Poet Spotlight: Terrance Hayes

Last week, we had the good fortune of having Terrance Hayes on our campus, visiting classes and talking with students. My composition students probably don’t know how lucky they are to have had this award-winning poet talk to us about his work for an hour, but I sure got a lot out of it! Terrance also attended our graduate nonfiction writing class, where we peppered him with questions about his writing process. 

I asked Terrance about the longevity of his writing career and how his writing material has evolved over the years.  This was fantastic his response:

“You can’t outrun your obsessions. Behind every revelation is another question. So I poke at my obsessions, I play with form. I try to do something different—go in thru the trap door—but it’s always different angles of the same obsession.”

As a writer at the very beginning of what will hopefully be a long writing career, I am starting to see these patterns that he’s referring to. The more I write, the more I realize that I am often circling the same topics, sometimes even referring to the same event in different essays or stories. Similar themes show up in everything that I write, whether it be fiction, memoir, or children’s lit.

He said something else that was a great image for the writing mind:

“The mind is a junkyard. I keep rooting around, putting things in a box, then a bag. I try different containers until I get it right. I stockpile my writing, looking where to shelve it.”

We pull from our life experiences, so it makes sense that we return to some of the same ideas again and again, but hopefully in a refreshing and illuminating way each time, getting deeper and deeper into the center of that obsession. 

Some more great Terrance quotes:

On poetry:

Poems are about poetry.

My poems travel without me.

The job of poetry is not to correct history but to engage history.

Poems are living things. They are constantly changing.

The point of poetry is to get the things we can’t express into the world.

What else would I be doing if not failing at poetry?

Poetry is the thinking mind.

On writing:

I wish to achieve surprise, exhaustion, discomfort in a poem. As a writer, I'm interested in the place of not knowing.

The mind is a junkyard. I keep rooting around, putting things in a box, then a bag, different containers until I get it right. I stockpile my writing, looking where to shelve it.

We are walking consuming creatures, and all of that we ingest will show up in our writing.

I assume everyone is smarter than me.

Get away from thesis/argument/aboutness.

Challenge your rituals to create different kinds of work. Observe changes, mess up.

I know what comes natural to me

Write without worrying, even if it doesn’t come together right away

The unification, thread, harmony of a piece might come together differently than you expect.

Write for writings sake – find joy in the process.

Trust your intuitive sense. It’s a dangerous slope to trust what other people think is good

Vulnerability is a useful tool, and maybe a kind of weapon. The alternative is silence and shame, and not much art would get made it we focused on that.

On revision:

Revision process is endless. I could revise forever.

Infinite failures, infinite successes.

Sending work out as part of the revision process.

I want a poem to sound easy and natural even if it’s taken a whole lot of work.

If you’ve offended someone, maybe it’s not done yet.

WHAT'S HAPPENING IN THE RESTLESS WRITER WORLD:

• A new piece out in the world! "Night Owl" at Cleaver Mag
• Leading a 6 week memoir workshop at Temple Terrace Library!

Upcoming Readings:

• 6 x 6 on March 25 at Felicitous Coffee 
• There Will Be Words in Orlando, April 12 at The Gallery at Avalon Island

Composing Real Life: Putting the FICTION in Nonfiction

In my fiction class the other day, my professor made a comment comparing my fiction writing to my nonfiction.

“You seem so in control of your characters in your fiction,” she said. “And with your nonfiction, there are too many people on the stage. I always want you to edit down the characters, maybe combine a couple and cut some out.”

Her comment made me laugh. I come from a big family! What does she expect? (And while I wish I could control my family members, I can't!) But my teacher is bringing up something that we talk about A LOT in my nonfiction class: What liberties can we take when we are writing true stories?

We just read Richard Blanco’s hilarious memoir about growing up in Miami, The Prince of Los Cocuyos, which comes with an interesting disclaimer. He writes in his author’s note at the beginning of the book: “I’ve compressed events, changed the names of people, places and things. At times I have collaged two (or three) people into one, embroidered memories, or borrowed them. I’ve bent time and space in the way that the art of memory demands.”

Almost every memoir that we have read in my nonfiction class comes with some version of this author’s note, and we always spend class time speculating what characters were “composited” and which events were compressed.

When people ask what creative nonfiction is, I tell them it’s applying the tools of fiction to tell true stories. In nonfiction writing, people you know become “characters” and real events become “scenes.” This is how nonfiction is different from journalism or reportage. We are shaping real events into a compelling story, but in order to do so, we might have to take some creative liberties.

