concerns behind your writing? What kinds of questions are you trying to answer with your work? What do you even think the current questions are?
Theoretical concerns, like religious quests, like sacred text, like am I bending backwards to discover some TRUTHS. I love masking theory with higher-grounds of escapism and being a modern day philosopher that dismantles the readymade.

7 – What do you see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Does s/he even have one? What do you think the role of the writer should be?
The current role of the poet in the US is sorta screwed right now-- I would say poets aren't appreciated nearly enough and that we have to look to other countries to serve as role models, where there has been a history of the poet being considered a prized position in the cultural arts is what we need to move towards.

8 - Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?
I've found it essential, especially when they're able to provide incite that is unexpected and that by just making a few changes that the poem can be strengthened to phenomenal degrees. It took me a long time to accept the role of an outside editor but you have to acquire trust and believe that they understand your vision and only want to help the poems. For a while I was scared that my meaning would be lost by the imposition of editorial decisions.

9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?
The best piece of advice I heard was an entire lecture by Dave Hickey-- he's an awesome against the grain art/cultural critic-- he suggests that you don't need to go to art school but rather just buy a really expensive leather jacket & an old torn up joy division t-shirt & then go hang out in bars with groups of friends & talk about shit that interests you-- & you're way more likely to become an interesting artist that way-- I admit I went to art school & also went & have an MFA -- so it's not me following his advice-- but I love it--

10 - How easy has it been for you to move between genres (poetry to jewelry)? What do you see as the appeal?
I float between the two as naturally as changing from pajamas into daytime clothes!  I usually work in one mode for a bit of time (2-3wks) then often switch to the other mode- but generally I am always thinking in both forms-- making jewelry satisfies a very tactile sensory element of my brain but I couldn't ever chose one form over the other--- I like listening to podcasts and such while I'm making jewelry.

11 - What kind of writing routine do you tend to keep, or do you even have one? How does a typical day (for you) begin?
I am not a routine oriented person. And I don't clock hours for when I write, or when one thing happens as opposed to another thing! Right now I'm in a transitional and transitory state so there's no typical day- but I do always drink coffee first thing!

12 - When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?
I read and listen to music and don't let the idea of "having to write" get to me, if it's not meant to be then I take a hiatus, being stalled isn't something I fear nor do I let it claim my ability to survive and thrive in other ways.

13 - What fragrance reminds you of home?
Chlorine, BBQ, animal urine, clean sheets, (family/childhood home); my personal home: hmm not sure

14 - David W. McFadden once said that books come from books, but are there any other forms that influence your work, whether nature, music, science or visual art?
Music influences me for sure, so does the way in which I make jewelry and the kind of thinking and processes that go into that-- comedy as an art form influences me recently since I've been listening to a lot of comedy podcasts...I adore visual art too, and have it displayed all over my home and I think writing with a visual sense in mind makes for an interesting transformation into language...I'm not so sure McFadden was onto anything.

15 - What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?
Ohh so many, and it shifts quite often too... the poetry of my friend is essential to my own writing

16 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?
I'd like to own a house and decorate it exactly the way I envision...possibly own a small store that houses my jewelry along with other interesting items

17 - If you could pick any other occupation to attempt, what would it be? Or, alternately, what do you think you would have ended up doing had you not been a writer?
hmm...it'd be cool to be a stylist/personal shopper--- but i could maybe make that happen-- I'd also like to more wholeheartedly run my own jewelry business....and I don't think "being a writer" is my occupational choice...being a poet is something that I have chosen as much as it chose me, and I will continue to be a poet infinitely but I don't embody it as an occupational choice. But the best would be to be a singer-- and make a career of it--

18 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something else?
I wrote/write because it enables exploration into non-physical, tactile realms and it pushes the spatial mind zones that would otherwise be unexplored

19 - What was the last great book you read? What was the last great film?
I'm reading an amaaaazzzing book right now called Nochita by Dia Felix that City Lights recently published, it's a poetic novel and it really pushes boundaries and the language is magical. The last great film, hmm, maybe Inside Llewyn Davis , it was subtly genius.

