12 or 20 (second series) questions with Kim Magowan

Kim Magowan lives in San Francisco and teaches in the English Department of Mills College at Northeastern University. She is the author of the short story collection How Far I've Come (2022), published by Gold Wake Press; the novel The Light Source (2019), published by 7.13 Books; and the short story collection Undoing (2018), which won the 2017 Moon City Press Fiction Award. Her fiction has been published in Colorado Review, Craft Literary, The Gettysburg Review, Smokelong Quarterly, Wigleaf, and many other journals. Her stories have been selected for Best Small Fictions and Wigleaf's Top 50. She is the Editor-in-Chief and Fiction Editor of Pithead Chapel. www.kimmagowan.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 novel and my first short story collection were accepted within a month and a half of each other, in July 2017-- the novel first, though the short story collection, Undoing, came out a year earlier, in March 2018 (Moon City Press has a very speedy turnaround time). I wouldn't say either book changed my life--I'd been writing pretty steadily for 7 years by then. But I definitely felt more legitmized as a writer-- more willing to say out loud "I'm a writer" when people asked me what I did. I turned 50 a week after 7.13 Press accepted my novel, and I remember feeling more capable of facing that birthday because (after years of slogging!) I had a book.

I've been obsessed with flash fiction (stories under 1000 words) recently, so that's the main way my recent writing has changed: it keeps getting shorter. My first story collection was about 60,000 words and had 28 stories; the book I'm finishing now is about 55,000 words and has (gulp!) 75 stories.

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

I love poetry, but I was never a poet--I don't have an intuitive sense of lineation. The few times I've tried to write a poem in the past few years, it's always turned into flash fiction. Non-fiction is too scary! The short answer is, I'm afraid of pissing people off. Though my new collection (the WIP) has some CNF in it, and my last book, How Far I've Come, has an essay about my parents called "Irreconcilable Differences." I included that essay because it shared genetic material with the stories, many of which were about divorce and regrets, and my parents' divorce was such a formative experience in both my real life and my writing life. The funny thing is most readers don't realize that piece is nonfiction; I guess you have to know me!

Anyway, all this is to say, I primarily write fiction from a combination of aptitude and cowardice.
 
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?

Well, it entirely depends on the length of the project: my novel took me 4 years to write. I will write a first draft of a flash fiction piece in a sitting, and spend the next few days (sometimes weeks) revising it. I don't drive, and I take a lot of long walks. While I'm walking, I think about stories (and sometimes sit on a bench somewhere and type ideas on my phone-- "Walk thoughts 7/22"--that's as close as I get to outlines or notes. I tend to write pretty polished first drafts. The hard work for me of writing is always in the revising-- removing all the flab, lifting the story that 10% that converts it from pretty good to publishable (and of course many drafts are not salvageable, so my Fiction file is full of discarded efforts).

4 - Where does a 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?

Definitely the former! I backed into my novel by accident: I thought I was writing a few linked short stories, but they increasingly fused together. I throw all my completed new stories in a "New Collection" file, but I don't even start thinking about sequence or shape or curation until that file approaches book length (that is, gets to be around 50,000 words). I am a "trees" versus "forest" writer.

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

I used to dread reading, but it's become more fun. I have a better sense now of what kinds of stories are successful to read-- funny stories, short ones, ones that don't make me emotional. I'm an ambivalent reader but an enthusiastic audience member.  I love attending readings!
 
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 am always trying to figure people out, and I don't distinguish particularly (I know this makes me sound nutty) between real people and fictional people. My entry to fiction is always going to be character. Why does this person behave the way they do? What factors govern their bad decisions or self-sabotage? I'm interested in what the way we treat people says about us. In another life, I could have been a therapist.

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 an English professor and an editor of a literary journal as well as a writer, and I feel very strongly about this: story tellers are essential truth tellers. Barack Obama said in an interview with Marilynne Robinson that reading novels taught him how to be a citizen because they taught him empathy. Writers put their readers in the mind of someone else, including someone repellent. Last week, I was reading and had tears pouring down my face (very sad book!), and I was made aware of the very special kind of magic writers perform: to make readers feel so strongly about imaginary strangers. That's potent.

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

Both, depending of course on the editor! But overall, I love editors. I appreciate the care and attention they put into my writing. I'm an editor myself. Editing is a disciplined act of love.

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

A therapist once said to me that the problem with being a writer is that we're chasing a moving target. I remember years ago thinking that if I could just publish a story, I'd be satisfied. Ha! I think about that therapist's obervation a lot-- that there's always the next thing/ publication/ book/ etc. I'm running after, and that the rejection-heavy life of being a writer is structured to make us feel demoralized. I do my best to forge ahead; I try to appreciate what I've managed to create.

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

Honestly, I don't know if I will ever write another novel. The revision process was grueling, since I'm very kicking-and-screaming about revision. As a reader, I love novels and short stories equally, and go to novels and stories for different reasons. As a writer, I'm more comfortable with short stories, and lately with very short stories. They appeal to my perfectionist side.

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'm a professor, so I get a lot of my writing done in the summer, when I'm not teaching. When the semester is on, mostly I write flash fiction (that's part of what initially appealed to me about flash-- it was the only writing I could reliably get done while teaching). I don't have a set writing schedule.

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

I take those afore-mentioned long walks to try and shake something loose. I open one of my discarded drafts in my "Starts" file to see if there's anything there that sparks my interest.

13 - What fragrance reminds you of home?

Rosemary!

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?

I am always grabbing things that I use in my writing. I'll see something starling or distinctive, like a long-nosed dog with one brown eye and one blue eye (David Bowie eyes!), and it will end up in a story. A crazy-looking dahlia, a funny observation a friend makes about children as vampires: it all goes into the stone soup.

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

I have writer friends who I share drafts with or even, in the case of Michelle Ross, collaborate with on writing projects. And I have a long, long list of writers who I read and reread and teach and talk about. I'm an English professor; I'm always reading. Some of my favorite contemporary writers, but this is a very incomplete list: Kazuo Ishiguro, Alice Munro, George Saunders, Zadie Smith, Sally Rooney, Jennifer Egan, Lydia Davis, Edward P. Jones, Jhumpa Lahiri.