For example, if I were writing a memoir, my gaggle of Cuban aunties might become a single character. Or, if I wanted to write about my daily drives to elementary school with my father and sister, I might borrow dialogue and events from several of those drives and roll it into one scene. Would this make my writing less true? Can this still be considered nonfiction?

You may be wondering why a writer of nonfiction would even consider employing these strategies. There are several reasons. First of all, you must understand that our loyalty is to the reader. As writers, we have made a contract with the reader to tell them a story, and we are going to tell the best damn story that we can.

If I were to name my aunties, all eleven of them, how would this effect the reader? Would the reader be able to keep track of who said what? More than likely, they would become overwhelmed by the abundance of characters on the stage (as my fiction professor was when reading my nonfiction.) The same goes with the car rides. Sure, I can try to recreate for you each separate car ride when my father said something crazy and my sister did something funny, but by compressing them into one scene, you get a feeling for what those car rides were like. Everything I am saying happened did actually happen; it just might not have happened in the exact way that I am describing it.

Writers must decide for themselves where they stand on this issue. But even if you don’t feel comfortable combining a few minor characters into one or compressing events, most likely you are still not telling the “whole truth and nothing but the truth.” Why is that? Because, in order to fulfill your contract as a storyteller, you are going to cherry-pick what events and characters to write about. This is called narrative omission. Again, what we do as storytellers is very different from what journalist do. Our loyalty is to the story and not necessarily to the facts.

So how does omission work? Well, let’s say I’m writing a hypothetical memoir about my lifelong battle with diabetes (*completely made up scenario). Of course, lots of other things are true about my life, such as taking a trip to Africa and having a love of whales. But if these things don’t pertain to my battle with diabetes, does it make sense to include them in my memoir? Two things may be happening in your life simultaneously, but one thing will have to do with what you’re writing about and the other doesn’t.

Readers pick up a memoir for a very different reason than they do a work of historical nonfiction; the art of memoir demands a reader who appreciates emotional truths. Memoirists understand the malleability and ambiguity of memory, and their attempt is to write as close to their truth as possible. Of course, each person in any situation will have a different perspective of the same event. As Blanco writes in his author’s note, “these pages are emotionally true, though not necessarily or entirely factual.” It is up to the reader (and the writer) to decide how to come to terms with this complexity.  

Art Farm Reading Recap: The Art of Listening & Other Quandaries

This weekend, I was lucky enough to read at the KGB Bar (which also has a literary magazine!) with four other women writers who also did residencies at the Art Farm this season. It was great to reunite with Raluca and Aimee, writers that I lived and worked with on the farm, and Ed, the amazing ringmaster of this gloriously DIY operation. I was also introduced to two other awesome writers, Kaylen and Lauren.

The Art Farm writers and ED, mastermind of it all!

Before I got to the bar, friends asked me if I was nervous about reading. "Nope," I said. "Not in the least." I had a bunch of friends coming to the reading and somehow their presence seemed to be enough to ward off any feelings of worry or anxiety. [By the way, thank you to the best friends ever who came from Boston and NJ to attend! It was so special to have their support!!]

That is, until I got up the podium. Then I forgot my name and how to even speak English, for that matter. The whole thing was a strange out of body experience, and I'm not quite sure how I got through it. But somehow, my mouth spoke words and pages were turned.

Anyway, this has me wondering -- do people actually LISTEN to what's being read at a reading? 

Generally, I think I'm a pretty bad listener, although I've been getting better since becoming addicted to podcasts. But usually, when I'm listening to a podcast I'm by myself and I'm keeping myself physically occupied with an activity like driving or cooking. 

During a reading, there are so many moving parts. First of all, you're in a room full of people. That's distraction enough to keep my mind occupied for days, thinking up story lines for these strangers' lives. Also, you have nothing to do but listen. Maybe it's just me, but I find this extremely hard. 

Don't get me wrong -- I like attending readings and I get something out of the experience, but I think it's such a wholly different way to interact with the written word.

I think about how different the "writing life" is these days. Today, writers have to think like rock stars in order to sell any books and make money. With free music downloads, musicians can't make money on records like they used to. So they have to go on tour to make the big bucks. It's the same with writers. Gone are the days when writers didn't need to have a public persona to be successful. I see more and more writers going on tours (if they're lucky enough to have their publishers foot the bill). Some readings I've been to even make buying the book mandatory to get into the event!

I think that readings can be moving events, and they certainly have a purpose in terms of getting your work directly to an audience. But for an extrovert like me who can barely keep my butt in a chair, I wonder what people get out of the experience. Feel free to post a comment here and let me know what you love or dislike about attending readings! 

Here are some photos of the event!

The sultry venue on the lower east side!

