Rob Mclennan's Blog, page 57

Ellen Chang-Richardson, Blood Belies

 

I can still hear the mosquitosin my deepest anxieties, hear
their high-pitched hum. Ican feel the oppressive heat. I can
smell it, thatcombination of human feces and fear pungent.
My small nose        wrinkles.

I crawl into my fort-likecabinet, run my hands over solid
wood, feel the      p  u l s   e    of my father’s secrets in my
veins. enclosed. safe. claustrophobic.       free. (“storm surge”)

Oh,I am absolutely delighting in the structures and shapes of Ottawa-based poet, editor and collaborator Ellen Chang-Richardson’s full-length poetry debut, BloodBelies (Hamilton ON: Wolsak & Wynn, 2024), published through PaulVermeersch’s Buckrider Books imprint. Even the back cover copy provides aliveliness, working to prepare any reader for the wealth of possibilities thatlay within: “In this arresting debut collection Ellen Chang-Richardson writesof race, of injury and of belonging in stunning poems that fade in and out ofthe page. History swirls through this collection like a summer storm, as theybring their father’s, and their own, stories to light, writing against thebackground of the institutional racism in Canada, the Chinese Exclusion Act,the head tax and more. From Taiwan in the early 1990s to Oakville in the late1990s, Toronto in the 2010s, Cambodia in the mid-1970s and Ottawa in the 2020s,Blood Belies takes the reader through time, asking them what it means tolook the way we do? To carry scars? To persevere? To hope?” There is such awonderful polyvocality to this collection, a layering of time and tales told, includingasides, overlapping and faded, fading text; a multiplicity within a singularframe, representing multiple ways, furrows and threads across this collection.The poems offer quick turns, clipped lyrics and inventive speech, writingheredity, silence and open space.

Setthrough three sections, and a poem on either end of the collection to bookend,Chang-Richardson plays with space on the page through word placement, composed absence,swirls of text and image, erasure and hesitation, providing a forceful book-lengthprovocation of slowness, storytelling, pulse and punctuation. “My brother and Isometimes posit” they write, part-through the collection, “that maybe theynamed him Sing in the hopes he would go through life / embodying a song – //past present and future interactions make us question that line of thinking.” Chang-Richardsonwrites of race, of family, of identity; of anti-Asian racism, and a historythat provides an intimacy around such facts as Canada’s Royal Commission onChinese and Japanese Immigration in 1902, and The Chinese Immigration Act of1923, which prevented Chinese immigration into Canada until the Act wasrepealed in 1947. Chang-Richardson offers a delicate and powerful lyric of suchstrict, incredible precision, speaking only a single word or phrase or absence,where others might have offered pages. Through memory, archive, gymnasticlanguage, erasure and an expansive, inventive sequence of forms, Chang-Richardsonoffers insight into and through family history, trauma, possibility and story,one that honours both past and the present, constructed as a larger portrait offamily, history and self, but as much a loving and attentive outline of theauthor’s father. “I lost my wanderlust   in tandem / to losing you --,” Chang-Richardson writes, near the openingof the collection, “ – but we no longer speak / of such things.”

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Jesse Keith Butler

Jesse Keith Butler is an Ottawa-based poet who recently won third place in the Kierkegaard Poetry Competition. You can find his poems in a variety of journals, including Arc, Blue Unicorn, THINK, flo. and The Orchards Poetry Journal. His first book, The Living Law (Darkly Bright Press, 2024) is available wherever books are sold.

1 - How did your first book change your life? How does your most recent work compare to your previous? How does it feel different?
My first book of poetry, The Living Law, was published on March 1, 2024. It's probably too early to say how it has changed my life. This book is a compilation of selected poems written over the last twenty years, so it is much more a continuity of my writing rather than a break from an earlier phase. It feels like the fulfillment of all my writing to date.
 
2 - How did you come to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?
While I've dabbled a bit in fiction and published non-fiction (academic articles) poetry has always been my preferred medium. I remember as a very young child aspiring to be Dr. Seuss. Something about the musical and rhythmic use of language, the intense compression of meaning, has always appealed to me at a deep level. It still feels to me like the most natural way to use language.
 
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'm a very slow writer. Sometimes a first draft comes quickly, though more often it'll start as a seed--just a phrase or even a rhythm--rattling around my head for weeks. Once I have a draft I tend to revise it many times. I'll often have multiple times when I think a poem is complete, and even submit it for publication, but then later rethink it and revise it again. A number of the poems in the book are revisions of a poem previously published in a journal.

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?
This book is definitely more of a compilation, although there are themes running through the book that give it a sense of unity. Now that I have published my first book, I find that I'm more likely to think about how new poems might fit into an imagined future collection.

5 - Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?
I enjoy connecting with people about poetry, but not being the centre of attention. I'm an introvert and I stutter, so poetry readings are a bit of a stretch for me. But I value them as a way to share my poetry with people who might not otherwise pick up the book.
 
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?
I prefer a poem to emerge from either a striking image or a memorable phrase. It can engage with theoretical concerns as it develops, but I feel like poems are richer if they don't start with a specific thesis.

7 – What do you see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Do they even have one? What do you think the role of the writer should be?
I'm not sure I can speak for writers in general, but I see the role of the poet as reminding people to slow down in a frantic age. Most people don't listen, but I think there's value in presenting an alternative way of engaging deeply with language and reality.

8 - Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?
It's both. There's a difficult balance as a poet in getting outside your own head to speak engagingly with your audience while also staying true to the original gut instinct that is the source of the poem. A thoughtful dialogue with an external editor can help you work through this, but it can also be frustrating and water down the work.