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

Ha, good question! Well, back to the moving goalposts: I have my big dreams. I'd love to be a reknowned enough writer that I get to be the annual guest editor for Best American Short Stories. :)

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?

My day job is that I'm a professor, and I love teaching and would never give that up. But in another life, I'd be a psychotherapist.

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

Well, I do other things-- I teach, I edit. But the thing that makes me a writer, I guess, is that I have things to say, and I express them best through writing.

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

I just reread Zadie Smith's On Beauty-- wow! I strongly recommend reading E.M. Forster's Howard's End first, if you haven't. My husband teaches film, and I've been watching a bunch of movies with him in preparation for a Golden Hollywood class he's teaching in the spring-- so many extraordinary ones, but I'll give a particular shout-out to brilliant, dark "All About Eve."

20 - What are you currently working on?

I've already mentioned it, but I think the new WIP is pretty much ready to send now. It's another short story collection, 75 stories, mostly flash fiction. The working title is "The Problem Is," and it has four sections (Partners/ "Friends"/ Relatives/ Oneself). It's about the messes we make and the people we blame, about the people who thwart us, and the people who lift us back up.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Evan Kennedy

Evan Kennedy is a poet and bicyclist. He is the author of I Am, Am I, to Trust the Joy That Joy Is No More or Less There Now Than Before (Roof Books), Jerusalem Notebook (O’clock Press), The Sissies (Futurepoem), Terra Firmament (Krupskaya), Shoo-Ins to Ruin (Gold Wake Press), and Us Them Poems (Book*hug). He runs the occasional press, Dirty Swan Projects, and was born in Beacon, New York, in 1983. He lives in San Francisco, California.

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?
Until my first chapbook, Us Them Poems (Book*hug, 2006), I hadn't brought any project to completion. For years I thought I had moved past the stuff in that book, but now I understand that the same concerns play out in all I've written since, just differently.

2 - How did you come to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?
A poetry anthology in my grandfather's attic. I was wowed by the urgency of Chidiock Tichborne's poem written on the eve of his execution. I grew committed to scratching in notebooks.
 
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?
Six months to a year to determine the ground rules or armature. I try to approach each project differently, to make one or two drastic changes to throw myself off balance, or step into the waters until they're lapping at my nose. On the other hand, I worry I'm fooling myself into thinking I'm innovating when I'm only repeating the past. I edit my drafts till they're slick.

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?
My books are formed around a topic: Francis of Assisi, Ovid, my biography, a sex robot with body dysmorphia. Usually enough material or ideas accumulate and require they be cohered into a single poem that serves the manuscript's subject.

5 - Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?
Readings provide an unequaled opportunity to shepherd the work into the world. I can best test and plead my case for the work by reading it. But I try not to let my voice get in the way. Early in a project, I like to debut a new project at a Bay Area reading for my friends. Preparing the writing to be tested is as important as gauging the room and hearing their thoughts.
 
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?
Uniting it all in the tree of life. Making an appeal to its creator. Reconciling myself with it.

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?
Perhaps like monks, poets work separate from society to offset its sins. I don't see poetry playing a significant role among the general public I find myself among. It's not like Zbigniew Herbert reading at labor gatherings. Yet it's essential to life, or mine at the very least. I never want to join the poets who claim its uselessness. They have careers in poetry to protect, so they gotta say it's useless.

8 - Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?
My editors have been supportive but mostly hands-off. I like to submit a tidy manuscript.

9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?
If you see an item of clothing that appeals to you, buy two. My distant relation Jackie Kennedy recommended that.

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?
Because I work a job separate from literature, I have to find pockets of time. On days off, I read or write in pajamas until two or three, then hit up Amoeba Music in Haight-Ashbury. I check out what Doc recommends in the metal section.

11 - When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?
I continually ask my friends for book recommendations and to read whatever they're working on.

12 - What fragrance reminds you of home?
A mown lawn.

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?
INRI, the debut album by Brazilian black metal legends Sarcofago, is a masterpiece. I'd love to shape a manuscript consistent with that tracklist. I mention that because there's no way I could approximate Myra Hess's arrangement of Bach's "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring." Or Mozart's String Quartets dedicated to Haydn. My creative process is closer to David Bowie's than any poet's. I'm interested in pastiching styles and imagery. I wish I were a scientist, but that would require too much recalibrating of my fundamental being. I wish I could identify more plants and animals than I do now.

14 - What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?
My book Metamorphoses springs from Ovid, who becomes increasingly dear to me. I fantasize about writers the way people imagine themselves befriending Alyosha Karamazov or Elizabeth Bennett. Among them is Herve Guibert, Ovid, Kafka, Ronald Johnson, Simone Weil. Real friendships with Noah Ross, Jacob Kahn, Jackqueline Frost, and Jason Morris are crucial.

15 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?
I wish I could sing but I'm incapable.

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?
If I were capable, I'd prefer a career like tenor Ian Bostridge's. It's probably too late for me to become a priest, a projectionist, a mopper at The Cock. It's probably not too late to scalp tickets.

17 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something else?
I didn't have perseverance for anything else. Abilities in other things like music plateaued.

18 - What was the last great book you read? What was the last great film?
Emanuele Coccia's Metamorphoses. David Cronenberg's Crimes of the Future.

19 - What are you currently working on?
A book-length poem with the same concerns as my Metamorphoses (transformation, talking animals) involving the two birds from the Scottish ballad "Twa Corbies," a poem I first read as a child in Texas public school.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Nick Courtright

Nick Courtright is the founder and Executive Editor of Atmosphere Press. He is the author of The Forgotten World, about Americanness and identity in a vast global culture, Let There Be Light, called “a continual surprise and a revelation” by Naomi Shihab Nye, and Punchline, a National Poetry Series finalist. His prose and poetry has appeared in such places as The Harvard Review, The Southern Review, Kenyon Review, Boston Review, The Huffington Post, The Best American Poetry, Gothamist, and SPIN Magazine, among dozens of others. Find him at nickcourtright.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?

