On Reading Other Poets

I often forget, during poetry workshops, to talk about the importance of not only reading other poets' work, but their interviews as well. They are usually quite insightful, and often lend clues to the background or inspiration for poems that have mysterious edges to them.

I recently did an interview for Indigo Williams' blog "Ask a Poet" and mentioned synesthesia. I've since received three emails from people who did not know there was an actual name for this thing they've experienced since childhood. I ended up writing back-and-forth for a week with a woman, talking about the sounds of colors and colors of letters and how imagery in our work was driven by synesthesia. It was exciting. And comforting.

On that note, I have decided to post numerous interviews from some of my favorite writers. I hope you read them. And I hope you come away inspired.

Tennessee Williams

Anne Sexton (interview is near the bottom) and there is also a partial interview here.


Gwendolyn Brooks


Gabriel García Márquez


Philip Levine


Arthur Miller


William Faulkner


Pablo Neruda


Alice Walker


P.S. While I was in Austin, TX last week, I bought a couple sheets of the Poets Stamps that the USPS put out. Get yours before they're gone!

MAMMOTH

WOOHOO! After a five year drought, I've finally put together a poetry CD, filled with twenty-five poems, including Untitled (Last Love) and two dozen poems that are rare, new or have never seen the light of day. I am extremely proud of this CD. It's my most favorite of all three and is available in person (I'll be in Austin, TX as of TOMORROW!) or online. It might take a minute to get up on my website, so til then, you can click here:

Here's one of the poems I wrote for the 30/30 challenge!

 Poem for Lupe Vélez

What hell twitch fever to be the fixed appetite of dogs,

to line your eyes in black wax, stare at a stranger

in the mirror's eye and wonder which wretched escape 

will claim you: an eight-foot deathbed, 

your dreamless body chalked in roses.  

Someone’s husband couldn’t sleep once the news broke,

no surprise a jilted reporter wanted to write

your pretty head in the toilet, but the shipwrecked ghost

rattled chains in your womb; truth is every bastard’s 
favorite lullaby and every woman is someone’s diary 
of flesh hidden in the outhouse.

I bet you play your part well in the afterlife. Riot hyna, 
I bet you howl like mudsong, hair a mess 
of hot telephone wires 
crook’d atop your troubled skull.

© Rachel McKibbens

Writing Exercise #87

Okay, loves, this is the 30th exercise of National Poetry Month.

Write your shrine. The thing people might build when you leave our planet. What is the saddest song in the world playing? What is the shrine's house made of? What object represent you? What memories paint the walls? What is made from your bones? Your hair? Your teeth? Need inspiration? Read the poem that inspired this exercise. But brace yourself - it's a doozey.

Writing Exercise #86

My most favorite form in the world is the PANTOUM. I am a sucker for rhythm and repetition, when done well, and I tend to write them when I'm outraged. Weird, I know.

Write a pantoum where each line is either a bad excuse (i.e. "She meant nothing to me") or any quote or cruddy pick-up line that has ignited the angry bone in you to spark some fire. If you want to get real deep, you can make the pantoum be a collection of the worst things you've said to a lover/family member/friend or vice versa. Just remember, the first line of your poem is the last line of your poem, so make sure it has resonance.

Writing Exercise #85

Write a seven section poem with small vignettes for each deadly sin.


(This exercise is inspired by a set of poems in Stephen Dobyns' book "Griffon," most particularly, this one.)

Writing Exercise #84

I like the idea of writing a ghazal with a slang refrain, like "yeah, whatever" or "psssh, I don't think so." I don't know why I have never written a ghazal. I have a dozen pantoums and sestinas, but no ghazals! I better get crack-a-lackin!

Need some inspiration? It's not a ghazal, but it's HOLY.