20 - What are you currently working on?
I'm working on finalizing edits for my 2nd book, Or Replica that will come out later this year with Brooklyn Arts Press. I'm also trying to work on other manuscripts and in general reassess what I already have written as opposed to making new work.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

On Writing : an occasional series

It's been eighteen months since I discovered (thanks to Sarah Mangold) the website for the NPM Daily, and absolutely loved the short essays presented on a variety of subjects surrounding the nebulous idea of “on writing.” I would highly recommend you wander through the NPM Daily site to see the pieces posted there.

The occasional series I've been curating since, "On Writing," over at the ottawa poetry newsletter blog, has been progressing quite nicely, and I've included an updated list, below, of those pieces posted so far. A number of the pieces have been quite astounding. Just who might be next?

Forthcoming: new essays by Gary Barwin, Jason Christie, Adam Sol, Emily Ursuliak, Asher Ghaffar, Carla Barkman, Missy Marston, Robert Swereda, Monica Kidd, Rob Budde, Ian Roy, Renée Sarojini Saklikar and David Dowker. 

On Writing #40 : j/j hastain : Infinite Chakras: a Trans-Temporal Mini-Memoir

On Writing #39 : Peter Norman : Red Pen of Fury!

On Writing #38 : Rupert Loydell : Intricately Entangled

On Writing #37 : M.A.C. Farrant : Eternity Delayed

On Writing #36 : Gil McElroy : Building a Background

On Writing #35 : Charmaine Cadeau : Stupid funny.

On Writing #34 : Beth Follett : Born of That Nothing

On Writing #33 : Marthe Reed : Drawing Louisiana

On Writing #32 : Chris Turnbull : Half flings, stridence and visual timber

On Writing #31 : Kate Schapira : On Writing (Sentences)

On Writing #30 : Michael Bryson : On Writing

On Writing #29 : Sara Heinonen : On Writing

On Writing #28 : Stan Rogal : Writers' Anonymous

On Writing #27 : Lola Lemire Tostevin : What's in a name?

On Writing #26 : Kevin Spenst : On Writing

On Writing #25 : Kate Cayley : An Effort of Attention

On Writing #24 : Gregory Betts : On Writing

On Writing #23 : Hailey Higdon : Hiding Places

On Writing #22 : Matthew Firth : How I write

On Writing #21 : Nichole McGill : Daring to write again

On Writing #20 : Rob Thomas : Hey, Short Stuff!: On Writing Kids

On Writing #19 : Anik See : On Writing

On Writing #18 : Eric Folsom : On Writing

On Writing #17 : Edward Smallfield : poetics as space

On Writing #16 : Sonia Saikaley : Writing Before Dawn to Answer a Curious Calling

On Writing #15 : Roland Prevost : Ink / Here

On Writing #14 : Aaron Tucker : On Writing

On Writing #13 : Sean Johnston : On Writing

On Writing #12 : Ken Sparling : From some notes for a writing workshop

On Writing #11 : Abby Paige : On the Invention of Language

On Writing #10 : Adam Thomlison : On writing less

On Writing #9 : Christian McPherson : On Writing

On Writing #8 : Colin Morton : On Writing

On Writing #7 : Pearl Pirie : Use of Writing

On Writing #6 : Faizel Deen : Summer, Ottawa. 2013.

On Writing #5 : Michael Dennis : Who knew?

On Writing #4 : Michael Blouin : On Process

On Writing #3 : rob mclennan : On writing (and not writing)

On Writing #2 : Amanda Earl : Community

On Writing #1 : Anita Dolman : A little less inspiration, please (Or, What ever happened to patrons, anyway?)

Make Contact: Circulating Small and Micro Press Poetry in Canada

Congress 2015 is being hosted at the University of Ottawa. Colin Martin (University of Calgary) and Cameron Anstee (University of Ottawa) wrote a CFP for a member-organized session for ACCUTE that has been accepted. Full details below (pdf over at Anstee's original link, here), and further member-organized session CFPs available here. Send them your stuff!

a week (plus) in the east; (part two,

Our big trip, part two (see part one here). As Christine informs, over a period of eleven days we drove some 3765.47 kilometres. A drive of 41 hrs and 45 minutes. With a ten-month old. Madness.