I think my first book, Punchline, which came out in 2012, gave me a sense of relief. Not validation necessarily, but I think it freed me to write when I wanted, rather than write as if life depended on it.  My newest book, The Forgotten World, is my third, and by far my most personal book, and my book most rooted in the real world, rather than any sort of metaphysical space. Being the Executive Editor of Atmosphere Press, which is not tied to the academic calendar, gave me the opportunity to explore the world more fully, and that exploration made for a book set in places, rather than in the one place of the abstract.

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

I actually came to fiction first, back in high school, but poetry eventually became my mode. I was more interested in ideas than I was in telling stories—the invention of characters and plots started to seem like a weird game to me, whereas with poetry I could run straight at a problem, whether it be love, the universe, or culture.

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 used to write prolifically, but now I take my time. My first two books were released two years apart, and it wasn’t until seven years later that I had a third. I wrote probably three books worth of material between that second and third book, though—I was writing whole books and chucking them. I think I needed to go through that process to get something that felt most authentic. As for drafts, they are usually 90% of what the final will look like, but that other 10% can take eons to figure out.

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?

I’ve done both, and for The Forgotten World it became clear along the way that I was writing a travel book and a book about the intellectual struggle of being American while not in America, and respecting cultures that have been mistreated by people who look like me. Once I realized that that was the subject matter I felt compelled to write, I just had to spend the years it took to go the places I needed to go to learn. This book is a product of years of feet-on-the-ground research in a way my others weren’t.

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

I do enjoy readings, and I think going on tour for my first two books changed me substantially as a writer. I realized that I wanted to entertain and be accessible on a first listen, rather than just write poems that have to mulled over many times in quietude. I always imagine my poems as being read aloud, though some of them are better suited for this than others. But connecting to the random folks you find in an audience became a key part of my vision for the type of poet I wanted to be: engaging and challenging, but very much not elite.

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 think the question of accessibility is a major item, and what is the goal of poetry? Why do we do it? I believe that writing is mostly something we do for ourselves, even if we have big goals of connecting to others—the act itself, the pleasure of refining one’s work…so much of it is just a hobby to enjoy, with the hope that someone else enjoys the product being secondary. In my PhD we often discussed matters of the lyric, “the overheard,” etc., and I do buy this idea, though lyric can be both navel-gazing and also a means for intellectual problem-solving. I think poets, given the economic limitations of the art (so long as their output isn’t connected to career advancement in academia) are freed to be their own souls.

7 – What do you see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Does s/he even have one? What do you think the role of the writer should be?

Connected to the previous answer, I think one of the greatest roles of writing is to make the writer a more satisfied and content person. People often look to the value of a writer in relation to a reader, but I think the contrary view of what the writing does for the writer is more interesting. If all these writers weren’t writing, would they be less fulfilled individuals? Of course, the role of the reader is where this question would usually go, but as someone who helps writers every day with Atmosphere Press, it’s the satisfaction that writing can bring an individual that is at the forefront of my mind. Writing as art is a public service to the creator as much, if not more, than it is to the outside viewer of the creation.

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

Both, haha. It’s always tough to hear the thoughts of a good editor, because a good editor will challenge the writer. But…you’ve gotta hear those thoughts, because they’re going to help the work. You don’t have to work with an outside editor, but it’s almost certain that you won’t see everything your work has to offer.

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

From Nobel economist and psychologist Daniel Kahneman: no problem is as important as it seems when you are thinking about it. It helps keep things in perspective, and keeps the anxiety from going crazy. All things are transitory, and the sun is only too bright when you are staring directly at it.

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

My main art form nowadays is writing emails. That’s my primary genre, haha. I try to put a little of the poetic in there, though.

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 don’t keep a rigid writing routine, other than the aforementioned emails! A typical day begins for me with coffee and work at around 6:20am. Bright and early!

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

Books of poetry. That’s really the key thing that gets my mind in the mode to write poetry. That and place, but really, it’s just finding a book of poetry that inspires me to write. They are pretty hard to find, so when I get hold of one, I’ll read it again and again. Recent stars for me were by Anders Carlson Wee, Kaveh Akbar, and Bianca Stone.

13 - What fragrance reminds you of home?

Diesel exhaust in the winter. Reminds me of having to ride the bus to school in Ohio in January. I’ve lived in Austin, Texas for nearly twenty years, but every time it’s cold and I catch a hint of this smell, it takes me back to childhood.

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?

I’ve been inspired a ton by science, and by all of these mentioned things. The world is the filter through which the coffee of all poetry must run. That’s an absurd sentence, but you get what I’m saying.

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

Well, my fiancée Lisa Mottolo is the most important poet in my life. No doubt about that! She’s a great inspiration, and her book will be coming out in 2023 with Unsolicited Press. It’s gonna be awesome and devastating. Just on the literary front, though, I’ve always found kinship in Robert Bly, Federico Garcia Lorca, and the Bhagavad Gita, and my PhD work was on Whitman. These have all had a big effect on me. Emily Dickinson took me an eternity to comprehend in the slightest, but her genius is remarkable.

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

Gotta get Antarctica and Australia. Those are the two continents I still need to see. I’m also psyched to be a grandparent, but since my kids are 12 and 8, I’m good waiting another twenty years, haha.

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 was a professor for a long time and thought that was what I was going to be, until I somehow found myself the Executive Editor of a successful publishing company. Weird how life does that. If I’d gone a wildly different route, I think I would have been an architect. Which is basically just poetry, except for buildings.

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

Had no choice when I was young: even when I was in elementary school I was always writing stories. Writing picked me, not the other way around.

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

Wine Simple by Aldo Sohm. Of course, this isn’t a literature book, but as someone who was totally ignorant about wine but wanted to learn, this was the perfect way to get started. Hard to say the last great film I saw, but I will mention the Italian film La Grande Bellezza as a great work I come back to again and again. It is a piece of literature.

20 - What are you currently working on?