9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?
At one point in developing my book I had the impulse to cut a bunch of the older poems and replace them with brand new ones I was then writing. My friend and fellow poet Joshua Alan Sturgill told me I should keep the focus on poems that I've been satisfied with in a stable way for a long time, rather than what's exciting me at the moment. It was good advice -- many of the poems I was then thinking of including were too fresh and have continued to evolve over time. They still need time to stabilize.

10 - 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 don't have a writing routine. I have a full-time job and kids, and I write in little bits where I can.

11 - When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?
I try not to get stressed about it. I try to just focus on living well, having good relationships, and reading good books. Those things are the source of good poetry, when it comes.

12 - What fragrance reminds you of home?
I grew up in the Yukon, so my first thought here is pine trees.

13 - 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?
Yeah, a lot of my inspiration is literary. But I also have many poems inspired by nature, memories, experiences, or relationships.

14 - What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?
Some of my favourite poets are Gerard Manley Hopkins, W. H. Auden, Emily Dickinson, Dylan Thomas, William Blake, Alice Oswald. I also read the Bible a lot, and other ancient literature. I also have a soft spot for science fiction. I'm a pretty eclectic reader, and it all shapes my poetry.

15 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?
I've been really interested in the recent trend of verse novels. I think I'd like to give that a try eventually.

16 - 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?
Writing really isn't my occupation, it's a hobby I do where I can on the side. I'd love to be a full-time writer, but that's not really an option right now.

17 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something else?
I'm not sure I have an answer to that. I've always been drawn to poetry, as far back as I can remember.

18 - What was the last great book you read? What was the last great film?
I'm currently reading Stanislaw Lem's Solaris. I'm a big fan of the Tarkovsky movie, and finally am getting to the novel. I love science fiction that explores an encounter with a genuinely alien form of life. Speaking of which, the last great film was probably Annihilation , which I'd also group in that genre.

19 - What are you currently working on?
Since finishing The Living Law I've been writing a series of poems roughly themed around flood mythologies, geological history, and climate anxiety. This may be the beginning of my second book, but time will tell.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

Touch the Donkey : new interviews with Michael Harman, Terri Witek and Laynie Browne,

Anticipating the release next week of the TENTH ANNIVERSARY forty-first 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 fortieth issue: Michael Harman, Terri Witek and Laynie Browne.

Interviews with contributors to the first thirty-nine issues (more than two hundred and fifty interviews to date) remain online, including: Noah Berlatsky, Robyn Schelenz, Andy Weaver, Dessa Bayrock, Anselm Berrigan, Alana Solin, Michael Betancourt, Monty Reid, Heather Cadsby, R Kolewe, Samuel Amadon, Meghan Kemp-Gee, Miranda Mellis, kevin mcpherson eckhoff and Kimberley Dyck, Junie Désil, Micah Ballard, Devon Rae, Barbara Tomash, Ben Meyerson, Pam Brown, Shane Kowalski, Kathy Lou Schultz, Hilary Clark, Ted Byrne, Garrett Caples, Brenda Coultas, Sheila Murphy, Chris Turnbull and Elee Kraljii Gardiner, Stuart Ross, Leah Sandals, Tamara Best, Nathan Austin, Jade Wallace, Monica Mody, Barry McKinnon, Katie Naughton, Cecilia Stuart, Benjamin Niespodziany, Jérôme Melançon, Margo LaPierre, Sarah Pinder, Genevieve Kaplan, Maw Shein Win, Carrie Hunter, Lillian Nećakov, Nate Logan, Hugh Thomas, Emily Brandt, David Buuck, Jessi MacEachern, Sue Bracken, Melissa Eleftherion, Valerie Witte, Brandon Brown, Yoyo Comay, Stephen Brockwell, Jack Jung, Amanda Auerbach, IAN MARTIN, Paige Carabello, Emma Tilley, Dana Teen Lomax, Cat Tyc, Michael Turner, Sarah Alcaide-Escue, Colby Clair Stolson, Tom Prime, Bill Carty, Christina Vega-Westhoff, Robert Hogg, Simina Banu, MLA Chernoff, Geoffrey Olsen, Douglas Barbour, Hamish Ballantyne, JoAnna Novak, Allyson Paty, Lisa Fishman, Kate Feld, Isabel Sobral Campos, Jay MillAr, Lisa Samuels, Prathna Lor, George Bowering, natalie hanna, Jill Magi, Amelia Does, Orchid Tierney, katie o’brien, Lily Brown, Tessa Bolsover, émilie kneifel, Hasan Namir, Khashayar Mohammadi, Naomi Cohn, Tom Snarsky, Guy Birchard, Mark Cunningham, Lydia Unsworth, Zane Koss, Nicole Raziya Fong, Ben Robinson, Asher Ghaffar, Clara Daneri, Ava Hofmann, Robert R. Thurman, Alyse Knorr, Denise Newman, Shelly Harder, Franco Cortese, Dale Tracy, Biswamit Dwibedy, Emily Izsak, Aja Couchois Duncan, José Felipe Alvergue, Conyer Clayton, Roxanna Bennett, Julia Drescher, Michael Cavuto, Michael Sikkema, Bronwen Tate, Emilia Nielsen, Hailey Higdon, Trish Salah, Adam Strauss, Katy Lederer, Taryn Hubbard, Michael Boughn, David Dowker, Marie Larson, Lauren Haldeman, Kate Siklosi, robert majzels, Michael Robins, Rae Armantrout, Stephanie Strickland, Ken Hunt, Rob Manery, Ryan Eckes, Stephen Cain, Dani Spinosa, Samuel Ace, Howie Good, Rusty Morrison, Allison Cardon, Jon Boisvert, Laura Theobald, Suzanne Wise, Sean Braune, Dale Smith, Valerie Coulton, Phil Hall, Sarah MacDonell, Janet Kaplan, Kyle Flemmer, Julia Polyck-O’Neill, A.M. O’Malley, Catriona Strang, Anthony Etherin, Claire Lacey, Sacha Archer, Michael e. Casteels, Harold Abramowitz, Cindy Savett, Tessy Ward, Christine Stewart, David James Miller, Jonathan Ball, Cody-Rose Clevidence, mwpm, Andrew McEwan, Brynne Rebele-Henry, Joseph Mosconi, Douglas Barbour and Sheila Murphy, Oliver Cusimano, Sue Landers, Marthe Reed, Colin Smith, Nathaniel G. Moore, David Buuck, Kate Greenstreet, Kate Hargreaves, Shazia Hafiz Ramji, Erín Moure, Sarah Swan, Buck Downs, Kemeny Babineau, Ryan Murphy, Norma Cole, Lea Graham, kevin mcpherson eckhoff, Oana Avasilichioaei, Meredith Quartermain, Amanda Earl, Luke Kennard, Shane Rhodes, Renée Sarojini Saklikar, Sarah Cook, François Turcot, Gregory Betts, Eric Schmaltz, Paul Zits, Laura Sims, Stephen Collis, Mary Kasimor, Billy Mavreas, damian lopes, Pete Smith, Sonnet L’Abbé, Katie L. Price, a rawlings, Suzanne Zelazo, Helen Hajnoczky, Kathryn MacLeod, Shannon Maguire, Sarah Mangold, Amish Trivedi, Lola Lemire Tostevin, Aaron Tucker, Kayla Czaga, Jason Christie, Jennifer Kronovet, Jordan Abel, Deborah Poe, Edward Smallfield, ryan fitzpatrick, Elizabeth Robinson, nathan dueck, Paige Taggart, Christine McNair, Stan Rogal, Jessica Smith, Nikki Sheppy, Kirsten Kaschock, Lise Downe, Lisa Jarnot, Chris Turnbull, Gary Barwin, Susan Briante, derek beaulieu, Megan Kaminski, Roland Prevost, Emily Ursuliak, j/j hastain, Catherine Wagner, Susanne Dyckman, Susan Holbrook, Julie Carr, David Peter Clark, Pearl Pirie, Eric Baus, Pattie McCarthy, Camille Martin and Gil McElroy.

