Rob Mclennan's Blog, page 11

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Éireann Lorsung

Éireann Lorsung [photo credit: David Torralva] works in a field of images, objects, movement, and texts, and especially in the overlap between printmaking and poetry. Her publications include The Century, winner of the Maine Literary Award in Poetry, Her book, and Music for Landing Planes By , named a 'new and noteworthy collection' by Poets & Writers. Pattern-book (2025) is newly out from Carcanet Press, and Milkweed Editions will publish Pink Theory! in 2026. She is a 2016 NEA Fellow and held the 2025 Mary Routt Endowed Chair of Writing at Scripps College.

[Éireann Lorsung reads in Dublin at Books Upstairs on Sunday, July 13 at 2pm with Canadian writers rob mclennan and Christine McNair, and Irish poet Christodoulos Makris]

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, Music For Landing Planes By, was also my MFA thesis (in a revised form), and that it was published at all that changed my life—or, really, what I understood to be possible for me. My teacher at the University of Minnesota, William Reichard, had had us write post-MFA publication trajectories as part of our thesis class. I had very sincerely written that I planned to make a dozen copies of my manuscript and leave them on public buses, benches, and in the grocery store. This was the extent of my interest in publication at the time. To his credit, Bill knew me well enough to know that I was totally serious, and he sent my manuscript to Milkweed without my knowledge. (I have no qualms about this. I would not have submitted the manuscript on my own, possibly ever.) Without Bill, I doubt I would have had a first book, which means I would not have had my second or third collections with Milkweed either. I am certain I would still be writing and publishing in all kinds of forms—making books myself, publishing other people—but my sense of myself as participating in literature in public would likely be very different. Bill's generosity and perceptiveness opened a path for me I would not have known was there, or how to open, for myself.

My most recent collection, Pattern-book, is in some ways very close to Music For Landing Planes By. It's different from the intervening two collections which are in some ways more rangey. Pattern-book contains mostly short poems (≤ two pages). Most of these are in the lyric tradition that was given to me as the primary tradition of anglophone poetry when I was a student. Like that first book, I can see my attraction to and tendency to think using image in this new collection. I also see certain religious principles—wonder at bigness and complexity, the preciousness of living things—at work in both books. This collection is different from my first collection, though, in part because time has passed and I have lived away from the city where I was brought up (though Minneapolis still figures prominently in these poems). I can now also understand my writing reflectively and contextually in ways I couldn't when I was a younger writer, and I think this has allowed me to structure the new book in more intricate ways; I can rely on my acuity of perception as well as on the intuition that years of reading gave me.

2 - How did you come to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?
My parents gave me poetry alongside visual art and music and things to eat and places to go, one of many ordinary beautiful things that should be and can be democratically available. We had some children's poetry books, and when I was in high school my dad gave me his copy of Edna St Vincent Millay's Poems Selected for Young People. But books were just around. My dad taught special ed and had done a teaching Master's and so he had the books from that in the house—he had loved and still revered his poetry teacher—and so I read Understanding Poetry and other such textbooks when I was in high school as well. We didn't have a ton of money, but we did have great access to the public library, to public museums like the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, and to music both on the radio and in our house. So poetry was just a normal part of life, one more thing that was possible.

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 am always "collecting data"—literally collecting instances of plants or weather or bus routes, among other things. And I am always assembling poems and other things from that data and from observations and impressions. Projects are less things I begin and more things I realize are happening when I put a frame around some of the things that are already ongoing. Because I am writing all the time—not very much at a time, but in a more or less continuous way—by the time my brain catches up and begins to suggest forms or 'project' ideas, the work is almost always there in pieces. So things come slowly and then happen quickly. That means tracing a single draft is, at least in the last five or ten years, less straightforward. And in fact I'm interested in the way the same phrase, image, idea may recur across poems or other work, without ever getting "used up".

4 - Where does a poem or work of prose 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?
As above, I tend to be-writing and then realize certain conceptual or formal likenesses that are taking place. I generally then respond to these, amplifying or complementing them. Once I have a book in mind, it often helps me reframe and reposition individual poems—ones I had thought were definitely in may be sorted out by a given frame, and others brought in. For example, when I was writing The Century, one working title was Mother Country, Fatherland, and then I had a number of poems in the manuscript that more directly thought about family structures. Those are almost all gone in the book that ended up being published—not because I didn't like them, but because the focusing idea in the book shifted and they no longer did what I wanted the book to do. I do think about books as forms in themselves, and though I don't write toward a book necessarily, I do revise toward the book once I know what it is, meaning thinking about what poems go in, in what order, and why.

5 - Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?
I love to read. I love to perform. To me, speaking poems in public is an essential part of writing/publishing. What I read, and how, depends on what the audience is, where we are, what time of day it is. I like to think about performance as yet another way of revising the poems or the book—a separate, but related, project. Reading aloud to others is about equal to the thrill of being translated, to me. Audiences are a true gift.

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?
Yes, I am trying to figure out how language does what it does. I am also interested in charisma: how can the writing convince the world to look (not necessarily at the writing but at the world)? What are the uses of charisma on the page and how does it appear? And I am also trying to see what it's like to work in as narrow a circumference as I can, and, relatedly, how to insist that nothing is beneath notice. I am trying to ask myself to stay with things I might be tempted to say have been resolved, or can be taken for granted. I am trying to ask myself, "how do you know?" when I say, "I know".

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 think the role of the writer should be like the role of the bus driver, librarian, teacher, grocery store worker, post officer, etc.: to do what you do as fully as possible, with as deep a sense of being among other people whose lives are as real and precious as your own as possible. To be attentive and to care for others' attentiveness. To take time and to make a world in which others can also take time.

8 - Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?
I think this depends on the editor. I know that being read with care and precision is one of the greatest gifts—and so rare. I recently had the experience of being copy-edited by the Kenyon Review editors and it was so thorough and so attentive to every detail. It felt like having a very good doctor. They really had figured out what I meant and caught tiny gradations of meaning that I hadn't been able to. In general I find working with editors—who tend to be readers who are both committed and open at the same time—a very welcome thing.

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

10 - How easy has it been for you to move between genres (poetry to prose to the graphic essay)? What do you see as the appeal?
Generally very easy, but also perhaps not so much about appeal or even decision anymore. I have gotten to a point where I can kind of sense what the texture of the idea is and what kind of form it will want. Sometimes this gets revised in the making, or I reprise the idea in another form or genre. But generally the ideas come with their forms and genre demands attached.