I’m working hard on the most ambitious artistic undertaking I’ve ever pursued, and that’s running Atmosphere Press. There’s always so much to solve, so many processes to refine, so much magic to witness. It’s a creative act every day, and the satisfaction I get from designing a workflow that will help my team and help our authors…as crazy as it sounds, it’s no different than landing the right ending for a poem.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

12 or 20 (second series) questions with David Wojciechowski

David Wojciechowski is the author of Dreams I Never Told You & Letters I Never Sent (Gold Wake Press). His poems have appeared in Bateau, Jellyfish Magazine, Meridian, Figure 1, Sporklet, and other journals. He is a freelance designer living in Albany, NY. David can be found online at davidwojo.com and on Twitter @MrWojoRising.

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

It briefly changed my confidence. For a whole day I felt like I could write poetry. It did show me that there was some hope for my work, which meant a lot. It also allowed me to teach a workshop here and there. Now it kind of functions as a reminder to keep trying, keep writing. As far as it how it compares to my new work, I feel like there’s a tonal similarity because I am who I am. In my new manuscript, there are poems that directly echo and respond to poems from the first book. The composition is all different though. And these new poems feel like they’re trying to be more open—perhaps unsuccessfully, but, still, more open than the first book.

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

My high school was lucky enough to have a literary magazine elective thanks to a very dedicated English teacher, so my interest for poetry probably started there. Then in college I was lucky enough to meet people like Bruce Smith and Michael Burkard who just further kindled that interest in poetry. It came down to, I’d love to write a novel or a movie or a play, but there’s a freedom in poetry that I think makes it difficult for me to write in another genre. Though, I am trying.

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?

The actual writing of the poem is quick. Mostly because I use exercises I make up for myself so that I can get something out on the page. With my first book and early writing, first drafts definitely looked very similar to the final one. I used to be terrible and editing my work, mostly because I was worried I’d edit the heart of it but also because I felt being in a different head space editing it than when I was writing it was going to make editing impossible. I might change “the” to “a” and call it a day. Recently, the past year or two actually, I’m spending more time cutting lines and looking for some semblance of clarity. I’m really trying to figure out what a poem might be trying to say before I call it finished.

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?

It begins early in the morning at the computer soon after waking up. I don’t have a plan in mind when I start writing or when I finish. Usually I know when the poem is over, I put it away, and then when I have a good amount of poems, I begin looking at them with new eyes. Then, hopefully, they become a book. Though I have finished an erasure project that was definitely intended as a book and recently started a new one. So sometimes there’s the idea for a book at the start.

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

I love them and hate them. I get excited that I was asked to read and it sounds like it’ll be a hoot so I’ll even promote it a lot, but then the whole day of the reading, the hours leading up to it, I’m a wreck. They are a lot of fun though, despite the terror. As far as being a part of the creative process…not so much. Unless someone gives me some feedback afterward I guess.

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?

The big question my poems are trying to answer are “Why am I this way?” which is, luckily, a question I think a lot of people struggle with. Writing poems has become a way for me to explore my own subconscious (since they come from a kind of automatic place) and maybe trigger memories I forgot existed. What I’m working on now very much feels like an exploration of self and what it means to be a person and be among people, what it means to exist in the world.

7 – What do you see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Does s/he even have one? What do you think the role of the writer should be?

That’s totally up to each writer. A lot of poets and writers seem to be able to respond directly to what’s currently happening in society. They have something specific to say and they go about saying it. They hope to change or bring awareness. I admire that. I wish I could do that. It feels more relevant than what I do since my work is so interior. Does a writer need to do that? Only if they want to. For me, a writer’s role should be to reanimate the world and its languages, to allow readers to find something in themselves that they didn’t know or forgot was there.

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

I loved working with my editor at Gold Wake on my first book. I always appreciate a new set of eyes that can help me understand what it is my poems are doing, to help me see things I didn’t realize were there. It wasn’t difficult at all, but I totally understand how it could become so.

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

I don’t want to misattribute this, but I’m pretty certain it was a professor at Syracuse who told me that in workshop, when you’re being told something you do isn’t working, that might be the thing that makes your work your work, so you should do it as much as you can until you develop it to a point where suddenly it works.

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 have a sporadic routine. I’ll write every morning for a month or three months, then I’ll stop for a year. It’s a terrible routine. It’s one reason I’ve been getting into erasures; so I can write more often without “writing.” For instance, the poems in the manuscript I’m working on were all written during the summer of 2018. Since then I’ve written very, very little outside of two erasure projects. When I am writing, typically I wake up around 6am, go to my computer, turn on some ambient music, and write for 15 minutes or so. I like writing before I’m fully awake. Before my brain has a chance to process all of my daily worries and insecurities. Then I put that poem away for at least a month before I read it again.

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

The poet Michael Burkard introduced me to ekphrastic writing way back in undergrad, and that’s something I still use and, in turn, introduce my own students to. If I’m desperate to write and nothing is coming, I’ll turn to various art blogs and collections to see if anything sparks a line or phrase or idea. Whenever I’m in a new city, I love to wander their art museum. I wish I lived closer to a great one. In a museum, you’re just fully immersed in creativity, so it’s hard to not walk out of one without at least a line or two for future use.

12 - What fragrance reminds you of home?

My immediate thought was sauerkraut. I’ve been overthinking this question. It doesn’t say “what is the only fragrance,” so I’m going to go with sauerkraut since it came into my head first. My dad made it once a year, for his work Christmas party, but it is such a distinct and awful aroma that would fill the entire house.

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?

As I said earlier, visual art is a big influence for me, but not the only one. People watching, hiking, space…a lot of things end up influencing my work whether I know it or not.

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

Finding Russell Edson’s The Rooster’s Wife in college really changed what I thought a poem could be, and I adore his work to this day. Mark Strand’s work was the first time I truly saw myself in poetry. Other favorites include James Tate, Vasko Popa, Chris Kennedy, Michael Burkard, Dara Wier, Mary Ruefle, Zach Schomburg, and many, many more. I’m not sure why I stuck to just poets, so here are a few fiction writers too: Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Shane Jones, Samanta Schweblin, and Lydia Davis.

