Rodrigo Toscano is a poet living in New Orleans. He is the author of
twelve books of poetry. His latest three books are WHITMAN. CANNONBALL. PUEBLA (Omnidawn, 2025, a National Poetry Series finalist), The Cut
Point (Counterpath, 2023), The Charm & The Dread (Fence, 2022).
His other books include In Range, Explosion Rocks Springfield, Deck
of Deeds, Collapsible Poetics Theater, To Leveling Swerve, Platform,
Partisans, and The Disparities. His poetry has appeared in over 20
anthologies, including Best American Poetry (2023, 2004), and Best
American Experimental Poetry (BAX). His Collapsible Poetics Theater
was a National Poetry Series selection. His poetry has appeared in the Boston
Review, Poetry Magazine, The Bennington Review, The Kenyon
Review, The Harvard Advocate, Georgia Review, Yale Review,
Conduit, and Fence. rodrigotoscano.com
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 published book was Partisans (O Books, 1999), though, a previous manuscript, The Disparities, had been accepted by Green Integer. That was
published two years later. Partisans represented for me further
validation of my growing reputation among several avant garde milieus. But
basically, it was just a box of books that was handed to me by Leslie Scalapino
(editor) on a noisy street corner in the Mission District in San Francisco. I
gave some copies to local poetry friends and mailed a few to poets in NYC who I
admired.
My most recent manuscript is a book of 100 sonnets.
Each line is 10 syllables exactly. Like my recent five books, this future book
blends philosophical, critical-ideological, and street-level existentialist
thought into a quirky demotic that’s (hopefully) fit enough to confront the
times we live in.
I suppose my earlier work was decidedly more haute in
its approach to diction. Partisans is more Susan Howe than say, Frank
O’Hara, though the book is clearly on its way towards formalizing Toscanoese as
my lingua franca.
How does it feel to be fluent in Toscanoese? It’s an
odd fit at union or environmentalist work meetings, but it’s been quite the political
mating call over the years. Aren’t all poets erotics?
2 - How did you come to poetry first, as opposed to,
say, fiction or non-fiction?
I seem to have a great deal of word-stick. Like on flypaper,
words get stuck in my head, before plot lines of any kind. I mouth them,
ruminate over them. I toss words around like beach balls into unexpecting social
gatherings. Words act rather reserved at first, until they discover their native
crazed inner cores. Bach is my greatest poetic influence. I’m happiest when
cracking open single words and spinning variations on their energies.
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 either writing poetry, or I am not. I don’t
fiddle-faddle in the between zone. Once I strike a tone, or historical
perspective, or angle of inquiry, I don’t stop till I have a whole book. My
desire is to be a contemporary and write like one. I got this overall
aesthetic, I think, from the Roman poets. Zeroing in on contemporaries, to me,
is the highest form of poetry. Maybe that’s why I’ve never spent a single
second in the Rilke cult, or the Oppen cult for that matter. I’ll surely catch flak for this, but I’m generally
put off by too much ellipticality in meaning-making.
In terms of my process, I’m a notepad hand scribbler. I
don’t think left-to-right, nor the opposite, but diagonally right to left, then
loop around in swirls. It’s very hard to decipher afterwards, even for me. I also
like to keep argumentation real loose for as long as possible, until I smush together
strange bed fellows, and tighten up the whole deal with titanium bolts.
4 - Where does a poem usually begin for you? Are you an
author of short pieces that end up combining into a larger project, or are you
working on a "book" from the very beginning?
I’m miniaturist. I chip away at medium-small stellae. I
don’t have long velvety lines like a Jorie Graham, which I greatly admire. I pop
out Monk-like cluster chords seemingly from nowhere. My poetics seems to be a
balance of improvisation and fugal development.
5 - Are public readings part of or counter to your
creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?
I always imagine any poem of mine as being read in
public, yeah. The ideal settings for each poem, however, vary. Some are dim-lighted
lounge poems to be read quietly and received even more quietly, others are
hammerhead sharks thrashing in the face of dismayed audiences.