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?
Right now I don't have a writing routine in the standard sense (a certain duration of writing on a regular schedule). We have had a very unsettled few years—since 2020, really—and I deal with unsettledness by establishing short-term constraints that I can respond to. For example, from March of 2023 through March of 2024, I wrote an essay every week and posted it online in a public space. I also keep running notes, added to almost daily on my walk to work and on errands, where I track plant and animal life as well as weather and encounters with human beings—these are for a longer-term project that I don't yet know the form of. When I have a deadline, I get that work done in a number of short stints—usually I can write an essay in a few sittings, and revise in a few more. But I long for a time when I know we will not be moving, I know that we have stable employment, and I can imagine just writing for an hour every day. I struggle to do that when I feel like there are so many things up in the air. Like a lot people probably, my day generally begins by looking at the texts I've gotten overnight. I try to read on paper after that, and not to look at news or Bluesky until after breakfast.

12 - When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?
Repeating something I've already done is one of my go-to methods for unsticking myself.

13 - What fragrance reminds you of home?
Soda bread or brownies baking; Lemon Pledge (dusting fluid).

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 of these! And philosophy as well. I don't know how to make work except to be looking at pictures, reading books and papers and poems, listening to lectures, walking around in the world, listening to music. Of course this means that some of the things I make don't act "like poems"; I have had people tell me, on several occasions, that my poems are "too philosophical" to be poems (no), or that they "have no form" (no), or that my wide focus means my life "doesn't make sense" (also no). But I understand that my breadth of interests and inputs means that I am not always making things in ways that are recognizable, including to myself. I make them to find out what they might be.

15 - What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?
People writing now: Christina Sharpe, whose In The Wake is a central text for method and also poetics for me; her Ordinary Notes is also in my pantheon. Kiese Laymon—he is able to say clearly what he means, and I love the chapter called "Meager" in Heavy especially. He seems to have a real commitment to transparency and to know what he values and why. I admire that. Tressie McMillan Cottom, similarly, for her clarity and commitments, and also for the way she writes sociology for a broad audience without giving in to the (false) idea that that audience can't handle complexity. Gillian Allnutt, the living writer I feel is closest to Dickinson. Kate Zambreno, whose Heroines and To Write as if Already Dead are precious to me. Leslie Marmon Silko for Ceremony , one of the most perfect books in the world. Thomas A. Clark, whose work with his wife Laurie Clark I find a beautiful model of an artist's life, and whose Farm By The Shore is a delight from start to finish. Similarly, the life-work of Erica Van Horn and Simon Cutts, who run Coracle Press—and whose 'writing' extends to the deeply creative acts of housemaking and housekeeping—is very inspirational to me.

16 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?
I would like to own a house and be able to live in one place for a decade at least. I'd like to be able to paint the walls and plant some fruit trees and get used to staying. And I would like to have steady and consistent access to healthcare.

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 would love to be an orchestra conductor. If I weren't writing—but I can't imagine a life where I was not making poems and other things—I am sure I would be teaching. Teaching is and always has been the primary way I think of my occupation.

18 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something else?
It was there, it was free, and it could be done anytime. And reading alone and with others always felt good.

19 - What was the last great book you read? What was the last great film?
Lara Pawson's Spent Light. Films: in the theater, Perfect Days . At home, Before Sunrise .

20 - What are you currently working on?
A book dealing with the artist Corita Kent, for whom teaching was as important as her art practice, about teaching and artmaking and the worlds that collaboration opens up for both. I'm also working on things to do with others—workshops making concrete poems using screenprinting; a series of banner-making sessions that lead to public processions.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

Ongoing notes: the ottawa small press book fair (part three : Claudia Souto Cuello (trans. by the author + Stuart Ross,

[Mia Morgan of Coven Editions and Dr. Dessa Bayrock of post ghost press]

[see the first part of these notes here; see the second part of these notes here]

Cobourg ON/Switzerland: Every few months, thereemerges further conversation how there isn’t enough literary translation occurringthrough Canadian publishing (Jérôme Melançon conducted a really compelling interviewrecently with Yilin Wang, for example, posted over at periodicities: ajournal of poetry and poetics), so it was good to see Swiss poet Claudia Souto Cuello’s chapbook, A braced triptych, translated from the Frenchby Stuart Ross & the author (Proper Tales Press, 2025). As the authorbiography mentions, Cuello “inherited the Spanish and French languages from herSpanish parents living in Switzerland. After working for years as a vegetablegrower, she published her first collection of poetry, Marina (éditionsdu goudron et des plumes, 2023).” The pieces in the collection exist as threepoem-clusters that could be three poems, or three cluster-sections—“Cathedralof Leaves,” “A little patch of yellow wall” and “The Ornaments”—each of whichexist through a blend of prose-stanzas and individual lines. The structureoffers a curious counterpoint of structures within poems, within pieces, thatplay multiple rhythms, narrative purposes, and declarative sentences. WhereasCuello’s poems lean into prose poem structures, there’s elements of theextended first-person meditative and declarative line of such as the late EtelAdnan (1925-2021), working a kind of lyric diary of the moment, running throughthe light and the dark of the current moment, or at least the moments across thetime of composition. Might Ross be working to get a full collection of thesehappening? I would certainly hope so.

When the fog arrived, thetimeworn lavoir and the weathered fountain tucked their necks into the hunched shoulders.Alone, circling the trees, tree by tree, I hung my words on the little coatracks of their leaves, like a little dictionary made of dry branches. And so itcame to me that I had nothing left to say. Trapped in this bottle-green, to bedrunk before winter arrives, my suspended words looked down on me.

 

 

 

 

 

 

{Before the lightfollowed me, I stepped in}

 

sign up for our VERSeFest/VERSe Ottawa email list!

hey! did you know that VERSeFest: Ottawa's International Poetry Festival now has an email list you can sign up for? You can do all of that here, if such appeals . We're aiming for monthly posts (at most), with information on upcoming readings, possible workshops and what our two Poets Laureate have been doing or will be doing, also. We're also starting to think about our Spring 2026 festival (our sixteenth year!), so that's pretty exciting, don't you think?

You probably already know, separately, about my weekly "Tuesday poem" email list , which offers a new weekly poem (more than six hundred poets and poems offered to date), which also includes the occasional update around my own activity. as well as above/ground press, Touch the Donkey [a small poetry journal] , the ottawa small press book fair,  periodicities: a journal of poetry and poetics , the monthly SPOTLIGHT series, Chaudiere Books, my clever substack, the above/ground press substack, the (ottawa) small press almanac , etcetera. There's an awful lot to keep track of, honestly.