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

I have a novella I want to write that’s a creation myth. I started it in 2012 but it got away from me and I’ve been meaning to return to it for years. I’d also love to write a comic and/or a children’s book. I’d like to see the Grand Canyon. And time travel. I’d LOVE to time travel.

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?

I graduated from college with a degree in advertising, so had I not become more interested in poetry, I’d probably still be writing copy for Applebee’s and MasterCard. That’s still technically writing though. Working in stop motion animation would be a dream. As would being a Master Builder over at LEGO.

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

My dad took me to the library once or twice a week when I was a kid so I could check out stacks and stacks of books. That’s probably where it started. I always loved being creative, but I think I gradually lost confidence in my abilities as a visual artist, so I kind of fell into words and decided to make my home there. After that it’s just a series of having teachers that introduced me to interesting books and writers, gradually stoking that interest.

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

I’m only going to include a book and a film that were recently new to me (no second or third readings/watchings). Sarah Sloat’s Hotel Almighty blew me away this past year. I have a thing for very very short poems, and these erasures totally functioned on that level and were haunting and open to possibility and micro stories behind the page. Then there’s the erasure aspect and this book is a little master class in what an erasure can (should?) be. I was engrossed in how she put each of these together through collage and colored pencil and stitching. They are each a work of art. Movie-wise, it’s Palm Springs (available on Hulu!). I’ve loved Groundhog Day since I first saw it as a kid, so to see this movie which is at once similar but also wholly its own new thing was a joy. I’m a sucker for time travel or time travel adjacent movies.

19 - What are you currently working on?

I have a second manuscript of poems that I just got together and would like to start sending out. There’s also a manuscript of erasures of cowboy poetry that I need to tidy up. A few years ago I bought a novelization of Ang Lee’s Hulk at a library book sale and it recently became my new erasure project.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Brandon Amico

Brandon Amico is the author of Disappearing, Inc. (Gold Wake Press, 2019). He is a 2019 National Endowment for the Arts Creative Writing Fellow, the recipient of a North Carolina Arts Council Regional Artist Grant, and the winner of Southern Humanities Review’s Hoepfner Literary Award for Poetry. His poems have appeared in The Adroit Journal, Blackbird, The Cincinnati Review, Kenyon Review, New Ohio Review, and Verse Daily, among other publications.

1 - How did your first book change your life? How does your most recent work compare to your previous? How does it feel different?
Disappearing, Inc. being a real object in the world feels wild. You write and revise and submit and revise and write and so on for years and years and it seems like a book is at the top of the hill that you never stop climbing...until all of a sudden you're there and the book is a real thing. My work more recently, that I began writing after the book manuscript was finalized, has been more socially pointed. While the first book was certainly aware and interested in our cultural moment, it was more implicit/macro about a lot of those things, and I'm enjoying writing poems that zoom in a little farther.  

2 - How did you come to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?
It was through my love of music. I read everything, so was drawn to prose as well, but growing up I loved music and the lyrics that came along with them, so I started writing songs before poems. Granted, I couldn't play an instrument or sing, so it would be fairer to say I wrote lyrics to songs that don't exist, and yes, they were terrible (I was in middle school when I started this!) but I enjoyed playing with language so much when doing this that moving to poetry naturally followed. Fortunately, I've managed to get a little better at it over the years!

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?
It really depends. Sometimes poems go through endless revisions, sometimes they come out remarkably like their final form. More often than not, it's somewhere in the middle—my poems generally go through three to five rounds of revision before I'm comfortable with them heading out into the world. I could endlessly tinker and change them, as all writers could with their work, but at some point you have to put a poem down and move to the next one.

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?
Poems for me usually begin with an odd image or phrase that gets caught in the netting of my mind. I get it on the page, then use that as a catalyst for the rest of the poem. Why did this image/language stick out to me, why is it resonating? I dig and dig in there and usually the poem unfolds from it. As for larger book projects, I often don't write with a book in mind, I just write the poems and see what links up and what might fit into a manuscript together—but with Disappearing, Inc., it was actually the opposite. About 75% of the final book was written with that project in mind; the book was initially a single long prose poem in numbered sections. Over time nearly all the poems morphed into verse, and they gained titles as they began to take their own shapes and identities outside of the project itself.

5 - Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?
I very much enjoy doing them! I love meeting readers and lovers of literature, and sharing with them. I wouldn't say they are part of the creative process, but they're certainly not counter to it either. I'd say readings and events are adjacent, something I enjoy a lot that's related to the work, but doesn't really change the process of creating the work for me.

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 think poetry is more useful to ask questions—or, perhaps more accurately, to discover what questions we should ask—that it is to answer them. I've always seen the act of writing a poem in order to answer something, to tell someone what you already know, an exercise in redundancy or, at worst, vanity. The best poems have a genuine curiosity underpinning them, the very act of writing them, and the reader is hopefully allowed to be along for the ride and to experience the same ideas and questions and contradictions as the author. For Disappearing, Inc., one of the most important questions I was searching for answers to is what happens to the self in an age of excess, of noise, and amid the constant fracturing of who we are by forces both technological and political? Did I answer that question? No, but I didn't try to. I found the question at the center of my concerns, and spent many pages digging around and exploring it.

7 – What do you see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Does s/he even have one? What do you think the role of the writer should be?
Poetry at its core is about connection, about encouraging us to see the threads sewn under the surface, not just of the world and the culture but each other. Poetry is the opposite of simplification—if it’s doing its job, its encouraging empathy and embracing both the inability to know all and the valuing of that which we do have in our lives.

8 - Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?
Every artist needs outside feedback/guidance, and working with a talented editor is hugely beneficial. I don't know that I would say essential, as it's not a requirement to make good art and not everyone has the privilege of working with an editor in this capacity.

9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?
I took an acting class in undergrad, and though this advice was given to me in that context, I still apply it to my writing: the instructor told me, when I asked how I was going to communicate the underlying subtext of a monologue to the audience, to trust in the process to bring my understanding out in the acting. In regards to writing, I take this to mean not to belabor the point; trust your audience will follow your thought processes.

