His poems “The Truck” and “Pillow Talk” appear in the forty-seventh issue of Touch the Donkey.
Q: Tell me about the poems “The Truck” and “Pillow Talk.”
A: Both poems were written around the same time when I was tinkering with prose forms. I had been reading James Tate, and loved how he was able to embed dialogue into his verse.
“The Truck” comes directly from an experience I had with a friend a few years back, after he bought a truck. I’ve been fascinated and terrified by the explosion of enormous trucks that appear on the roads, often in larger, more aggressive forms. It’s almost like these trucks have evolved from velociraptors to T-Rexes.
I wrote “Pillow Talk” in one go, a day or two after playing the board game Wingspan with my partner and some friends, and subsequently researching that most birds come from a unique species. I enjoy writing from different voices, so having to write from two birds’ POV was a blast. I wish more poets explored dialectal approaches to writing. The personal, confessional “I” (or popular “i”) is becoming exhausted.
Q: How do these poems compare to some of the other work you’ve been doing lately?
A: A: These poems are more experimental and less lyrical. I have always enjoyed trying my hand at different styles, techniques and forms. I remember after publishing my first full-length book the exceptional poet Catherine Owen wrote in a review that I appeared to be donning forms like different hats: trying one on, taking it off, putting on another. At first, I took that feedback to mean I needed to eventually find a consistent, signature voice and style. Looking back now, I’m not so sure. I feel the need to explore. I love trying on different styles.
To go back to your question, many of my newer poems are different shapes. I’ve become less interested in lyric forms and more interested in prosy satire, as well as poems that venture into the absurd and the surreal. I’m also not as interested in mining my adolescence and early adulthood trauma. I presume this is a metamorphosis that occurs with many writers. A difficult question arises: after writing to find peace, and peace is found, what do you write next?
Q: Does a poem usually begin with form, or language, for you, or through elements of subject?
A: Great question. My poems either come from language or subjects. I tend to write and collect lines, images, or ideas of what I may, or may not write about; if the line or idea continues to resonate and I can’t shake it, it often leads to a poem.
For instance, with “The Truck” I had a few ideas, but I was struggling to find a way to write it so that it would capture everything I wanted to say.
It started from a WhatsApp group chat I was a part of years ago. The group was a beer league hockey team. The conversation that week—often about NFL fantasy teams, skipping work to golf, impromptu weekend Vegas getaways to avoid being with the wife and kids—was singularly focussed on trucks (what truck they have, what model and brand was the best, specifications about engines and other parts etc.). For awhile I tinkered with iterations of a found poem quoted directly from dialogue in those truck conversations, but it felt voyeuristic and petty to expose and cherry-pick their conversations like that. So I scrapped it, and eventually months later I wrote “The Truck”.
It might surprise some how long it can take to finish a poem. Poets are anything if not tenacious.
Q: With two poetry collections under your belt, as well as your current works-in-progress, how do you feel your work has progressed? Where do you see your work headed?
A: In terms of form and quality, my poems have always tended to be sonnet-length, so I’m trying to write longer ones. I want to think my poems are smarter and more succinct (I mean doesn’t every writer want to think their writing has gotten better over time!?). I’m less preachy than I used to be, and my work balances ambiguity and insight a lot better than it used to. I would often force a clever line in order to make a point, or to simply show off and appear smart. I’m not doing as much of that anymore. With that said, I think the most satisfying poetry is also entertaining, so I still try to think of ways to surprise and excite the reader. Oh, and I’ve allowed more nonsense and non-sequiturs into my verse—that’s been fun for me!
As for process, I’m more comfortable with a stream-of-consciousness approach. Wake up and write without a plan. Or sit down for 20 minutes after work and see where my mind wanders. The benefits of free-writing is that it can circumvent one's inhibitions and inner critic. I would have never felt confident in this approach before. I used to have to have a line or several, or at least a conceptual idea of what the poem's going to be about, before I put serious effort into making a poem. Now, I’m able to trust my instincts.
As for where my writing is headed, I don’t know. We’ll find out.
Q: I’m curious about your engagements with the sonnet. What do you feel the form provides that might not be possible otherwise?
A: Yeah, I wrote a sonnet series (near “crown”) in my last collection Gospel Drunk in a section titled “Drowning Man Sonnets”. The sonnet is an excellent container. It can hold as much and as little as you want. Rules and constraints can be helpful for poets. We are often a messy and imaginative bunch, so having goalposts (fixed rhythm and/or end rhyme) and sidelines (14 lines) keep our ideas on the pitch. I mixed metaphors there, but I think you catch my drift. Anyway, sonnets are great for keeping the imagination accountable to the page. They’re also, for me, the perfect length of poem. If you can’t get down what you want to express in a sonnet, poetry may not be your form.
Q: If you see sonnets as the perfect length, how do you make your way from there to assembling manuscripts? Do you see yourself as the writer of poems, or of collections? Or is there a difference?
A: After I write enough poems, I start to think about a collection. That’s when I begin arranging and ordering them in ways that fit (by theme, style, contrast etc.). I find it difficult to order poems in a manuscript. I’ve received advice in this area from stacking all your strong poems together at the start to putting them into thematic piles. I dunno. Some of my favourite collections are say 50 different poems that stand alone by themselves. It’s like I’m being introduced to 50 strangers, and they’re unique and wonderful in their own sort of way.
As for the second question, I’m a writer of poems. I see collections as simply a home for these magical creations. Is there a difference between being a writer of poems or a writer of collections? I suppose. I evaluate collections for their summative strength and ability to wow me. I often read long poems, book-length poems, and get bored, and tired of them after a few pages. I can almost predict what’s coming next. There’s no element of surprise or wonder. That said, there are a few exceptions. Frank: Sonnets by Diane Seuss and Wayside Sang by Cecily Nicholson come to mind.
Q: Finally, who do you read to reenergize your own work? What particular works can’t you help but return to?
A: Love this question. I usually turn to American poets. Jeffrey McDaniel’s Splinter Factory, Tony Hoagland’s Priest Turned Therapist Treats Fear of God, Bob Hicok’s Insomnia Diary; I really love the language in Kiki Petrosino’s collection Hymn of the Black Terrific; and I love the playfulness, wit in Michael Bazzett's chapbook The Temple. As for Canadians, I reread Kayla Czaga and Raoul Fernandes a lot. I’ve also become a fan of Chris Banks’s work. His latest collection, Alternator, I read in one sitting. So good. So smart. Mmmmm....I’m trying to think of other stuff. Oh, there was a collection a few years ago that I liked—Shifting Baseline Syndrome by Aaron Kreuter.
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