The forthcoming forty-first issue features new writing by: rob mclennan, Gil McElroy, ryan fitzpatrick, John Barlow, Amanda Earl, Renée Sarojini Saklikar, Conyer Clayton, Julie Carr and Pattie McCarthy!

And of course, copies of the first thirty-nine issues are still very much available. Why not subscribe? Included, as well, as part of the above/ground press annual subscription! Which you should get right now for 2024!

and don't forget the Touch the Donkey TENTH ANNIVERSARY SALE, available until the end of April!

We even have our own Facebook group. It’s remarkably easy.

the laurentitudes: eastering in sainte-adèle,

Aftermonths of seemingly-unable, we finally managed a weekend into Sainte-Adèle,into the Laurentides, where we spent a few days with mother-in-law in her weecottage across the Easter long weekend. I know we’ve been there since, but I seem not to have posted a report since we were there for Thanksgiving in 2022 for some reason. Oh, it was good to get out of the daily for a little bit. We considered heading up on Friday, but didn’t quite make it out (Aoife wasn't feeling well),landing Saturday mid-day, instead. We hadn't realized the temperature difference (there was still snow on the ground, and we could see an array of skiers up in all those hills as we drove in). Christine didn't even bring a coat!

The children played games, played outside, played on their tablets, did quiet things. I focused my attentions on the growing mounds of books over the past couple of months I hadn't even had a chance to open yet, for the sake of potential review. I think I managed to start more than two dozen reviews (and a couple of books I realized I didn't think I would have anything, or enough, constructive to say, so those were set aside). There is simply too much remarkable material being produced these days to be able to account for it all (I know I'm seriously behind on Graywolf Press titles, for example, as well as Copper Canyon and Flood Editions; at least Sylvia Legris' new title from New Directions landed, as I was writing this). I sat in the sunroom and I poured through books (and also made significant headway, I must say, through two short stories I've already been months working on, plus a few other odds and sods of note-taking). Christine, on her part, finished reading the book she'd been going through, and went through two different books on L.M. Montgomery (including the short Penguin biography by Jane Urquhart) for the sake of working a small write-up for an exhibition on and around her works.

There were three daily deer, also. The final morning, they even brought along two friends.

Atone point on Saturday, Christine pointed out she couldn’t find the cat, but thescreen was out of the open second storey window, and we all scoured the houserepeatedly, around the house and even walked down the road with the two youngladies, knocking on doors. Have you seen a black and white cat? A full twohours of stress, completely unaware where he might be, although mother-in-lawand I weren’t quite convinced he was outside. Half an hour later, I madeanother attempt to look upstairs, as he simply strolled out of the upstairsmaster bedroom, blissfully unaware of the stress and chaos prompted by whereverit is he was sleeping. Both children in tears.