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 set writing routine. I make the time to write when I can! The closest thing I have to a routine is meeting with my writer's group where we exchange poems and edits monthly.

11 - When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?
Reading is always a nice place to go to when writing is stalled. Funny enough, I do more poetry writing when I'm in a wave of reading prose than when I'm reading verse! I think it's the sentences of prose that catch me up in their flow, get my brain thinking in sentence structure upon which I can impose lineation and new types of rhythms.

12 - What fragrance reminds you of home?
Can't say there's one in particular that transports me back there.

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?
Comedy—be it film or television, stand-up, late night, whatever—has always been a big influence. Humor is the means through which I process a lot of things.

14 - What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?
I am very lucky to have a number of incredibly talented writer friends and acquaintances. For risk of leaving anyone out I won't rattle off names, but suffice to say that the talent and/or friendship of a number of writers has buoyed me along. One person I will mention is Karen Skolfield. She's a remarkably talented writer, and her friendship and her poems themselves have meant an incredible amount to me over the years.

15 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?
Part of me wants to teach poetry! I'm not schooled in that area, though--I have no MFA and have never taught more than a workshop here and there. But perhaps someday!

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?
When I was younger I very much wanted to be a doctor. I was even accepted into university as a pre-med student. I like to think that if I didn't fall in love with words, I would have gone down that path.

17 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something else?
I've always kind of needed this outlet, and since I have no musical talent and I can't paint, it's been something I've loved throwing myself into.

18 - What was the last great book you read? What was the last great film?
The last great book was Julian Randall's REFUSE. As for film, I recently rewatched The Royal Tenenbaums—what a movie. If that doesn't count since it's a repeat viewing, definitely Jordan Peele's US.

19 - What are you currently working on?
I don't have a second book project in mind yet, so close after the first one released. I'm enjoying the freedom of being able to play around in the poetic space and organically find the interests I'm drawn to in my writing.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Anne Champion

Anne Champion is the author of Reluctant Mistress (Gold Wake Press, 2013) and The Dark Length Home (Noctuary Press, 2017).  Her poems have appeared in Verse Daily, The Pinch, Pank Magazine, The Comstock Review, Thrush Poetry Journal, Redivider, Cider Press Review, New South, and elsewhere.  She was a recipient of the Academy of American Poet’s Prize, a recipient of the Barbara Deming Memorial grant, a Pushcart Prize nominee, a St. Botolph Emerging Writer’s Grant nominee, and a Squaw Valley Community of Writers Poetry Workshop participant. She holds degrees in Behavioral Psychology and Creative Writing from Western Michigan University and received her MFA in Poetry from Emerson College.  She currently teaches writing and literature at Wheelock College in Boston, MA and is a staff writer for Luna Luna Magazine.

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, Reluctant Mistress, didn’t significantly change my life.  The process of writing it taught me a lot, both about myself and about craft.  Publication was simply a goal completed that allowed me to move on and dedicate my energies to other projects.  The best part of publication was having readers who fully understood my work.  I’m so humbled and grateful for the warmth of the poetry community—that simply means everything.  It gives my life a sort of fulfillment that I never dreamed I’d have.

My new collection set for publication by Noctuary Press, The Dark Length Home, is a collaborative collection that I wrote with the incomparable Sarah Sweeney.  It was an experience I treasure.  I generally have a plan as I sit down to write a poem. I know what images I will focus on, I know what story I want to tell, and I have a general idea of how it will end.  With Sarah, we alternated line by line.  I had to let go of control, and it was exciting.  Poems would take turns I didn’t expect, and I had to adapt to tones and voices that were not my own.  I’m really proud of how we navigated the process, and I think it pushed me in new directions.

I’m working on other collections, and I always want to challenge myself in terms of topics that I obsess over and formal constraints.  I am trying to do something new with each one.  At some point in time, I started to feel like I was writing about the same thing repeatedly, and I needed to challenge myself.  I definitely think I’m doing that with my new work.

2 - How did you come to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?
I actually came to fiction first.  I wrote stories from the time I was a child and I studied primarily fiction through college.  However, at some point in my college experience, poetry simply started to become the genre that spoke to me most forcefully, moved me most emotionally, and served me as a writer.  Once I started writing poetry, I stopped writing everything else.  I still read all genres of writing religiously, but poetry allows me to express what I want in a variety of creative ways.

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?
The initial draft work comes quickly to me. I’m usually struck by an image, a line, or a concept and it harasses me until I begin to interrogate it through writing it down.  I’ll shape it into a poem fairly fast.  However, the revision process is often long, tedious, and torturous.  I have a group of writers that I bring drafts to and rely on for revision advice.  I’ll often play with various forms and structures, going back and forth between new and old drafts.  Sometimes the revision comes within weeks, sometimes I keep tweaking a poem for years.  Some poems I finally abandon and throw away.  Regardless, the final draft rarely looks like the original.

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?
Within the last few years, I have focused on making a book from the beginning.  It seems that, in terms of both getting a manuscript published and in reader’s experience of the work, it’s best to have a cohesive collection.  My first two collections (one which is unpublished), did not really begin as a “book” per se, though I tried to structure them so that they look at specific themes.  In writing them, I was simply writing poems about all different things that inspired me.  Now, I generally start with a vision for a book, and focus my writing on exploring that vision.

5 - Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?
Public readings are necessary to the process, as they get your writing out in the world and allow you to expose it to new people. I enjoy performing in front of crowds, so I’ve always enjoyed readings. However, after my first book, I did so many readings that I had to take time off from it—I got very burned out, and I just wanted to hole myself away and focus on new work.

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 don’t have specific questions, but I do have obsessions that I’ve been exploring for years.  Some of my obsessions include female sexuality, feminism, sexual liberation, abuse, war, race, and oppression.  In terms of questions, I always think of my poems as interrogating a wound.

