Jennifer Martelli has received fellowships from The Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, Monson Arts, and the Massachusetts Cultural Council. Her work has appeared in The Academy of American Poets Poem-A-Day, Poetry, Best of the Net Anthology, Braving the Body Anthology, Verse Daily, Plume, The Tahoma Literary Review, and elsewhere. She is the author of Psychic Party Under the Bottle Tree, The Queen of Queens, which won the Italian American Studies Association Book Award and was shortlisted for the Massachusetts Book Award, and My Tarantella, which was also shortlisted for the Massachusetts Book Award and named finalist for the Housatonic Book Award. Jennifer Martelli is co-poetry editor for MER. www.jennmartelli.com
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 hadn’t written or submitted work for about 10 years. I completely unplugged from the poetry community; we had moved with our infant daughter out of Cambridge and up to the North Shore, where I had no connection to poetry groups, etc. This, I discovered, is central to my writing. As introverted as I can be, I need a community of writers. Through my good friend, Jennifer Jean, I was introduced to an editor in the area, the magnificent Robin Stratton. She published my first chapbook, Apostrophe, and in 2016, my full length, The Uncanny Valley. I was so honored to have somebody who actually wanted to publish my work!
When I look back on those books, I see a through line, at least in terms of what I’m still writing about: sisters, witness, relationships. The difference is that I’m older and more willing to take chances with my voice; less afraid of what people will think.
How did you come to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?
I came to poetry after reading Stephen King’s Salem’s Lot (a novel about vampires). I was probably about 13-years old. In the book, he uses a poem, “The Emperor of Ice Cream,” by Wallace Stephens. I had no idea what the poem meant (I’m still not sure I do), but I wondered why this mysterious poem was in a book about vampires. Thus, my love of poetry!
I’ve never really tried fiction; perhaps I’m lazy. I do go through periods where I write non-fiction, which I enjoy, and which can be as lyrical as any poem. A while ago, I was in a writing group that committed to 100-word stories/week. This was a perfect forum for a poet: I had to practice concision, as well as story-telling. My poems don’t always follow a narrative or chronological arc (this can be problematic at times!), so being in this group helped a lot. The stories tended to be biographical or, at least meditative. I was able to complete a 1000-word creative non-fiction piece about a statue of the Virgin Mary in my childhood neighborhood who, people believed, began to speak, to prophesize. This story still haunts me; writing it as prose was a way to contain it.
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?
This is a tough question. My process can be both slow and quick. I have a poem from my 2018 collection, My Tarantella, and a poem that ends my 2022 collection, The Queen of Queens. Both poems began with the same idea but took years to form, to split. They are, in fact, the same poem. So, yes, some poems fill up notebooks with drafts and notes.
Other times—and this doesn’t happen a lot—I’m given a gift. A poem comes out almost formed. This usually happens when I’m reading a lot of poetry, or a lot of poetry that shows me something new, that I have a physical response to. It’s very rare, and I don’t completely trust this, though, which is why I have readers.
I remember hearing Louise Glück talking about this; she would go for long stretches without writing, and then, complete a whole manuscript in a year! I will say that if I’m deep in the weeds of writing a book (or what I think might become a book), the writing is a little easier; comes a little faster.
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 last two collections were project books, meaning, they centered around a specific person (Kitty Genovese and Geraldine Ferraro). I never start out thinking, “Oh, I’ll write a book about this person.” I might get an idea in my mind—perhaps I read an article about them or I see an image that reminded me of the times in which they lived—and write from there. So there’s an image, or a look, that’s contained in the poem. So, I write another poem perhaps with that image, and then another. What emerges is my own personal mythology, with imagery that repeats. In The Queen of Queens, which centered around Ferraro, pearls showed up in a lot of poems because Geraldine Ferraro wore them a lot; in My Tarantella, which recounts the murder of Kitty Genovese (who was murdered in 1964), leather gloves and bats show up. In a way, the subjects become prompts, thus the book is less of an historical account, but way more personal to the speaker.
But, to simply answer your question, no, I never start out thinking I have a book.
Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?
I do enjoy doing readings, especially now that we’re back in person (though Zoom afforded me the chance to read—and to go to readings—in places that would have been harder to visit). Readings definitely don’t slow or hinder my creative process; in fact, they are a good way to see how the poem feels as I read it. Most of the time, I like the energy in a reading, especially in-person.
I don’t feel as if the thought of a public reading informs my creative process. I do try to think about my audience when I’m choosing poems to read. I was doing a reading with a friend, and she suggested a “round robin” format, meaning, we would riff off each other’s poems. I really liked this, because it was a surprise for me: which poem will I read next?
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?