We even managed a game of monopoly (the cottage housed the original, but it is incomplete, so we were forced to play the Star Wars Edition), which had some moments of conflict, but no crying, which is always a plus. With the game leaning too deep into bedtime, we even managed to complete the game the following morning, if you can believe it. Can you believe it?
On the drive home, we also made a quick stop to see my sister on the homestead, startled, still, at the new owners across the road from her stripping away trees, bush, fenceline, etcetera. One long continuous field, nearly to and across the next road south and beyond. I'm not used to seeing that far out that way. Our young ladies, on their part, played with their bunny, who then peed all over Rose's jacket. Ah well. Perhaps this was revenge for Aoife placing her bunny-ears upon said bunny's head?

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Christy Cashman

Christy Cashman is anauthor, actress, and producer who has appeared in more than twenty films,including American Hustle, Joy, The Women, Ted 2, and The Forger, and whosescreenwriting credits include The Love Guru and Dixie Storms. An active memberof the Boston community and beyond, she is on the board of directors for theAssociates of the Boston Public Library and co-chairs its Literary Lightsdinner committee. Christy also serves on the board of the CommonwealthShakespeare Company and supports the nonprofit Raising A Reader.

Her book The Truth About Horses,which was published in August 2023, has garnered early acclaim in literarycircles and has captured the admiration of the equestrian community. It was anAmazon Bestseller and #1 new release. In addition to her successful debutnovel, Christy is also the creative mind behind two beloved children's books: The Not-So-Average Monkey of Kilkea Castle and Petri’s NextThings. These enchanting stories draw inspiration from the true tale of aheroic monkey residing in the historic Irish castle.

Christy, her husband, and their two sons, JayMichael and Quinn, live in Boston and spend time in Ireland and on Cape Cod.Christy has three dogs and three horses and is an avid equestrian, riding bothstateside and internationally, all year long.

She is currently working on her second novel,Beulah, and her third children’s book, The Cat Named Peanut Shrimp Cookie FryMuffin Who Lives on Staniel Cay.

1 - How did your first book change your life? Howdoes your most recent work compare to your previous? How does it feeldifferent?

Theprocess of writing The Truth About Horses has definitely changed my life. Inorder to write Reese’s character from an authentic point of view involved a lotof self discovery. Taking the time to delve into her character also involvedrealizing things about me that I either had never coped with or possibly copedwith in an unhealthy way. In some ways it gave me the opportunity to revisitmyself as a 14 year old, who was struggling with the state of being human. Insome ways I had to learn how I worked as a writer. I had to learn that whenthings got difficult in the process to write my way through it. I had to learnto dedicate time when sometimes I didn’t feel like I had any. Taking the timewas possibly the most important thing I’ve ever done for myself. I learned tobe proud of myself in a way that I have never been before. When I look back atsome of my work before The Truth About Horses it feels very ‘writerly’. Almostlike I was trying to write how I thought I should write as opposed to writing froman authentic place.

2 - How did you come to fiction first, as opposedto, say, poetry or non-fiction?

The partof the book that came to me first was the image of the wild horses. I wasn’teven sure what it represented, but I knew it was powerful. I knew I would weaveit into my story. I knew I wanted the story to be grounded in real feelings andtrue relationships, but I also wanted an element of magical realism which wasbest suited for fiction.

3 - How long does it take to start any particularwriting project? Does your writing initially come quickly, or is it a slowprocess? Do first drafts appear looking close to their final shape, or doesyour work come out of copious notes?

TheTruth About Horses took 9 years, but I was also putting it down for longperiods of time. Sometimes for months. But I did try to keep working onsomething. I wrote a couple of children's books, a couple of articles, Iconstantly journaled and even started a gratitude journal. But I had to learnmy process as I wrote. One of my favorite expressions is “I was building theplane while I was flying it.” It seems so appropriate because although I mayhave a natural ability for my craft, there were so many tools that I had tolearn along the way. Those tools are the things that sometimes were moreimportant to me than my natural ability. The ones that made me sit down towrite even when I didn’t feel like it, the ones that taught me to believe thatwriter's block is really just a reason to write more. I think the fact that Iwould take a break for months from my manuscript, pick it up again and beinspired and invigorated was a sign for me that the story was worth writing.And more importantly, worth finishing. I would say that there are large chunksof my original draft that were maintained through other drafts but structurewas something that I worked on all the way through revisions. And working onstructure in and of itself feels like it takes a whole other skillset. I’velearned that I am not necessarily a fast writer and I’ve learned that I’m okaywith that. Things seem to take a long time to cook for me. I think I’mrealizing that with time there’s a lot of added flavor.

4 - Where does a work of fiction usually beginfor you? Are you an author of short pieces that end up combining into a largerproject, or are you working on a "book" from the very beginning?

I amalways drawn to worlds first. If I can start to see a world and begin todescribe it then I know I can create believable characters to live in thatworld. Those characters will then have the rug jerked out beneath their feet,then forced to see their world anew. Worlds, whether they be a house, a barn, atown, or a hospital room are what make me tick as a writer. The sheerexcitement of understanding a world with all of its layers is often what makesme sit down to write. I very rarely work on short pieces. For some reason, Ienjoy the three act structure, with well developed characters and well-pacedplots.

5 - Are public readings part of or counter toyour creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?

Idefinitely enjoy doing readings. I know that it's fun for me to hear authorsread their own material, because I get an idea of exactly what the author wasthinking. I think public readings only enhance the experience of being anauthor. I think the whole dream of being a creative person is to one day shareyour work.

6 - Do you have any theoretical concerns behindyour writing? What kinds of questions are you trying to answer with your work?What do you even think the current questions are?