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’m an ardent student of archeology, philosophy,
history, economics, political and social movements, and aesthetics. I’m also hot
on to people’s weird-think wherever I can find it.
In my opinion, the most pressing question for a U.S.
poet (and the frayed citoyens of nations the U.S. is dragging with it to the
gutter) is, what might be the Geo-Political GPS of current culture-making
(poetics being a subset of culture-making). That’s it. Location first,
subjective babble, second. My new book, WHITMAN.
CANNONBALL. PUEBLA. (Omnidawn, 2025) is largely about that.
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 can’t prescribe anything for other writers, but for
me, it’s important to be as historically aware as possible, taking into account
the dialectical relationships between classes, nations, and empires; that is,
to be maximally mindful of all that goes into the creation of cultures and
attitudes of one’s time.
8 - Do you find the process of working with an outside
editor difficult or essential (or both)?
I’ve had very liberal and generous press editors for
the most part, editors, who bend “my way.” On some occasions they’ve contested
my pieces, or parts of my pieces. I push back when necessary, but I also cede to
their recommendations quite a bit. If you look at my home webpage, it reads Poet, Rhetor. Those two archetypes
contest each other on a daily level.
9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not
necessarily given to you directly)?
“At all costs, write”— something like that (I forget
who said it). I works for me, I think, but again, only if and when I’m in
writing mode. Come to think of it, I disagree with that advice. I would actually
encourage most young poets to always keep the option of quitting very close to
them, especially American poets. If they’re just writing out of sheer egotism,
and little else, then the poetry is likely to be deficient of all that goes
might to into Public Address. Langston Hughes is a master of avoiding needless
egotism.
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 write best between 5:00 a.m. and 8:00 a.m. submerged
in warm tub water, a towel over the lamp above me to dim the lights just right.
11 - When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn
or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?
I stop writing. I respect stalls. My default thinking
is that I have nothing to say, that’s for a reason, a reason that goes quite
beyond me. I have to be completely empty of anything to say, before firing up
another round of something to say.
12 - What fragrance reminds you of home?
Laurel Sumac (native to Southern California / Northern
Baja California). Eucalyptus bark. Sea salt in the mouth.
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?
Noting people’s speech rhythms and intonations is key
for me. Musical principals, techniques, and harmonic effects, are foremost in
my mind.
14 - What other writers or writings are important for
your work, or simply your life outside of your work?
Man, I don’t want to get into this writer idols thing.
I’ll say that right now, I pay closest attention to the poets of the Baton
Rouge and New Orleans scenes. That’s plenty a barometer in order gauge what’s
going down. There’s some rip-roarin’ poets down here, let me tell you.
15 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet
done?
What I really want right now is to have my latest
manuscript of 100 sonnets published! I really do think that the collection will
make a significant contribution to the art of sonnet writing in the U.S.
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?
Wait. I do have another occupation. I’ve worked in
labor movements, environmental and public health for over thirty years. But if
I were to click my heals and pop into another reality, I would have loved to be
a composer of music, maybe in a band). But honestly too, I often daydream,
“wouldn’t it be cool to be a public poet!”
17 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something
else?
Poetics is the discipline of the between of all
disciplines. Who couldn’t be madly enthralled by that?
18 - What was the last great book you read? What was
the last great film?
Henry Goldkamp’s Joy Buzzer and Dylan Krieger’s upcoming No One Is Daddy are two books I really love. Edgar Garcia’s Cantares too. There’s so many.
I’ll admit, I was very moved by Taylor Swift’s The Eras
Tour movie. I went to a matinee in the early winter of 2023, and I literally
was the only one in the theater for about half of it.
19 - What are you currently working on?
I’m
currently working on a new round of dialogues on poetry. People can check out The Dialogues I’ve done so far, with people
like Julie Carr, Paisley Rekdal, Roberto Tejada and others.
12 or 20 (second series) questions;
