Behind the Screens: Tuesday Author Interview

Every Tuesday, get to know a bit about the stories behind the books you love, and discover your next favourite novel.

Sabitha: Poetry and nature come together in Su Zi’s poetry collection, Chirp . Su, can you say a bit about your work?

Su: The book linked is Chirp, a book of poems from Hysterical Books that was released just as Covid hit. However, the book was written some years before by the following  process: every morning, regardless of weather, I go outside to care for my live-outside family (they are not humans, but they are my family). During the year I wrote the book, I would come back inside and write a poem that recorded the moments just before, with an especial emphasis on birds. I think the presence or absence of birds tells us everything about the health of an ecosystem; people who don’t notice bird populations tend to not notice the world beyond humans. Thus, the poems are naturalist notes of a year’s duration. 

I did reference the Cornell site for certain aids in species identification to correctly name who I had seen. Originally, I wrote each poem daily onto a social media platform that had limitations on characters for posts, so I used haiku. I liked that the platform had a bird logo and I was posting bird-naturalism poems. The title is thus a pun.

Sabitha : What’s your next writing project?

Su: There’s a part two manuscript to the work, which is not yet published, but which continued this anachronistic idea of observing the local world and the other life forms with which we exist. I continued to post these daily—where they continued to be as observed as clouds. However, the platform I was using allowed for more character usage, so I used tanka. I hope to see this book fly into physical existence.

The incidence of “naturalism” is in all the work i do—written, visual, or physical; it is a life-long commitment. In truth, I am a second-generation eco-feminist. It informs every aspect of my life.

Since I also review literary works of any genre, I have seen trends in the writing community which tend toward urban violence. Given our times now, this doesn’t strike me as a good direction for the writing community, although it is a bit popular or common. There’s also the perennial reminder of craft—something well-crafted in any art form takes flight in us.

Sabitha : Thanks for sharing your story and your process. We’re looking forward to reading! Where can the Night Beats community find you and your book?

Su: Chirp can be found on the publisher’s website, and it might be available still through Amazon or book fetch sites.  I can be found on instagram (xsuzi00) on Etsy (xsuzi00) and on Bluesky (suzi00).

 Copies of the artist-book, poetry chapbook series Red Mare are only available through Etsy—contact me for international shipping. Submission guidelines are pinned to the Facebook page Pink House.