It’simpossible to be a creative person and not be full of self doubt. In some ways,it’s the self doubt that drives me. Therefore, there will always be questions.One big theme that I enjoyed writing about was recognizing how we can be livingour lives, being busy and doing everything that we think we should be doingwithout truly connecting. I was really influenced by the play Our Town by Thornton Wilder. My mom and dad took me to our local playhouse to see it. It wasimpossible to not incorporate some of the themes from that play into my novel.

7 – What do you see the current role of thewriter being in larger culture? Do they even have one? What do you think therole of the writer should be?

I thinkit’s the writer's job to entertain and provoke feeling. If I read something orwatch something or see an exhibit and it makes me feel something, possiblyunexpected, then the creator has done their job. The role of the writer is tomake us feel. End of story.

8 - Do you find the process of working with anoutside editor difficult or essential (or both)?

I had afantastic relationship with my editor, Louise Piantedosi. She was the perfecteditor for me because she was sensitive to all of the details and nuance of thestory. She even helped me to dive deeper into the characters, theirrelationships and the description of the horse related scenes. I felt likehaving Louise’s perspective was crucial for my book.

9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard(not necessarily given to you directly)?

“When ascene pops into your head, you have to write it, even if it doesn’t end up inthe story.” I think the writing takes place in the subconscious, so much sothat when I found myself overthinking a scene it was usually a scene that I hadto scrap. I found that when a scene popped into my head out of nowhere, myfirst instinct was to dismiss it. The deeper I got in the process, the more Irealized how important it was to write every scene that popped into my headbecause that’s my subconscious trying to tell me something. It might just beinforming me of a feeling or a detail that I hadn’t thought of, but either waythe information was always necessary.

10 - How easy has it been for you to move betweengenres (children's books to the novel)? What do you see as the appeal?

Writingthe children’s books really started out as an exercise for me. While taking aclass, one of my instructors told me that writing children's books was a greattool to use. It helps to distill a story down to being able to tell the storyvery simply and not overcomplicate the themes. I found it extremely helpful andI would advise anyone writing a novel to try it. It’s a reminder that writingis supposed to come from a creative and fun place. Writing children's books isa great tool to bring the fun back into writing.

11 - What kind of writing routine do you tend tokeep, or do you even have one? How does a typical day (for you) begin?

Mywriting day depends on what stage I’m in with my story. In the beginning Iforced myself to take classes in order to be accountable. I knew myself wellenough that I knew if I wasn’t in a class, I wouldn’t take the time to write.In order to get a first draft, I took several years of different writingclasses. My goal was just to keep writing even if I wasn’t working on themanuscript in the classes. After I got a first draft, then I realized thathaving the eyes of an editor would be helpful because at that point I was tooclose to the canvas. During editing and revisions, I found that since the storywas there and mostly on paper, it was almost like I had to put on the hat of anarchitect in order to see the bones of the story and where the plot pointswere.

I writebest in the mornings, with my coffee before I’m swamped by texts and emails andlife. Whether it’s fifteen minutes or six hours, I feel best when I start myday with writing in the morning.

12 - When your writing gets stalled, where do youturn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?

I walkmy dogs. Or take a trail ride on my horse. Nature is always an inspiration.

13 - What fragrance reminds you of home?

A skunk.They were always hit on the road outside my house.

14 - David W. McFadden once said that books comefrom books, but are there any other forms that influence your work, whethernature, music, science or visual art?

Inspirationcomes from so many different places. Definitely TedTalks, podcasts,documentaries, stories behind art exhibits, and museums for sure. For me musiccan be distracting unless it's a nondescript instrumental.

15 - What other writers or writings are importantfor your work, or simply your life outside of your work?

The mostinfluential books I’ve read for my writing, I probably read between the ages of12 and 15, Anne of Green Gables, the Narnia Tales, the Red Pony, Of Mice &Men to name a few. I also love almost all the lyrics from Cat Stevens. Later onin life, writing inspiration came from Dave Eggers, John Irving, Frank McCourt,Wally Lamb, Tom Perrotta, Olive Ann Burns and Gail Honeyman.

16 - What would you like to do that you haven'tyet done?

Write abook that becomes a series for an online streaming service. I would also liketo have a writing retreat in Africa as part of my mentorship program. Wouldalso love to take my family, dogs and horses to live off the grid for a while.

17 - If you could pick any other occupation toattempt, what would it be? Or, alternately, what do you think you would haveended up doing had you not been a writer?

Withouta doubt a veterinarian. I am very interested in holistic health for animals(and people). But I would probably practice on my husband and children.

18 - What made you write, as opposed to doingsomething else?

I wasvery frustrated with my experience in the film world, and as much as peoplelove the collaborative part, it was very difficult to have my voice andmaintain it when there were so many other ‘more important’ people vying forposition. Compared to the collaborative work that's done in the film world, Ienjoyed the lonely journey of writing a novel.

19 - What was the last great book you read? Whatwas the last great film?

The lastgreat book I read was called The Yellow House by Sarah M. Broom. I recentlywatched the tv series Love & Death on HBO, and I thought the acting wasincredible.

20 - What are you currently working on?

My nextnovel, Beaulah, is a novel that is set in the Smoky Mountains in Tennessee, ina fictitious town called Beaulah in the 1980’s. The main character is BarrettChildress Owens, and she goes to her high school one day to find one of thegirls in her class has gone missing. It sort of is about what happens when atown is gripped in fear. How hypocrisy creeps into friendships andrelationships and poisons them.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

Rennie Ament, Mechanical Bull

 

HOW TO MAKE MILK

Coat the cow in calm.
Sing it a song

with blossoms. Where agirl
who smells like vinegar

sells violets. Pick
your version: make herdie or find

Wild mind by the side ofthe road.
Give her a lover.