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Alicia Swain

Alicia Swain is theauthor of  Steel Slides and Yellow Walls,  afeminist poetry collection releasing in August 2025. Her work has been featuredin several online publications, including Vast Chasm and TheVehicle. Swain studied English at Penn State University andEastern Illinois University. She can be found on her website at aliciaswain.com, onBluesky as @aliciamswain.bsky.social, andon Instagram as @aliciamswain.   

1 - How did yourfirst book change your life? How does your most recent work compare toyour previous? How does it feel different? 

While there aremany experiences to come still, the process of working with a publisherwas eye-opening. It showed me my weak spots and what crutches I useto hide them, what words I have a habit of repeating and why, andwhat themes I bury in my work that I don’t always mean toinclude. Since editing Steel Slides and Yellow Walls, I’ve foundmyself exploring different poetic forms and writing far longerpieces than I did before. I think learning about what I didthat worked, and what didn’t, allowed me to feel more confidentand eager to try new things. The newcollection I’ve written, but is not yet published, has acompletely different feel to it.  

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

I’ve beendrawn to poetry since I was in middle school, which is when an Englishteacher really opened my eyes to it (thanks, Mrs. Troop!). Something aboutits concision and abstract nature speaks to me, and writing poetry comes morenaturally than any other form of writing. I can write apoem on any day at any time, from the minute Iwake up to seconds before I fall asleep.  

3 - How long doesit take to start any particular writing project?Does your writing initially come quickly, or is it a slow process? Dofirst drafts appear looking close to their final shape, or does your work comeout of copious notes? 

When it comes topoetry, the ideas come quickly, but the organization comes slowly. The firstdraft will emerge, but when I read my work through for the firsttime, I often find unexpected threads and thematic connections. In a way, Ilike to let the ideas pour out as they arrive and worry about the restlater.  

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? 

For my debutcollection, Steel Slides and Yellow Walls, itwas a matter of writing short pieces over time and eventually putting them intoa collection. I’m certain I will do that again in the future,but the next collection I am working on is more chronological and waswritten with the intention of being a book from day one.  

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

I enjoy doingreadings, and I am actually seeking more opportunities to dothem these days. One thing I’ve discovered, however, is that Ineed to approach work I intend to read aloud differently than work I intend topublish on paper. I love to play with form and use the placement of text on apage to add meaning, and that doesn’t always translate wellaloud.   

6 - Do you haveany theoretical concerns behind your writing? What kinds of questions areyou trying to answer with your work? What do you even think the currentquestions are? 

Feminist theorytakes center stage in a lot of my work, in one way oranother. I want to follow the threads that formed thecloth women are forced to wear because I want to find the knot holdingit all together and untie it. It’s my hopethat what I write can answer questions about the present and thefuture: how do we experience the systems in place? What can a womanachieve when she is not burdened by oppressive systems? What would ittake to build a more idyllic world that’s built with equality in itsroots?  

7 – What doyou see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Do they evenhave one? What do you think the role of the writer should be? 

Ibelieve it’s the job of writers and artists to take risksand show the truth about our world without letting the fear of othersdampen our message. In America, we are seeing a lot of book bansand threats that aim to silence the creative world. Ithink it’s up to writers to criticize loudly, to tell thestories of real people and their experiences, and to craft paths forwardbecause our creativity and our ability to portray new ideas haspower.  

8 - Do you findthe process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)? 

I love workingwith an editor. Like any art form, writing gets interpreted by peoplethat don’t know my mind or my intentions. An outside editor can comein and see where my intentions are getting lost andwhat opportunities I missed. Every opportunity I haveto work with an editor, I emerge with new ideas andfeel inspired. I welcome critique. I know everything Ido won’t be effective the first time around,and that’s okay.  

9 - What isthe best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to youdirectly)? 

When I was incollege, I took a course with Robin Becker. She was tough asnails and asked every poet to take the course as seriously as they wouldtake any other subject. I adored her, and, to thisday, still think about what I learned from her.That advice, to take art seriously and treat it asrespectfully as one would calculus or physics, gave me alaser focus and shaped me moving forward.  

10 - How easy hasit been for you to move between genres (poetry to non-fiction to fiction todrama)? What do you see as the appeal? 

I think writingother genres teaches me to be a better poet, but I also think being a poetshapes my narrative style with prose. I am working on a speculative fictionnovel, and how I choose to approach describing setting or a character’sexperience is often rooted in poetic language. That said, learningto branch out and shift from brevity to a more uninhibited structurerequires some serious mental exercise. I notice that I tend to focus oneither a larger poetry project or my novel, butnever both at once, because it is too challenging to switchmodes. When I return to the other genre, everything feels fresh, andI have a renewed outlook on how to approach the work.  

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 should have moreof a routine than I do. I have a habit of starting poems when I get up andget ready in the morning, so it’s integrated in my regularroutine in a way. I’ll jot down lines in my Notes app and come backto it later in the evening. Saturdays are the only time I get to fullyimmerse myself in writing for as many hours as I would like, andso it’s my favorite day of the week.  

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

For better or forworse, when I feel stuck on a piece, I start something new. A new project isalways invigorating. This sometimes means, as in the case with my novel,that a project doesn’t get finished for some time, but when Ireturn to it, I have a new perspective and fresh eyes.  

13 - What wasyour last Hallowe'en costume? 

I’ll behonest, I haven’t dressed up in several years! COVID definitelychanged that for me. I did buy all the needed pieces toembody Galadriel for an evening a couple years back,so it’s high time I broke that out.  

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

Nature and visualart inspire a lot of my work. I have an ekphrastic chapbooksearching for its home as we speak, so I have a lot of love forwriting inspired by art. As for nature, I draw connections between ourlives as humans and the ways of nature very regularly, including in Steel Slides and Yellow Walls. It’s mygoal to find myself back in a mountainous, rural area to soak in the naturalbeauty and let it guide my hand.  

15 -What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply yourlife outside of your work? 

For many years, Iread only speculative fiction and poetry for pleasure. At this point in mylife, however, I find nonfiction important for my work becauseit allows me to immerse myself in subjects that align with what I am currentlywriting about. Since difficult topics like sexual violence andhomophobia are very present in what I’m writingnow, I’ve been reading works like Is Rape a Crime? byMichelle Bowdler, The Stonewall Reader by the New York PublicLibrary, and, currently, Missoula by Jon Krakauer.  

16 -What would you like to do that you haven't yet done? 

I am determined tofind an agent for my speculative fiction novel. I love poetryand frequently abandon prose projects to satisfy my curiosity aboutnew poetry ideas, but I really want to see through finishing andpublishing a novel traditionally.  

17 - If you couldpick any other occupation to attempt, what would it be? Or,alternately, what do you think you would have ended up doing had you notbeen a writer? 