7 – What do you see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Does s/he even have one? What do you think the role of the writer should be?
In many cultures, poets are revered.  When I was doing activist work in Palestine, Palestinians would always tell me that I was a messenger for God, because “a poet speaks God’s pain.” I found this sentiment lovely (though it certainly put a lot of expectation on my work!) 

I think writers are important in that artists play a role in creating culture, reflecting cultural values, and capturing the sentiments of a historical moment.  No matter what you are writing, you are writing in the context of culture and history; thus, we have a very important responsibility to respect that and reflect deeply upon the issues of our time.  We need to be creatures of empathy and morality, though we may not be perfect ourselves—in our writing, we should be striving for the better world.

8 - Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?
It’s essential for any writer to work with other people.  Many people think of it as such a solitary profession, but I really don’t think it should be.  Our work is not read in a vacuum, and it shouldn’t be written in one either.  We need an audience and we need feedback to perfect our craft.  I’ve never had a bad experience working with an editor.  In fact, I quite like my editors! 

9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?
I saw Michael Cunningham speak when I was in college.  Someone asked him what advice he could give to young writers. His answer was simple: “It’s going to take a really, really long time to see your work in print.  You are going to be rejected a lot.  You have to be really patient and really determined to keep trying and keep writing.”  It seems like common sense, but I really took it to heart.  I don’t let rejection bother me.  I just keep focusing on trying to make my writing better and make my projects become something I’m personally proud of.  Even if they never see the light of day, the process of writing is still very fulfilling to me, in and of itself.  I want my work to be read, but I don’t make publication a measure of my happiness as a writer.  When I have success, I consider it a bonus to something that I already love, something that is a major part of who I am. 

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 really have one.  As a professor, I try to sneak in writing whenever I can.  I dedicate myself most to writing when I have time off.  I don’t think a writer needs to write every day to be a real writer; part of being a writer is experiencing life and processing the world mentally and emotionally.

11 - When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?
I go to books of poetry that I know have powerfully moved me.  When I re-read books that changed me, I usually feel inspired immediately. Or I look for new books of writers who are exploring themes that I’m interested in.  Whenever I find a poem I wish I wrote, I get very excited about going back to writing and experimenting on the page.

12 - What fragrance reminds you of home?
I don’t think I’ve fully figured out what home means to me.  I feel at home in a lot of places.  I feel most at home when I’m traveling far from home. (Though I miss my cats!)

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?
I know a lot of writers that dabble in other arts or use other arts for their inspiration.  For me, personally, books really do come from books.  I love all forms of art and I try to expose myself to it as much as possible, but they rarely explicitly influence my work.  Whereas writers influence my work constantly.  I wouldn’t change or experiment if it were not for what I’d seen other writers do.  I get most inspired while reading. 

14 - What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?
There’s so many!! This is always the hardest question because I want to rattle off a long list. Sylvia Plath is really my backbone as a poet. If it were not for her, I would not be a poet.  She showed me how to write about rage, pain, and abuse with such musical grace, and I still think no one holds a candle to her metaphors.  Anais Nin influenced me in terms of sexual liberation and feminist themes.  I also love Louise Gluck, Tarfia Faizullah, Traci Brimhall, Sharon Olds, Mark Doty, Sandra Cisneros, and Junot Diaz.

In terms of my life outside of work, there are several poets who have been an incredible support system: Lisa Marie Basile, Mary Stone, and Kristina Marie Darling, to name a few. I also greatly admire their writing.

15 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?
Work in a refugee camp in the Middle East.

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?
I would be a full time activist and community organizer.  That’s hard to make a living doing, but I’m so inspired by revolutionaries that sacrificed everything for social change.  I was really inspired by young peace activists that I met in Palestine; they are doing such creative things!  I’d love to be fully immersed in that.

17 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something else?
I write because I have to.  Words haunt me, and if I don’t get them out then I’ll lose my mind.  I write to know who I am and understand the world better. I write to increase my sense of empathy for others. I write because I simply have no choice.  It gives my life depth in ways that nothing else does.

18 - What was the last great book you read? What was the last great film?
I recently read Nelson Mandela’s autobiography Long Walk to Freedom. As an activist, I found his voice to be monumentally inspiring, full of wisdom, dogged patience, and compassion. 

I don’t see a lot of movies (I’m more of a TV gal), but I really loved Selma.

19 - What are you currently working on?
I’m currently working on revising a manuscript called Graveyard of Numbers which is the result of a Peace Delegation that I went to in Palestine.  The manuscript documents the many stories I was told by locals in documenting the horrors of war and military occupation.  It also ties in issues of race and oppression in American culture.

My next manuscript, which I’ve started the process of writing, will be Odes and Persona poems to famous historical women. So far I have poems to Annie Oakley, Amelia Earhart, Judy Garland, Sylvia Plath, Harriot Jacobs, Anne Frank, and others.  I hope to have a broad range in terms of race and sexuality, including transgender women and men.

12 or 20 (second series) questions;

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Kristina Marie Darling

Kristina Marie Darling is the author of twenty books, which include The Arctic Circle (BlazeVOX Books, 2014), Fortress (Sundress Publications, 2014), and Scorched Altar:  Selected Poems and Stories (BlazeVOX Books, 2014).  Her awards include fellowships from Yaddo, the Ucross Foundation, and the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation, as well as grants from the Kittredge Fund and the Elizabeth George Foundation.  She was recently selected as a Visiting Artist at the American Academy in Rome.

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?
I feel like my first book opened up everything for me.  In the process of giving readings, doing interviews, and reaching out to critics and reviewers, I really started to feel like I was part of a community.  I'll always be grateful to Jared Michael Wahlgren of Gold Wake Press for taking a chance on my first book, Night Songs.  But my recent work is definitely more experimental than that first poetry collection.  Night Songs was a thematically linked poetry collection, containing many prose poems that addressed classical music in some way.  Lately I've become much more interested in fragmented forms, since I feel like they leave more room for the reader's imagination. 