They touch each other
like a goat and toddler

at the petting zoo.
Toddler calls the greatpony.

Goat could use astrawberry
to rub its head against.

Ittook a while to get to, but I’m finally working my way through Maine poet Rennie Ament’s full-length debut, Mechanical Bull (Cleveland OH: ClevelandState University Poetry Center, 2023), a collection of short, sharp lyrics of slyhumour, observational oddness, language play and smooth clarity. For much ofthe collection, Ament’s poems offer a straightforward lyric of subtle turns, withechoes of what could be seen as correlations with those sly Canadiansurrealists Alice Burdick or Jaime Forsythe. “Someone told me, take a leftat the next light.” Ament writes, to open the poem ““PERFECPTION IS REALAND THE TRUTH IS NOT”,” “Her name was Imelda Marcos. She  sat like a window / festooned in blue silk.Her son Bongbong still a baby boy / in the backseat. I swung / on asinstructed.” Elsewhere, Ament’s language play is more overt, allowing collisionsof sound and meaning as the spark of the poem emerges from and across thosebreaks. Listen, for example, to the poem “RENATA S AMENT,” a short poem on herown name that begins: “Me. / A name. / An enema / as atman. Tart / as a manatee’steat.” Ament’s poems offer a delightful sense of play but one still very sly, almostcovert, and provide effects slightly disorienting. “Remember me knee-deep.” thepoem “HE THEN PLEDGED” begins, “Remember me kelp-bedecked. / Remember me wet, /legs pretzeled, sex-melted  /yet spleen-tempered.Best egg / esteem the verve, never / defer me.”

Thesepoems really are delightful, thoughtful, and compact. The collection is structuredin two sections--halved, one might say—of short poems that play with a varietyof line-lengths and form, each offering their own variation on that centralcore of compact observation, but one slightly turned, twirled or twisted. “Motherand father were nude models.” she writes, to open the poem ““DISCLOSE THE SHADYLOCATION IN WHICH YOU LURK”,” “Neither of them ever hit me. Once // I bit mymother so she bopped me, / which is different. I had crossed the street //wrong.” What a lovely book. What a lovely debut.

 

Matt Rader, FINE: Poems

 

Last summer in Sunnybrae
we watched from acrossthe lake
a kilometre of railcars
the colour of oldmemoires
slowly describe theshoreline westbound
below Mount Tappen
What are they hauling? I asked,knowing
we didn’t have an answer
The insides of mountains,trees, prairie
I imagined
It was difficult to watch
something being taken
but what
exactly (“Sweet Air”)

Thelatest from Kelowna, British Columbia writer Matt Rader is FINE: Poems (Nightwood Editions, 2024), a book of fire, climate and crisis, includingdeforestation, mining and other increasingly-devastating resource-extractions. Ashis author biography inside the collection reads, Rader is the “award-winning authorof six volumes of poetry, a collection of stories and a book of nonfiction,”the last title on that list being Visual Inspection (Gibsons BC: NightwoodEditions, 2019) [see my review of such here]. Composed across twenty momentsorganized in four cluster-sections (as well as a further poem, hidden aspost-script, just after the acknowledgments and author biography), the poems inFINE articulate “a vision of the present from a deep future, chartingthe porous borderlands of the self and the social through a year of cataclysm.”There might be those who don’t recall that particular year, existing within theCovid-era, of the British Columbia fires, and this collection exists as an intriguingcounterpoint to Delta, British Columbia poet Kim Trainor’s new long poem aroundthe same geography and subject matter, A blueprint for survival: poems (Toronto ON: Guernica Editions, 2024), a book I’ve yet to fully delve into.

Acrossthe poems of FINE, Rader offers long, meditative stretches, almost as asingle, meditative length, through this year of catastrophe, offering a thoughtful,quiet and slow-moving sketchwork of point-form, writing of visiting his brother’sfarm, watching the landscape hollowed out and the aftermath of a season oforange skies. As the poem “Working on My Brother’s Farm in Errington, BC”writes: “When we read / a silence / we change it. I can’t tell you / what it’slike / to be outside / language / inside language. The tall grass / at the edge/ of the field makes shapes / in the breeze [.]” These are poems that existfrom within a changing landscape, and one that sits nervously on a precipice ofcomplete environmental, entirely man-made, collapse. Throughout, Rader offerslovely sequences of sharp moments, turns and observations across a poem-suiteof sharp attention, deep concern and an abiding engagement with his landscape. Really,it is just as much the pacing of his short lines and line-breaks that makethese poems as any other element, moving at exactly the correct speed as itmakes its way down the page. As well, the ‘hidden track’ poem-as-postscript, “LiteReading,” offers its own kind of conclusion to the collection, opening: “Whatdoes a good future look like? / I asked the plum tree / as I steadied myself /on the aluminum stepladder. In its bare branches / the tree held open a fewchoice pages / of daylight to read. That’s what it asks here, I said / but theplum knew that passage / from memory / being a natural, as it were, in the literature/ of water and heat.”