Part of our trip thrived on the level of accident, seeing what we might see as we went, and allowing ourselves the time to explore. Our schedule of travel really focused on the people we were visiting, with the remainder at sites we might never have even seen had we bothered making too many plans.

Tuesday, September 16, 2014: Leaving Saint John (after a morning of wandering), we landed in Moncton, New Brunswick to spend some time with an old school friend of Christine's. Rose was initially less taken with Jeanette's toddler Beatrice than with Beatrice's toys [above], but that was eventually settled. They circled each other, curiously.

After lunch, we had just enough time to make it to Hillsborough, to catch the Hon. William Henry Steeves House and Museum before it closed at 5pm. Hon. Steeves (1814 - 1873) was one of the Fathers of Confederation, a couple of generations after the Stieffs family arrived and changed their name to Steeves (an array of Pennsylvania Dutch families arrived to thrive in the area after the expulsion of the Acadians, a number of whom Englicized their names). This makes everyone related to a Steeves a descendant of this family, including Christine, as well as Gaspereau Press editor/publisher Andrew Steeves. The list of other notable descendants is impressive, and includes Jack Layton, as well as some thousands of others. 

We were quite a while in the house, as Christine sat in the back adding our information to theirs at Ancestry.ca. Given the amount of family they're attempting to track, its quite a daunting project, but Christine's (and thusly, Rose's) lineage is now included. As Christine was involved in such, Rose and I were given a tour of the family church [pictured, above], which is still in use. An oddly-shaped building, it is really quite lovely. The inside is designed as a ship, and to look up to the ceiling is to see the upside-down outline of a sea-worthy hull.

We were there far longer than we had hoped, and were very taken with the generosity of the couple running the place.

Upon leaving, we made for a small bed-and-breakfast in the Village of Parrsboro, and took a walk to see the water, and other sights, before retiring.






Wednesday, September 17, 2014: I was slightly annoyed that the b+b (as much as we enjoyed such) didn't include a highchair or booster seat in their little breakfast nook (Rose, attempting to eat Cheerios from the breakfast table), Christine suggested that most other parents might travel with such, and Rose didn't much mind. Apparently the building was once a hospital, and our room had once been the delivery room. Delivery Room, meet Baby.



Our morning included the Bay of Fundy, wandering the beach right by The Ottawa House By-the-Sea Museum, known as the summer home of Sir Charles Tupper (another distant relative of Christine's). We wandered the beach for a bit, and Rose picked an array of stones, and wore the onesie-with-kilt (Nova Scotia tartan) that Christine picked up for her at the Glengarry Highland Games. Christine walked far further than we did, with Cape Blomidon in the distance (can you see her in the far, far distance, above?). Rose and I kept close, as we do.


Apparently the shore is known for amethyst, but we found nothing of the sort. Apparently one has to break rocks to discover them inside (we weren't travelling with any such devices to break things apart).

The Ottawa House was impressive, but the tour far less than the Steeves House (which made me appreciate even further our experience there).

This was another building on summer hours, despite September. It allowed us all to pretend that summer wasn't actually over. Oh no.

In the photo above, Christine and Rose in Sir Charles Tupper's front room, surrounded by photos.

Later, driving and driving and driving (including some places the gps took us we hadn't exactly planned on), we accidentally came upon the house that Elizabeth Bishop lived in as a child, with her grandparents. Apparently it had been a writers retreat for some time, but is currently for sale. How is this house not a museum? How can a building like this be for sale at all?

When we couldn't figure out where it was (oh, Christine said, the Elizabeth Bishop House is in this town we're passing through!), we stopped at a gas station. Where is it, I asked? The man at the counter pointed across the street. How random is that?

Someone out there has to purchase this house. Why is it not a museum?