2 - How did you come to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?
I came to poetry after a short career as a failed fiction writer.  I tried to write short stories, but the problem was, I approached them with a poet's mindset.  I didn't really care about plot, but spent all of my time crafting evocative images.  It was after several terrible short stories that I realized that poetry was a better match for me. 

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?
A book-length project takes me about a month.  This is because when I have a manuscript in progress, it literally takes over my life.  It consumes all my energy until I've finally finished it.  For me, revision is easiest when I'm in this mindset, so I mostly revise the book as I go along, changing certain passages after I've written the next one.

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 mostly work with long poems and book-length projects.  But I usually find the larger project, or the overarching theme, as I write.  I usually start out with a short piece or two, and from that, a structure emerges.  It's almost impossible, for me at least, to feel like I'm working on a book from the very beginning, since the book never turns out the way I think it will. 

5 - Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?
I love doing readings.  I look at them as an opportunity for dialogue.  You not only get feedback on your work-in-progress, but you make valuable connections with other poets.  I enjoy meeting poets whose work is much different from my own, since these are the poets who challenge me most, and who I learn the most from.  For me, readings present the perfect opportunity to make these kinds of connections. 

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 mostly write in appropriated academic forms (footnotes, glossaries, appendices, etc.) with the goal of rendering scholarly discourse more inclusive.  More often than not, academic conversations are predicated on acts of exclusion.  Most of us could probably name many things that supposedly don't belong in an academic paper.  These rules serve mostly to keep certain groups of people from participating in scholarly conversations.  With that in mind, my writing blends these received academic forms with types of language that would never appear in an academic paper - autobiography, aestheticized diction, etc.  I'm trying to figure out what scholarly inquiry would look like if it's language, and its forms, were more democratic.  I definitely think that one of the most pressing questions currently has to do with where we draw the line between "creative" and "critical" discourses. 

7 – What do you see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Does s/he even have one? What do you think the role of the writer should be?
It seems like most writers position themselves as cultural critics, but this is problematic, because the poetry community especially is so insular.   I think that writers should still hold a mirror to culture, but they should also look beyond their own communities to effect change.  

8 - Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?
I love working with editors, particularly when publishing book-length works.  I say this because I've had editors make suggestions that surprised me in the best possible way.  Even when I have a clear vision for what a given book will be, I really value feedback from someone who's been through the process many more times than I have. 

9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?
Poetry is 20% art and 80% business. 

10 - How easy has it been for you to move between genres (poetry to critical prose)? What do you see as the appeal?
I love working in other genres, particularly reviewing.  When writing reviews, I do close readings of other writer's work, and this teaches me a great deal that I can apply to my own craft.  It's also nice because when I'm at a standstill with a poetry manuscript or a larger creative project, I can turn to my work in another genre and hopefully find some inspiration there. 

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 definitely pride myself on not having a set routine.  I write when I can, and when I feel that I have something I'd like to say.  But much of my poetry wouldn't exist without artist residencies.  For me, it's crucial to have time set aside that's just for writing, and to be free of other obligations.  This is what enables me to sink deep into myself and begin writing. 

12 - When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?
When my writing is stalled, I read everything I can get my hands on.  This includes poetry, of course, but also many texts that would never be on a poetry workshop syllabus.  By this I mean Victorian novels, astronomy books, the work of visual artists, and even mathematical books.  More often than not, it's strange non-poetry related texts that provide the best inspiration and direction for my work. 

13 - What fragrance reminds you of home?
Yankee Candle's plug-in air fresheners. 

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?
That's a great question.  The time I've spent at artist colonies (Yaddo, the Vermont Studio Center, the Wurlitzer Foundation, etc.) has been a really important influence on my poetry.  What's great about artist colonies is that you're exposed to work in so many different mediums - music, visual arts, writing, and everything in between.  I immediately became interested in work that crosses disciplinary boundaries, and have since done many collaborations with artists.  My recent book, Music for another life, was co-written with photographer and costumer Max Avi Kaplan.  He would take beautiful Polaroids and I'd write poems in response to his work.  I've also collaborated with installation artist Naoko Ito and composer Dale Trumbore, both of whom are very talented.  I feel lucky to have had the opportunity to participate in these artist residency programs at such an early stage in my career, and to be exposed to such compelling work in other disciplines. 

15 - What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?
One of the first contemporary poets whose work I read was Eric Baus.  I was in college at the time, and picked up a copy of his magnificent book, The To Sound.  His work showed me that meaning in poetry doesn't always have to be clear cut, and that the reader can assume a more active role, participating actively in the process of creating meaning from the text.  More recently, I've found the work of Kim Gek Lin Short, Lucie Brock Broido, Leah Umansky, and Emily Toder to be particularly inspiring. 

16 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?
I've always wanted travel Europe by train.  I had a friend who claimed to have done it, and he said that the views were spectacular.  I've also thought about writing a novel, but all of my attempts at fiction usually become a prose poems, flash fictions, or something else entirely. 

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?
If I could pick another occupation, I'd probably choose to become a visual artist of some kind.  I've always wondered what it would be like to be liberated from my laptop, and to work with materials that are more tangible.  If I hadn't become a writer, I would have probably done something in this vein, perhaps working on text-based installations, paintings, etc.  This makes sense to me because my poetry is so visual, and frequently manipulates the space of the printed page.   

18 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something else?
I've always said that you don't choose to be a poet, but rather, it's something you're called to do.  I chose to write because, really, I had no choice.  It was something I was compelled to pursue, whether I liked it or not.

19 - What was the last great book you read? What was the last great film?
The last great book I read was Shelly Taylor's Black-Eyed Heifer.  I've always admired poetry collections that create their own rules, their own syntax, and their own worlds.  Shelly Taylor has done all that and more.  It's a beautiful book, and one that I'd definitely recommend. 

And I'd have to say the last great film I saw was Nebraska.  It combines deadpan humor, interesting visual choices (the film is shot in black and white), and dysfunctional families.  It doesn't get any better than that.   

20 - What are you currently working on?
I'm working on a new collection of prose poems called "The Sun & the Moon."  The book will be a love story, a ghost story, and an astronomy guide all in one.  Stay tuned for details!

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