 

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Jose Hernandez Diaz

Jose Hernandez Diaz is a 2017 NEA PoetryFellow. He is the author of The Fire Eater (Texas Review Press, 2020), Bad Mexican, Bad American (Acre Books, 2024), The Parachutist (SundressPublications, 2025) and Portrait of the Artist as a Brown Man (Red Hen Press,2025). He has been published in The American Poetry Review, The Yale Review,The London Magazine, Poetry Wales, The Iowa Review, Huizache, Círculo dePoesía, Periódico de Poesía, The Missouri Review, Epoch Magazine, The Nation,Poetry, The Progressive, Poets.org, The Southern Review, and in The BestAmerican Nonrequired Reading. He teaches generative workshops for Hugo House,Lighthouse Writers Workshops, The Writer's Center, and elsewhere. Additionally,he serves as a Poetry Mentor in The Adroit Journal Summer Mentorship Program.

2 - How did youcome to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?

I actually started with short fictionin high school and undergrad. My last semester of undergrad I took a poetryworkshop with C. S. Giscombe. It was interesting but I was still very new topoetry. After I graduated with an English degree I didn’t know what I wanted todo. I started going to the public library where I discovered contemporary Poetsof Color. Octavio Paz. Marcus Wicker. Joy Harjo. Francisco X. Alarcon. Alurista. Victoria Chang. That’s when Irealized I could not only study poetry but write it as well.

4 - Where does apoem usually begin for you? Are you an author of short pieces that end upcombining into a larger project, or are you working on a "book" fromthe very beginning?

I usually start with a title or astriking image. I often like to write about iconic Mexican and Mexican Americanimagery or symbols like boxing, piñatas, sombreros, mariachis, jaguars, famlia,etc. Also, in my prose poetry, I tend to create characters and write frompersona and third person, like the Man in a Pink Floyd Shirt or the Man in a“Kafka for President” Shirt.

5 - Are publicreadings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort ofwriter who enjoys doing readings?

I enjoy doing readings in moderation.Sometimes they can be surprising and thrilling. Sometimes they can bedisappointing and low turnout. Sometimes I have social anxiety. Sometimes Iembrace it and go with the flow. Oftentimes, though, I spend more time onwriting and reading and teaching than performing.

9 - What is thebest piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?

“Don’t compare yourself to others.” Iheard Eduardo C. Corral tweet that before and I think it is solid advice.

10 - What kind ofwriting routine do you tend to keep, or do you even have one? How does atypical day (for you) begin?

Right now a lot of my writing hasbeen responding to prompts I create for my generative workshops.

11 - When yourwriting gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a betterword) inspiration?

Prompts. Reading. Music. Space. Timeaway from writing.

Not looking for it. When it finds meit will come.

Maybe I need time away from it?

12 - What fragrancereminds you of home?

From childhood? Chlorine from thepool in the apartments I grew up in. From adolescence: pan dulce from thepanderia.

13 - David W.McFadden once said that books come from books, but are there any other formsthat influence your work, whether nature, music, science or visual art?

MF DOOM, Chicano Batman, Ramon Ayala,The Get Up Kids (music), the beach (nature), Philosophy (academics), Picasso,Kahlo, Rivera, ASCO, Jackson Pollock and Lee Krasner, Basquiat, my friends whowrote graffiti for DFLK, JPAK…

15 - What would youlike to do that you haven't yet done?

Teach full-time at an MFA Program,working with up and coming poets!

16 - If you couldpick any other occupation to attempt, what would it be? Or, alternately, whatdo you think you would have ended up doing had you not been a writer?

Maybe boxing or guitarist, not forbrutalist reasons, but I would’ve had to have started young.

18 - What was thelast great book you read? What was the last great film?

Instructions for the Soon-to-beBeheaded by Shivani Mehta. The Williams Sisters movie a couple years agobrought me to tears; inspirational.

19 - What are youcurrently working on?

Teaching workshops online. Readingsand interviews for Bad Mexican, Bad American. The Parachutist (SundressPublications, 2025); Portrait of the Artist as a Brown Man (Red Hen Press,2025).

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

new from above/ground press : Smith + Hall, eleftherion, Wren, Ebbitt, Deutch, Flemmer, Smith, carisse, Ballard, Burnham + The Peter F Yacht Club/VERSeFest Special,

; The Green Rose, in collaboration, Steven Ross Smith + Phil Hall $6 ; The Peter F Yacht Club #33/2024 VERSeFest Special, lovingly hand-crafted, folded, stapled, edited and carried around in bags of envelopes by rob mclennan $6 ; abject sutures, melissa eleftherion $5 ; From Desire Without Expectation, Jacob Wren $5 ; HYSTERICAL PREGNANCY, Katie Ebbitt $5 ; new york ironweed, Amanda Deutch $5 ; Alternate histories, Kyle Flemmer $5 ; Some Failed Eternity, Pete Smith $5 ; In The Margins. . . . . .of french translations found and remixed by russell carisse, russell carisse $5 ; BUSY SECRET, Micah Ballard $5 ; The Old Man: new stories, Clint Burnham $5 ;

keep an eye on the above/ground press blog for author interviews, new writing, reviews, upcoming readings and tons of other material; see the previous batch of backlist from January-February 2024 here; and don't forget that Touch the Donkey [a small poetry journal] is still in the midst of a tenth anniversary sale!

published in Ottawa by above/ground press
February-March 2024
a/g subscribers receive a complimentary copy of each
and there's still time to subscribe for 2024! (easily backdated,

To order, send cheques (add $1 for postage; in US, add $2; outside North America, add $5) to: rob mclennan, 2423 Alta Vista Drive, Ottawa ON K1H 7M9. E-transfer or PayPal at at rob_mclennan (at) hotmail.com or the PayPal button (above). Scroll down here to see various backlist titles, or click on any of the extensive list of names on the sidebar (many, many things are still in print).

Review copies of any title (while supplies last) also available, upon request.