A piece of mewishes I pursued law school. I love tearing apart the language of a documentand finding its weak points, pondering the art of persuasion, and fightingfor what I believe in. Whenever I read about or watch a movie about a lawyerthat uses their knowledge and skill set to improve people’s lives, I feel soinspired and wish I could do the same. The justice system is flawed, andlawyers are essential for helping people navigate itscomplexities.  

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

While it’s notall I do for a living, writing is my passion and has always been. Putting wordsto paper comes more naturally to me than any other means of expression or anyother subject. When I went to college, I tried to fight that at first. Ithought I might be a psychologist or an engineer, but I knew, deep in myheart, that writing and literature were what I loved and wanted to spend mylife surrounded with.  

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

This is toughbecause I’ve been reading a lot of stellar books lately. I wouldsay The 272 by Rachel L. Swarns and, like so manypeople are talking about right now, James by PercivalEverett are two that have really stuck with me. As for film,I haven’t been watching many movieslately because I’ve been watching a lot ofseries at home. I finally got my husband to watch Breaking Bad recently, which was fun to revisit.  

20 - What areyou currently working on? 

I am currentlysending out a poetry collection about endometriosis and an ekphrastic chapbookto publishers to find a home for them. Steel Slides and Yellow Walls andsome of my volunteer work has been taking a lot of my free time lately,but I am trying to return to my novel to get a full round of editing completedand get it one step closer to query-ready.  

12or 20 (second series) questions;

Ongoing notes: the ottawa small press book fair (part two : Pearl Pirie, Sacha Archer + STUMPT 7 + issue eight,

[nina jane drystek, jwcurry + Chris Johnson doing the first of their two sound performances mid-fair]

[see the first part of these notes here]

Toronto ON/rural QC: From Quebec poet Pearl Pirie comes the chapbook we astronauts (Pinhole Poetry, 2025), a titlethe acknowledgements suggest “could be considered a sequel to Sex in Sevens(above/ground, Sept. 2016).” With a poetics that includes collage-movement andhaiku, this small collection again works Pirie’s own familiar forms whileexpanding her nuance, her repertoire, of poetic assemblage, collision, sketch-notesand density. “inside the exquisite loss of everything / except where skin knowssweat,” begins the poem “vacation day,” “time and all else will be someone else’sproblem, / here is birdsong and wave crash, // eyelash and breath, lips as ifwarmed silk / and a hiking up onto one elbow.” Her phrases almost readaccumulatively, with the slight disconnect between each one, allowing the poemto exist in the collision between descriptive phrases. What amuses, as well, isPirie’s further inclusion into the ongoing “Sex at 31” series [see my own noteson the origins of the project here, and my participation in same], her “sex atfifty,” a two-page poem that opens with “perhaps I have seen my last / set ofmenstrual cramps. // I never needed to collect / the whole bleeding set.” and endswith the couplet: “eight minutes until a / teleconferencing call.”

light on your feet

how did it take decades
for the full moon tocatch
you, the sun? yoursunspots,
your corona flare ofbacklit hair
the dinner plate of light
on your chest, and your
shoulder blades as you
rise to turn down the heat
at 9pm, the moonlight is
music scoring your ribs,
and hip notch,
slips with my eyes
down to the horizon
of your fine, sculpted
delectable ankles,arches.

Hamilton ON/Achill, Co. Mayo, Ireland: There is abeautiful compactness to Hamilton (formerly Burlington) poet, publisher, editor Sacha Archer’s latest, the delicately-lovely Second Sight (Ireland: Redfoxpress,April 2025), a title subtitled “(36 Masks)” and produced as a hardcoveredition, number 214 in the “C’est mon dada” series, a “collection for visualpoetry, experimental texts and works influenced by Dada and Fluxus.” I’mfascinated by these blends of handwritten text and physical object, image,stitch and erasure, and would want to hear far more on his process around sucha project, and how far he might take such structures in subsequent work. Andwhile the production for such an object is wonderfully graceful, I do hopethere is an opportunity to see these works in larger renderings at some point. Asthe introduction to the collection offers:

The work of Second Sightrepurposes facsimiles of so-called famous/canonical MSS to create masks in whatis both a gesture of looking backward and forward. While reconsidering themanuscripts themselves, their relevance and legibility (handwriting andcontent) to the contemporary reader, the act of creating masks transforms theMSS into surface matter or, raw material, which is to say, the concrete. The mask,being a loaded tool both for its intended use as a transformative piece of costumeand for its trans-cultural historical presence, not to mention the colonialexoticization of African masks met in Modernism, primarily in the work ofPicasso, makes of the mask a powerful vessel for a leap of faith which is theblind gesture forward, concretizing the MSS via cutting and the addition ofbanal (read totemic) objects into masks which cannot be worn, but which mayreveal.

Stuart Ross, Proper Tales Press

Kingston ON: If you’ve never encountered anypublications from Kingston writer, editor and publisher Michael e. Casteels, throughhis Puddles of Sky Press, I would highly recommend: at any small press fair youmight encounter Casteels at his table, quietly staping, cutting, folding andassembling small publications throughout the day, throughout the afternoon. Twoof his latest include the envelope STUMPT 7 (64 copies; June 2025) and theJapanese-sewn STUMPT issue eight (60 copies; June 2025), all hand-stamped(echoing jwcurry’s own infamous production, through his 1cent series and other productions via Room 302 Books) by the publisher himself. There is a kind ofcare, an attention, to publications and processes such as these thatphotocopied items are simply unable to replicate: consider that this is notsixty-some copies of a single poem, but sixty-some times the publisherhand-printed each poem, each line, in the same way on each slice of carvedpaper. One has to admire the patience, and the attention, as well as the craft.STUMPT 7 is made up of three poems on cards, one per card: an untitledpoem by Hamilton writer Gary Barwin, BC poet Dale Tracy’s “Soft Growth,” and Kingston poet Allison Chisholm’s “Attachment Unavailable,” which I photographed, below:

Mostsmall press publications are very good at offering different elements of piecesby emerging, and established writers, and Casteels works a very nice balance aswell, but working from a far different pool of writers than might ever appear acrossmainstream publishing. STUMPT issue eight, produced with hand-sewn binding,offers a poem each by Keaton Studebaker, John Grey, John Repp, daniel f. bradley,and, on the back cover, which I photographed, below, this piece by DavidRomanda:
 

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Kit Robinson

Kit Robinson is a Bay Area poet, writer, and musician.He was born in Evanston, Illinois in 1949, and earned a BA at Yale University.He is the author of two dozen collections of poetry, including Tunes& Tens (Roof, 2025), Quarantina (Lavender Ink, 2022), ThoughtBalloon (Roof, 2019), Leaves of Class (Chax,2017), Marine Layer (BlazeVOX, 2015) and The MessianicTrees: Selected Poems, 1976-2003 (Adventures in Poetry, 2009). Hispublished collaborations include Individuals with Lyn Hejinian, CloudEight with Alan Bernheimer, and A Mammal of Style with TedGreenwald. Recent poems appear in Brooklyn Rail, Three Fold, TrafficReport, R&R, and The Best American Poetry Pick of the Week.