By the afternoon, we'd managed our way to Gaspereau Press, where Christine had worked for a couple of years roughly a dozen years back. After some twenty years of irregular correspondence over email (begun when Steeves was still a student at Carleton University) I was finally able to meet the illustrious Andrew Steeves, and we spent some good time with him as well as Gary Dunfield (who I'd met at a Griffin Awards Gala or two). The space is absolutely amazing, and worth a visit. We got a tour of the building (moved since Christine worked there), and Rose crawled around the floor, turning the palms of her hands black. We even saw a new memoir by John Terpstra as it was being built.

After twenty years, it was good to finally meet Andrew (and we were in agreement on a great many things--far more than I might have suspected), and he was kind enough to give me a selection of some of the chapbooks they'd been producing over the years (they were good enough to do one of mine, even, as part of the series), and I left with a small stack of works by Triny Finlay, ian letourneau, Brian Bartlett, Wanda Campbell (a book Christine typeset while at the press), Lisa Martin-DeMoor, Alison Smith, Peter Sanger and Tonja Gunvaldsen Klaasen (a poet I really hope has something new out, soonish). There are other chapbooks in the series, but I already have at least a couple of them. Over the years, I've reviewed some of them here and here and here (for example).


And of course, Rose managed to crawl around on the floor and slip, landing her head on the side of one of the big machines before hitting the floor, far more startled (and tired) than anything else. A stain of black ink all across her white onesie and the side of her face.

Given that Christine had lived here for a while, during her studies at Acadia University and subsequent Gaspereau Press staff, the trip felt like a kind of homecoming. She pointed out buildings that used to be other buildings (including the liquor store that formerly housed the furniture store where she'd purchased the bed that now lives in our spare room), and where she'd done this, and that, and that other thing. I was being introduced to her historical spaces.

And then there was the building named after her half-uncle's mother's family. Apparently her grandfather's first wife had come from quite a wealthy family. Who knew? 


Thursday, September 18, 2014: We spent two nights with former Gaspereau Press publicist Beth Crosby, and she and her husband were both entirely lovely and generous, and were thrilled to be able to spend time with the baby (photo of Rose and Beth playing with lego, below). It's always nice on a trip to be able to mix hotel and friend's homes, but it makes for a slightly trickier thing to visit someone's house with a baby (one never wants to be in the way, etcetera).

And in the morning: another brief coffee with Mr. Andrew Steeves, sitting in a coffeeshop where Rose did her best to say hello to everyone, charming strangers and Steeves alike. 


While in Wolfville, Christine did a small talk for a creative writing class, invited to speak by her former thesis adviser, Wanda Campbell. She was generous enough to take us all to lunch first, which was quite lovely. Rose and I wandered the town during the span of the class, and baby slept in the carrier.

And we were able to see Cape Blomidon, sitting in the Bay of Fundy, from the opposite side [above].

We wandered, and even managed to say hello to some of the other faculty in the department, including poet Lance La Rocque and Herb Wyile (who I met at the Postmodern Conference a few years ago at the University of Ottawa, and published a very cool book of interviews).


Upon leaving Acadia, we wandered over to the house Wanda and her husband were renovating, with a magnificent view of the valley below. Oh, what a view. Why, exactly, did I not take any pictures of that magnificent view? 

After Wanda's house, we managed not one but two wineries: Gaspereau Vineyards and Grand Pre, both of which were thrilled to help keep baby Rose entertained (which impressed us). She wandered the floors (supervised, obviously, by us), and the second winery even managed to pull out a box of toys for her to play with (really?). 


In-between: we visited a wool store, housed in a converted barn on a little farm, with chickens, sheep and other animals. Rose was angered at the fact that the chickens wouldn't say hello to her, despite her numerous attempts. She was indifferent (and even baffled) by the sheep. But perhaps, after her disappointment with the chickens, she had nothing left to offer the (also indifferent) sheep. They were sheep, after all.

Next: some Acadian stops, Saint John again, and the wilds of Maine...