Forthcoming chapbooks by ryan fitzpatrick, Mckenzie Strath, Kacper Bartczak (trans. by Mark Tardi), John Levy, alex benedict, Helen Hajnoczky, Ryan Skrabalak, Hope Anderson, MAC Farrant, Julia Polyck-O'Neill, Sacha Archer, Dale Tracy, Saba Pakdel, Peter Myers, Terri Witek and David Phillips (among others, most likely); what else might 2024 bring?

Johanna Skibsrud, MEDIUM

 

“LET THEM SLICE OFF OURHEADS”

“Let them slice off ourheads in the desert,” I whispered.
“Let our eyes roll uptoward the heavens; let our bodies
turn to dust and be blownin four directions from our
bones.”

I packed two sandwichesand an extra pair of stockings—
took my brother along.

When my uncle found us inthe marketplace and
delivered us back home,my mother shook her fist,
then knelt and sobbedinto her sleeve.

We tend to imagine ourlives as though they are in
themselves a limit ratherthan a tool or simple accessory,
like a knocker on a door.

I used to weep over thepassion until my head ached and I
could no longer see.

My father’s father was aJew, condemned; my mother
desired nothing more thanto lead a quiet, Christian life.

I hear loud noises in my head,which make it hard to
write this down.

Thelatest from Johanna Skibsrud [see her 2009 ’12 or 20 questions’ interview here],a writer who “divides her time between Tucson, Arizona, and Cape Breton, Nova Scotia”is the poetry collection MEDIUM (Toronto ON: Book*hug Press, 2024), acollection that “shares the lives and perspectives of women who – in theirroles as biological, physical, or spiritual mediums – have helped to shape thecourse of history.” The author of three previous collections of poetry, threenovels and three non-fiction titles, as she writes to open her “PREFACE”: “Thisproject began a decade ago, while I was pregnant with my first child. I keptthinking during that time, and afterward—through those first all-consumingyears of parenthood, two miscarriages, and the birth of my second child—about theways in which women have served as mediums throughout history, and of the waysthey continue to serve. I thought of and looked again for guidance from thepowerful women whose bodies, minds, and spirits have acted as conduits ofknowledge and intuition; as points of convergence for the past, present, andthe future; as concrete points of channeling and accessing a way forward—or sideways,or otherwise.”

Thepoems that make up MEDIUM are carved and constructed in a kind oflayering, providing different elements across a book-length project almost as apolyphonic call-and-response. Skibsrub’s lyrics and asides offer a multitude ofvoices, structures and perspectives, from Helen of Troy to Anne Boleyn, MarieCurie to Roe vs. Wade, and Shakuntala Devi to Hypatia of Alexandria. The effectis almost choral, offering threads on and around multiple figures vilifiedacross history, reclaiming the stories, purpose and legacies of an array ofhistorical women. “We don’t know either Julian of Norwich’s real name or / whather life was like before she recorded her Revelations / of DivineLove—the first known book to be written by a / woman in the Englishlanguage,” Skibsrud writes, “in the 14th century. Some / suspect shewas a mother before taking her vows, and that / during the plague years she mayhave lost one or more chil- / dren.” Skibsrud writes akin to an anthology thatleans into theatrical script, as different characters, including the narrator,take their turns in the spotlight. As the poem “SOMETIMES, I TELL MY DAUGHTER,/ YOU MAY FEEL” begins:

“Sometimes,” I tell mydaughter, “you may feel
one thing so strongly itseems it’s the only true thing.”

“But then the feelingsplits into two, and you find
there are other truethings.”

She holds onto my handand doesn’t look up.

“It’s also possible, ofcourse, to feel more than one thing.
Or for a single feelingto break down steadily into other
feelings over time.”

She begins to cry.There’s nothing more I can do. There
are, after all, only avery few hours in the day; they, at
least, do not divideendlessly.

I turn. She reaches after—.

Thereis a curious call-and-response element Skibsrud that employs in her book-lengthstructure, offering poems with the occasional aside, akin to Greek chorus,providing further information and foundation to what it is she is slowlybuilding. The narratives and legacies that Skibsrud weaves together alongside thoseof her (presumably) own first-person domestic considerations, including conversationswith her daughter, utilize language to offer both warning and study, seeking toprovide perspectives on histories lost or set aside, and what lessons might begarnered from those stories. The effect of becoming a mother to a youngdaughter, as Skibsrud, through both preface and the poems themselves suggest, pushthrough a further examination of the legacies of women, and how too often thosewith something to offer have been ignored, pushed aside or silenced. I wonderif Skibsrud is aware of Gale Marie Thompson’s remarkable Helen Or My Hunger(Portland OR: YesYes Books, 2020) [see my review of such here], which focuses abook-length lyric gaze around Helen of Troy? Skibsrud’s aside to introduce thepoem “LET THEM SLICE OFF OUR HEADS” reads:

Teresa of Ávila(1515-1582) was a Spanish mystic, writer, religious reformer, and spiritualguide. Her paternal grandfather had been a marrano, or converted Jew, at onepoint condemned by the Inquisition for returning to his Jewish faith. But Teresawas born a Christian and a noblewoman—her father having purchased a knighthoodafter securing success in the wool trade. Teresa was introduced to mysticwritings and romance novels by her mother and, as a child, dreamed of runningaway to North Africa in order to martyr herself there. At the age of twenty,she entered a convent and, after struggling with doubt, achieved the powerfulconnection with God she desired. Her fellow nuns were sometimes obliged to siton her, or tie her down, in order to keep her ecstatic and sometimes painfulvisions from quite literally carrying her away.