A collaborator on The Grand Piano:An Experiment in Collective Autobiography, San Francisco 1975–1980 (ModeA, 2010), Robinson has taught with California Poets in the Schools, performedwith San Francisco Poets Theater and, with poet Lyn Hejinian,produced In the American Tree: New Writing by Poets, a weekly BayArea radio show of interviews and readings. Kit has received fellowships fromboth the National Endowment for the Arts and the California Arts Council, aswell as an award from the Fund for Poetry. His papers are collected at TheBancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley. His essays onpoetics, art, travel and music may be found at hiswebsite: www.kitrobinson.net. He lives in Berkeley and plays Cuban tres guitar in thecharanga band Calle Ocho.

Robinson’s most recent publications aretwo reminiscences of Lyn Hejinian, one in the LosAngeles Review of Books and another in ThePoetry Project Newsletter, as well as an appreciation of NeeliCherkovski in TheBrooklyn Rail. He also recently published reviews of books by LynHejinian, Tyrone Williams, Yuko Otomo, Joel Chace, Maureen Owen, and BarbaraHenning.

In a statement on poetics, Kit has said, “Poetryis the heart of language. It’s what’s left after everything else has been takenaway. All the instrumental uses of language are completely necessary. We uselanguage to invite people over, order food, build cities, etc. Take all of itaway and you are left with poetry. The fundamental truth of language is that itis subject to change. Words mean in new ways every century. Words mean in newways every year. In poetry, words mean in new ways every moment. Poetry islanguage on a holiday. Free to go where it will. But it is not jobless. The jobof poetry is to continue, despite everything that is pitted against it.”

1 - How did your first book change your life? How does your most recentwork compare to your previous? How does it feel different?

My first book, Chinatown of Cheyenne, was hand-set and printed onfine paper by Michael Waltuch of Whale Cloth Press in Iowa City in 1974. Itchanged my life by offering irrefutable proof that I was a real poet and startinga steady stream of books from then on. My newest book is Tunes & Tensfrom Roof Books. In it I tried out two new forms: a series of poems written tomusic and a long poem comprising 73 decimas. It feels good to be exploring newwaters.

2 - How did you come to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction ornon-fiction?

I came to poetry as a teenaged fan of Bob Dylan and a reader ofFerlinghetti, Ginsburg, and Kerouac, which led to the New American Poetryanthology and the New York poets Bill Berkson, Peter Schjeldahl, and TedBerrigan, who taught weekly workshops at Yale and introduced us students to thePoetry Project scene in the East Village.

3 - How long does it take to start any particular writing project? Doesyour writing initially come quickly, or is it a slow process? Do first draftsappear looking close to their final shape, or does your work come out ofcopious notes?

After a book comes out, it usually takes me a while to get my arms arounda new project. Once I settle on a mode of production, the work usually proceedsquickly. In the 2010s, I hit on a method of writing 60 lines or an hour,whichever came first. I like to write spontaneously and edit only a little.

4 - Where does a poem usually begin for you? Are you an author of shortpieces that end up combining into a larger project, or are you working on a"book" from the very beginning?

It used to be the former but lately I tend toward the latter.

5 - Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Areyou the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?

Readings are a good way to test out the work, trial balloons kind of. Ido get off on performing. One never knows while writing how the work willappear to others, and the reading allows for immediate feedback. A good readingwill generate a lot of energy in the room. Afterwards people usually want tohang out and talk.

6 - Do you have any theoretical concerns behind your writing? What kindsof questions are you trying to answer with your work? What do you even thinkthe current questions are?

All kinds of theoretical questions, sure. Not that I have all theanswers. Ted Berrigan used to say, “To write great poems you have to have greattheories. And I do have great theories. I just can’t remember what they areright now.”

7 – What do you see the current role of the writer being in largerculture? Do they even have one? What do you think the role of the writer shouldbe?

I think the role of the writer should be to look around and see what’shappening and do whatever it takes to write it down. In that sense we arebearing witness. On the other hand, poetry has a phatic function, which is tosay, “Howdy! Nice to see you!”

8 - Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficultor essential (or both)?

That’s a tricky question. Much of the time I’ve found editors andpublishers are content to publish my poetry as is, or with occasionalsuggestions here and there. Sometimes though, an editor will challenge me to reworka piece or be more specific or put more umph in or something. I find I’m quiteresistant at first, but I try to comply and afterwards usually recognize thatthe work is improved by introducing the constraint of another perspective.

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

Have fun!

10 - How easy has it been for you to move between genres (poetry totranslation)? What do you see as the appeal?

I haven’t done much translation lately. In the 90s, in preparation for atrip to the Soviet Union, I translated the 600-line Ode on Visiting theBelosaraisk Spit on the Sea of Azov by Ilya Kutik. Not having any Russian,I relied on a rough translation by the author plus a series of working sessionswith Lyn Hejinian, who was studying Russian at that time. More recently Itranslated some fragments from the Latin of De Rerum Natura by Lucretiusas part of a study group led by Lyn. The appeal of translation is the challengeof working with another language combined with the opportunity to do things inEnglish one would never otherwise think to do. More broadly, translation opensa transnational conversation that is more important than ever in today’sincreasingly nationalist environment. As writers and poets we sense intuitivelythat we are citizens of the world. The imagination is not restricted bystate-controlled boundaries.

11 - What kind of writing routine do you tend to keep, or do you evenhave one? How does a typical day (for you) begin?

I used to write mostly in the morning after breakfast and coffee. Latelyit’s been more occasional, including the middle of the night. I keep a notebookby my bed for recording dreams and sometimes lines of poetry.

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

Sometimes I just sit and wait. This was the way when I was working by theone-hour rule. Lately I might just walk away and come back later for a freshimpetus.

13 - What was your last Hallowe'en costume?

For many years I have attended my daughter’s Halloween party in the samecostume, that of King Tut. I wear a coiled snake headdress and wear all blackwith a fake gold chain.

14 - David W. McFadden once said that books come from books, but arethere any other forms that influence your work, whether nature, music, scienceor visual art?