This is a good question. My last two books were definitely poems of witness: they pretty much spanned the Trump administration. This period affected me in ways I didn’t expect. This was reflected in my poetry; a lot of my poems do not hide my contempt. I had a friend and fellow poet ask if I was afraid that his would alienate some readers who either didn’t agree with my beliefs or who just didn’t want to hear about them. I had to accept this as a possibility. So, my theoretical question is: do I write to satisfy readers or do I write what is my obsession/concern at the moment? For me, it came down to (and I’ll quote Claudia Rankine): “I write what I write.” Another theoretical concern was coming to terms with my atheism, which I explore in my forthcoming book. As a person in recovery, rejecting the belief in a (G)god was scary. Can I recover as a non-believer? This kind of responds to the previous question: how much should I anticipate what the reader will absorb? Can I let this affect my writing? The answer is no, I can’t.
I guess I’m trying to answer my own questions: how do I live in this world? why do some topics/issues get caught in my internal sieve? why am I drawn to write about some things and not others?
I think the main question is: how can I not be invisible?
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 going to repeat what I heard Claudia Rankine say: “I write what I write.” My political poems (I hate that term) or poems of witness arose from the same place that any other poem I write arose (see questions above). So, whether I’m writing about a Queen of Night tulip or the Dobbs decision, I hope that I’m writing from an honest place. That’s the role of a writer in our larger culture: to write honestly.
As a poet, I’m not sure how much of a role I have, in terms of change, but that trying to change people or society has never been my goal as a poet. There’s a place for my activism outside of the poetry world—and I’m sure some of that seeps into my creative work—but I’ve never gone to poetry for activism.
Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?
I love working with editors. I find it essential to have a set of eyes that I trust on my work. Having hard conversations with people I respect has only improved my books. Shout out to Eileen Cleary at Lily Poetry Review Books!
What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?
About writing: “What’s a stake in the poem? what are you risking?” And of course, the Rankine quote.
About life: “What’s at stake? What are you risking?”
How easy has it been for you to move between genres (poetry to critical prose)? What do you see as the appeal?
I feel that my movement from poetry to critical prose waxes and wanes. I’ve always written reviews, though lately, I feel like my critical work has gotten a little lazy, formulaic, which is why I’m taking a break. I also go through periods where I’m writing non-fiction; I’m not always sure why this move happens—maybe I grow sick of line breaks!
I think these forays into sentences are good, in terms of keeping my own writing fresh. Critical prose is important in my writing life for a few reasons: first, I’m reading more poetry; second, I’m being a literary citizen, which can feel good.
What kind of writing routine do you tend to keep, or do you even have one? How does a typical day (for you) begin?
A typical day starts early. As I get older, I find it harder to sleep in! So I get up, feed my cat, Maria, have my breakfast while I read the paper, watch the news. Then I go up to my office and begin my day. This might mean finishing a review or a critique, organizing my own work, revising or generating new work. I find mornings are most productive.
When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?
Walking is a huge help; when I’m stuck on a poem or even prose, moving my body almost shakes a rhythm out of me.
The other thing is to return to collections which have always been generative: Marie Howe, Victoria Chang, Laura Jensen, Lucille Clifton, Rachel Mennies.
What fragrance reminds you of home?
I hate to say this, but sometimes when I smell cigarettes, I think of my mother (she quit when I was a teen). I loved how it smelled on her coat.
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?
Lately, I’ve been heavily involved in visual art as a source of my poetry. I’m in an ekphrastic group, where we write weekly to various works of visual art. The poems I write may not directly describe the work, but they respond to it—perhaps a color or shape. My hope is that the poems stand on their own.
I love movies, too, and they play a big part in a lot of my work.
What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?
As I mentioned, there are poets whose work speaks to me in a way beyond the intellectual. Elizabeth Bishop, Marie Howe, Victoria Chang, Laura Jensen are a few.
In terms of simplifying my life, probably The Twelve Steps and Twelve Traditions Book of AA. It’s dated and a little too Christian for my tastes, but there’s some beautiful writing there and some truth which transformed my life decades ago.
What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?
I would love to go to the very tip of Chile and gaze at Antarctica. I think I’d also love to take a cross-country train ride.
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 high school English teacher for years; perhaps I would have stayed at my job had I not been given the opportunity to go to grad school for writing.
Sometimes, I wish I had studied archeology; the idea of digging and finding excites me.
What made you write, as opposed to doing something else?
I don’t think I was very good at anything else, in terms of a creative pursuit. Or, I just didn’t have the patience to learn how to improve. I feel like a kind of “got” writing. With other arts, I’m just more of a fan!
What was the last great book you read? What was the last great film?
frank: sonnets by Diane Seuss; Winter Solstice and Summer Solstice by Nina MacLaughlin.
Great film? I should warn you that I love horror. I think Get Out is a perfect film. Parasite, The Zone of Interest.
What are you currently working on?
I have two manuscripts in the works: one is a collection of poems that was prompted (or responds to) the film, Suspiria; the other is a more political collection, dealing with violence and misogyny. We’ll see how they develop!
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