All of the above. My poem sequence “Tunes” was written while listening tofavorite music tracks by artists like Henry Threadgill, Thelonius Monk, CarlaBley, and various African and Cuban musicians. My long poem “Tens” includesmany descriptions from nature as well as two ekphrastic stanzas describingpaintings by Edouard Manet. For some years I’ve noticed that quotations crop upin my poetry, lines from poems and songs that have lodged in my head, includingmy some of my own. With “Tens” I decided to add citations in endnotes. Writerscited include Woody Guthrie, Robert Aitkin, Zora Neal Hurston, David Graeber,Douglas Woolf, J.H. Prynne, Sojun Mel Weitsman, Hozan Alan Senauke, AlfredBester, Erik Larson, Frances Richard, John Keats, John Donne, Dave Van Ronk,Farid al-din Attar, John Cage, Edgar Allen Poe, Jules Verne, Robert Grenier,Arkaadi Dragomoshchenko, Karl Marx, Bob Dylan, Ludwig Wittgenstein, and PhilipWhalen.

15 - What other writers or writings are important for your work, orsimply your life outside of your work?

OMG, there are so many. Right now I am rereading the Fictions ofJorge Luis Borges. Other authors I return to are Joseph Conrad, Clarice Lispector, Mario Vargas Llosa, Donald Westlake, Lorenzo Thomas, Lyn Hejinian,Ted Greenwald, Tom Raworth, Clark Coolidge, Anne Tardos, and on and on.

16 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?

I’d like to visit Japan.

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 notbeen a writer?

In elementary school I had to fill out a questionnaire that included thequestion, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” My answer was “writer.” Ithink I was destined to be a writer. I made a living writing press releases andmarketing materials for the tech industry, and then there’s the poetry. Had Inot been a writer, I might have liked to be a musician. Playing guitar andsinging was a form of social life I enjoyed when I was younger. To do soprofessionally would have required more discipline, study, and practice than Icould muster at the time. Later in life I did pursue the study of Afro-Cubanmusic and took up the Cuban tres guitar. My life in music has opened up wholenew networks of teachers, bandmates, friends and fellow enthusiasts.

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

I don’t know. My parents were teachers. I think it just came naturally. Ilike putting one word after another.

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

The Secret History of Costaguana by Juan Gabriel Vasquez. And Touchez Pas au Grisbi
Directed by Jacques Becker.

20 - What are you currently working on?

I seem to be writing poems, not sure yetwhat they will amount to.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

Canadian Poets Series : Peripety and/or Tronies

Happy Canada Day! A whileback, American writer Olivia Cronk invited me to participate in her Peripety and/or Tronies blog, a site that includes, as she offered via email, “establishedwriters with whom i’m friendly & student writers & others who like tothink in writing, etc. not fancy, no gate-keeping.” I was curious at thesuggestion, a thread I could offer in-between all the other notices ofreadings, new publications, interviews and the like. In the end, I thought itwould be interesting to offer Cronk’s students, already attempting to payattention to writing and readings and new publications, a glimpse into some ofthe amazingness of Canadian poetry, especially during the current climate. The “Canadian Poets Series” offers short biographies on contemporary poets working in variouscorners across the country, each featuring a healthy-sized author biography with linksto publications, and poems and interviews online. I like the idea of theseposts as being introductory, able to catch a good sense of what each poet hasdone and is in the midst of, through these rather straightforward biographicalposts. We should be celebrating ourselves, after all, with all theself-reliance, self-reflection and dignity our sovereignty provides.

The first six posts in this ongoing series have landed online since the beginning of March—ryan fitzpatrick, Renée Sarojini Saklikar, Kate Siklosi, Jake Byrne, Tolu Oloruntoba and Maggie Burton—withforthcoming posts featuring Armand Garnet Ruffo, Ellen Chang-Richardson, Jen Currin, Mark Goldstein and Jessi MacEachern. We are Canadian! And we are amazing. Elbows up!

Leigh Sugar, Freeland

 

INHERITANCE

In 1920, my grandfather receivedan American name:
Zucker to Sugar,now my own last name. 

The Third Reich nevertattooed on his forearm
a number. I count myselflucky to have a last name. 

Each April, magnoliaslitter my parents’ front yard
before Michigan’s springblizzard exposes its silver face. 

My oldest friend’ssurname is Blessing; I know to consider
possible prophecy whengiving a name. 

At eight, we jarredpetals with perfumes and spices
to capture that earlyspring teasing embrace. 

I didn’t, back then, knowcinnamon from cedar—
those potions turned rancidon shelves, defined waste. 

These days I scrawl 619754
on envelopes after alocked-up beloved’s last name. 

He says, Leigh, I dreamI’ve forgotten my number
and wake to realize I’veforgotten my name.

Michigan“writer, editor, educator, dancer, and, more importantly, learner” Leigh Sugar’sfull-length poetry debut is Freeland (New Gloucester ME: Alice JamesBooks, 2025), a collection that opens with the information that “Freeland,Michigan is home to the Saginaw Correctional Facility, a Michigan state prison.”Framed as “an impossible love story,” Freeland “examines the unbreakablebond between the author and an incarcerated writer.” As the press releasecontinues: “Drawing critical connections between personal and family history,the Jewish diaspora, and the racial imaginary of whiteness, Leigh Sugarobsessively searches form and language to communicate what happens in the U.S.mass incarceration system. Expanding out to touch on her own experiences withmental illness and disability, Freeland is a devastating and urgenttestimony of love across the physical, political, and social boundaries of theprison industrial complex, interrogating questions of abolition, race,solitude, and memory in poems that simultaneously embody and resist formal structures.”

I’mintrigued by the narrative tensions that Sugar achieves, layering multiplestory-elements across carved, crafted lines, allowing the multiple narrativethreads an interplay, writing on loss, love, grief and language, wrapping in threadsof family story, poetics and how best one might articulate across such potentiallyvast distances. As she writes as part of the extended sequence “FREELAND: ANERASURE”: “Not even Eliot or Pound approach the melancholy weapon oof thepunitive form. // In profile, I separate from this justice. // Tattoo economypens my skin into a letter. // Dear anyone.” Freeland exists as aninteresting counterpoint to other contemporary literary titles that haveexplored the prison system, whether Vancouver poet Mercedes Eng writing herfather through the poetry collection Prison Industrial Complex Explodes(Vancouver BC: Talonbooks, 2017) [see my review of such here], Kingston writer DianeSchoemperlen’s This Is Not My Life: A Memoir of Love, Prison, and OtherComplications (HarperCollins, 2017), or the collaborative study betweenphotographer Deborah Luster and the late American poet C.D. Wright, One BigSelf: an investigation (Lost Roads, 2003; Port Townsend WA: Copper CanyonPress, 2007) [see my review of such here]. Sugar centres her specifics aroundthe abstract of human space and interaction, connection and disconnection, composinga lyric of deeply-crafted lines that braid lived experience, whether by thenarrator or her “beloved,” across a poetics around human connection, even andespecially amid such punitive disruption. “A smile,” she writes, to open thepoem “REPRESSION,” “when the officer commands I stop // touching you. The spacebetween shame // and pleasure shorter than the scythe- // shaped stretch of shoulder// revealed when my shirtsleeve slips off // the me whose swift hands leaveyour neck to right the slip // then return to my own lap. I sag, // guilty,still, still under the camera.”

ARS POETICA
after Hermes, tr. from Arabicby Maged Zaher
 

I want a poetry
that reassembles the body 

that is 

investigates love
how it is not enough 

that is 

what prison taught me
teaches me 

that is 

I want to not be lonely

 

Samiya Bashir, I Hope This Helps

 

I’m the eldest child ofan eldest child. I spent most of my little years surrounded by grown-ups whotalked about grown-up things and lived their grown-up lives all while I —silent and usually unseen — watched, listened. Strong sense memory stories includean embrace of quiet invisibility and its helpmate: piping up to go along forthe ride. I’d slip across a back seat and disappear into overhearing.

To grow up was to knowall the ways to catch snatches of things that I wasn’t supposed to know yet.(“OVERHEARD”)

I’mreally struck by “poet, writer, librettist, performer, and multi-media poetry maker” Samiya Bashir’s I Hope This Helps (New York NY: Nightboat Books,2025), a dynamic and expansive book-length polyvocality of and around resistance,memory, literature and utterance. “listen: // we ain’t all well,” begins thepoem “PER ASPERA,” a poem that helps open the collection, “this world / spinsdesigns / which madden / us shape us / like dough / bake us crisp [.]” Bashiris very much a poet who works in sentences that build upon each other towards aparticular sequence of narrative truths or surrounding theses or comprehensionsin a propulsive and self-aware syntax. As the poem “I DON’T KNOW, DO I?”begins: “So I wake up to news that they took Sid to the Düsseldorf emergy roomin the middle of the night. / I’m not being honest about something. It onlytook two sentences to lie.” These poems are powerful, attempting a self-awarehonesty, as well as the difficulties of attempting such openness, working on howthings might improve, how the self might improve, and just how necessary bothare required for the sake of the other. As the extended poem “OVERHEARD”continues: “Thing is: / structures aren’t forever, / needn’t be — for me, atleast — shouldn’t be.” Or, two pages further: “I don’t usually write very welleither. But the Muse Industrial Complex makes certain guarantees. The more Iwrite, the more some things make sense — even if only to me; and if I’m honest,most of the world seems completely senseless, even if only to me.”

Thereis something to her text that offers, also, an echo to the structuralcounterpoint of Susan Howe collections [the most recent collection I reviewed was Spontaneous Particulars: The Telepathy of Archives (Christine BurginBooks/New Directions Books, 2014), although there are rumours of a new title this fall]—providing that opening prose essay blending research and memoiragainst counterpoint of poems set as phrase-collage—as Bashir employs a similarback-and-forth of deep research and first-person exploration againstcollage-phrases, but one set as a larger and singular ongoing structure. Bashirwrites a shifting font and font-size, writing straight and narrow andimpossibly large, providing a layering of text and volume as well as image,everything collaged together to provide a far broader experience of reading; ofexperiencing the text-as-performance, and the performance as absolute. Moving throughreferences to abusers, masks and darkness, Ezra Pound and apology, musicalscores, cartography, the Library at Alexandria, accusation, sadness, woodcutimages and memoir, this collection is masterful, propulsive in its urgency andin its agency, writing out survival across multiple forms and genres.

GREENWICH MEANS

pressured
forced — shoved
from what is to
what should 

enemy of presence
carrier of stress
illness delivery system 

like something that came
with slavery like a lie
we insist on 

an old tomorrow
another yesterday 

not always on time notalways
when called not
an appointment 

anti-response topresence

opposite
o’clock

 

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Sean Minogue

Sean Minogue is amultidisciplinary writer whose work has appeared on stages and screens, inmagazines, and online. His stories, poems, and essays have been published in Lithub,ARC Poetry Magazine, Maudlin House, THIS Magazine, FullStop, The Globe and Mail, and elsewhere. In 2017, Sean’s play Prodigalswas produced as a feature film. Terminal Solstice is his debut novel.

1 - How does your most recent work compare toyour previous? How does it feel different?

Terminal Solstice is my first big fiction project. Before the first draft, I had nomental canvas for writing a book. I didn’t understand what the informationshould feel like in my mind. I have that familiarity with screenplays and plays– they’re still hard to write, but I at least ‘get’ their shape. With anovel, I had to build a much larger creative scaffold.

Switching mediums is like being a competenttrumpeter and suddenly looking down at a harpsichord and wondering what thehell compelled you to try something new.

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

I was a late literary bloomer. Whenever I hearabout writers who discovered their love for telling stories at a young age, andthen they went on to publish their first book in their early twenties, itsounds so alien to me. I never felt any calling as a kid. I had zero ambitionuntil I left home. 

As a teenager in Sault Ste. Marie, I was mostlyplaying in bands or watching TV. When everyone started making plans for thefuture, I decided to cling to English Lit because that was the only subjectwhere I understood what people were talking about. 

But after a few years of university lectures onChaucer and Thackeray, I fled to the West Coast and started writing for kidscartoons while churning out spec screenplays that were never made. I only setmy sights on a big fiction project after I moved back to Ontario.

3 - How long does it take to start anyparticular writing project? Does your writing initially come quickly, or is ita slow process? Do first drafts appear looking close to their final shape, ordoes your work come out of copious notes?

Starting is the easiest part for me. It’s thebest. You get to make these big promises that some later version of yourselfwill have to fulfill. Writing only gets hard once I paint myself into a cornerand the adult ‘me’ has to swoop in with an exit strategy. 

My journey toward becoming a productive writerhas been focused on being more economical with my creative time. Now, I startfewer projects and finish more of them.

4 - Where does a poem, play or work of fictionusually begin for you? Are you an author of short pieces that end up combininginto a larger project, or are you working on a "book" from the verybeginning?

With Terminal Solstice, I knew I wastrying to write a book. I just didn’t know if I’d be able to finish it, letalone get a publisher’s attention. The starting point was a central fantasticalconcept (i.e., what if time froze but a few people were unaffected). Then Ifound myself developing three main characters who were all stuck at transitionpoints in their lives. It was unintentional but felt correct. 

My play, Prodigals, which will bepublished this August by Latitude 46, started with a group of friends shoutingover each other on the page. There was no initial structure. I was just tryingto make myself laugh and channel the guys I grew up with. It became a playbecause I happened to see a call for submissions from a theatre company. 

In summary: I have no idea how creativity works,but I’m glad that it does.

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

Thankfully, my time in the spotlight has beenbrief until now. I prefer informal occasions where you can unwind a bit andhave a laugh or a productive argument about something interesting. 

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?

I think every writer has some unconsciousbaggage they’re working through. Someone with a long list of books to theirname might be able to look back and recognize a thread running through them,like a preoccupation with self-destructive relationships or a belief thatpolitics corrupt art, or whatever. I don’t have that perspective yet. 

I wish I were a writer with grand philosophicalobsessions, but I think my creative process is more playful. I like storiesthat are accidentally bent and then stubbornly reinforced to strengthen thatquality. My plays feature on-stage characters who are deeply troubled byoff-stage characters. A recent short story of mine follows a guy waiting toanalyze soil samples from Mars and he accidentally gets high at a marketingparty. Terminal Solstice is built around an otherworldly globalphenomenon that is a mystery to everyone impacted by it. 

I think there’s a weird wisdom sloshing aroundin our unconscious mind. Writing provides a means for expressing it. If I havea theory at all, it might be that a good story requires getting out of theway. 

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 think writers should possess an ability tobullshit, but they’re at their best when calling bullshit. Anyone who can offercogent, broadly digestible insight for our current moment is in possession of asuperpower. Not everyone can do this. Even great writers struggle to make apoint. Clarity of thought is the ultimate goal, in my mind. 

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

I’ve been lucky enough to collaborate with somereally thoughtful, empathetic folks who have supported me through differentprojects. Sometimes the work doesn’t reach the finish line, but the quality ofcollaboration is such a pleasure that I grow as a result. For me, this is anessential part of turning something that could be interesting intosomething that is interesting. 

It takes a special kind of person to get onboard with a writer who’s attempting a feat they don’t know they can pull off.I’ve also encountered some folks who offer more notes than insight. Though,even that can be valuable. As a writer, you’ve got to know how to argue againsta bad note. The process sharpens your storytelling.

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

Did you ever see that old Ira Glass video thatmade the rounds on YouTube forever ago? He talks about how, when you’re firststarting out as a professional storyteller, the gap between your skill set andyour critical taste is immense. So, when you start creating your own work, itobviously sucks. And then you feel bad and that’s when most people quit. But ifyou create a second thing, and then a third, you start narrowing the gap. Ialways considered that a helpful way of thinking about a writer’s journey.

And then there’s George Saunders. He’s one ofthe best thinkers on how writing works from a writer’s perspective (vs. acritic’s perspective). I adore his whole approach to creativity. A Swim in a Pond in the Rain is bursting with the most generous, thoughtful insightinto the mysteries of great writing. Can’t recommend him enough.

10 - How easy has it been for you to movebetween genres (poetry to fiction to plays to non-fiction)? What do you see asthe appeal?

I’ve moved around a lot, genre-wise. My primaryfocus right now is fiction, but I could totally see myself jumping into somethingelse if an opportunity presented itself. My day job is copywriting, so I’malways engaged with shaping sentences and paragraphs. I think fluidity betweendifferent forms strengthens your ability to express creative ideas.

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

I never had a proper routine until kids cameinto my life. Then, all of a sudden, I had to account for every minute of theday. Now, I write most nights once the house is calm and I can get in a solidhour of coherent thought.

I treat my writing time the same way as theearly morning rush to get the kids out the door. There’s a ticking clock thatdoesn’t care about my muse or whatever. It’s either type or go to bed. Then,when I go to bed, I’m full of angst about what I didn’t get done. Rinse,repeat. 

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

I don’t really experience writers’ block, but Idefinitely go through periods where I think everything I write is terrible. I‘mjust too stubborn or delusional to stop.

The most reliable way for me to get back into aconfident space is through watching movies. I’ll put on Sidney Lumet’s TheVerdict a couple of times a year, along with Terry Gilliam’s Brazilor anything from . If I’m really bummed out, I’ll dig out theoriginal Law & Order seasons.

13 - What fragrance reminds you of home?

Cedar bushes in the summer. And welded metal,for some reason? 

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?

Early episodes of the Radiolab podcast were abig source of inspiration for Terminal Solstice. They did one aboutCRISPR in 2015 that blew my mind at the time (“Antibodies”). I also listento a ton of music on Bandcamp and try to keep my tastes evolving. I never wantto be the old dude who has four albums he listens to over and over again.

During the pandemic, I started picking upphotobooks. Gregory Crewdson’s work is incredible and really captures the kindof frozen-world creepiness I was thinking about for my novel.

15 - What other writers or writings areimportant for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?

I’m a sucker for Paris Review interviews.It’s my favourite thing to read. I love hearing about the personal dramas thatimpact a writer and how they respond to setbacks over a lifetime of creativework. Brick journal publishes good ones too. (Not to mention robmclennan’s blog.)

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

Make stable money as a writer. 

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?

Since becoming a parent, I’ve discovered a lovefor science and math. I never understood either subject as a kid, so I’m comingto both with fresh eyes. 

I think I could’ve found my place as anunderling in a research lab somewhere. There’s a ton of creativity involved inthese fields, and I wish schools made more of an effort to communicate that tokids who have trouble engaging with STEM.

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

I was drawn to writing because it gels with my conflictedintroversion. I enjoy small bursts of manic activity but then get worn out bycrowds. The best way to refresh my brain is expressing the tension into somewritten form. It’s like wringing out a wet cloth. 

Also, I can’t discount how important it was tohear teachers compliment my writing as a high school student. I wasn’tinterested in pursuing anything at that point, but the latent sense that I wasgood at something really made a difference when it came time to choose apath.

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

I really enjoyed Prophet Song by PaulLynch. It’s a terrifying book that feels like it’s forecasting the worst yet tocome in the United States. Rot: An Imperial History of the IrishFamine by Padraic X. Scanlan is a must-read for anyone who wants tounderstand how a caustic political ideology can hasten social collapse. I alsogot a kick out of Kneecap the movie (noticing an Irish theme yet?).

20 - What are you currently working on?

I’m in the earliest days of a new book idea. Notsure if this will become something, but I can feel the pull to getstarted. 

12 or 20 (second series) questions;