Aimee Herman shares poetry and letters

Raluca Albu reading from her novel-in-progress

Author Spotlight: Simon Moreton

This week, in my comics/graphic narrative class, we were fortunate enough to have a Skype conversation with British cartoonist, Simon Moreton. It was way too late his time, but he was gracious enough to spend the better part of an hour answering our questions.

We’d all read Simon’s latest book, the beautifully rendered Plans We Made (Uncivilized Books). To tell this poetic autobiographical coming-of-age story, Simon uses simple pencil line drawings with minimal text. Some of the pages have only two lines on them (that form an “x”, or an airplane, depending how you look at them), or are intentionally left blank. [Side note: Our class had an interesting discussion about the similarities between comics and poetry, with their heavy use of images and white space.]

One of my favorite spreads!

Anyway, reading Simon’s book really opened up the world of visual storytelling for me. Give me a blank page and ask me to draw a scene, and I’ll happily do so – with words! But for some reason, I have a block when it comes to rendering things visually. In our conversation, he told us that he used to obsess about getting things perfectly right on the page. But he quickly grew tired of perfection; you can never make something look exactly as it does in a photo or in reality. So he asked himself—what’s the point of making something super detailed? The most important thing is that your reader understands what’s a tree and what’s a person. I find this notion very freeing!

Trying my hand at Simon Moreton-inspired minimalist drawings

This shift allowed him to focus on the story more than the visual details. He says he asks himself these questions when he’s creating one of his comics. What’s the essence of the story? What feeling are you trying to elicit? From there, he follows the drawings and isn’t afraid to explore where the drawings take him—something that all art forms and artists have in common, I think.

As someone who also obsesses about place in my writing, I really enjoyed the place-based aspect of his story. Plans We Made has some really beautiful landscapes, and I could feel his connection to this small town where he grew up. As it turns out, Simon is geographer, which prompted me to ask him what connections he sees between his professional life and his artistic life. He said that the two work in conjunction with each other, and that the artwork deepens his intellectual experiences at work.

I was fascinated to learn about the trajectory of Simon’s comics career. He started self-publishing his comic, SMOO, in 2007. Since then, he has put out 10 issues and has amassed a strong following of SMOO supporters. The coolest part about it is that he printed and cut all of these zines himself, distributing them by mail and at comics festivals around the world. He told us that this was how he learned how to make comics – by making them and getting them out into the world. In doing so, he figured out his style, what worked for him and what direction he wanted to move in. But the most important thing for him was to be creating work. Clearly, his DIY style has worked out very well for him.

There is a quiet quality to his work that I find truly beautiful and inspiring. It was awesome of him to stop in and chat with our class, even if it was the middle of night across the pond!

As for me, I continue to stay restless. This weekend, I’ll be traveling to New York City to give a reading with my fellow Art Farm writers at The KGB bar, a "New York literary institution." The reading is Sunday Feb 14^th at 7 p.m., so please come on by if you’re in the area. It’s free of charge!

I am also pleased to share a new publication at the Normal School, a “hermit crab essay” that mimics a Wikipedia article to explore my relationship to my HAIR. I hope you’ll check it out and tell me what you think!

Exclusive Interview with A Bonafide Restless Writer

Some of you may have heard about Couchsurfing, a social network created to connect travelers with locals in the areas where they are traveling. It's a beautiful concept and I encourage you all to check it out! I have been participating in CS since 2007, mainly as a traveler, and I recently decided to open my home to couchsurfers coming through Tampa. My first surfer, Eagle Gamma, is an adventurer extraordinaire. He's spent the last 3 years of his life on his bike saddle, traveling all over Canada, the United States, and Mexico.  Not only is he a rider, but he's a great WRITER too! You can check out his blog here and this really cool interactive map of all the places he's biked!

How long have you been restless?

I have been restless my whole life. When I was a child, I liked to wander, a habit that I’ve carried with me to this very moment.

How long have you been writing?

I’ve been writing since I learned to write at a young age which I forget the number. I have been writing consistently since I was a young child.

What sorts of things do you like to write about?

I like to write about the universe, imaginary universes, selves, and also anything and everything in between.

Eagle's Travels

What projects have you completed on the road?

I’ve completed an account of the astrophysical research happening at top locations around the world intermixed with my own outlandish adventures (Astrotripping: A Cosmic Journey, forthcoming). I’ve also completed an interactive work of science fiction which readers can play with and edit themselves, PhaseQ . And most recently I wrote a children’s adventure originally in Spanish and recently translated into English called El Burrito que Queria Volar. As well as several articles on the subject of astronomy.

How does being in motion factor into your writing process?                  

That’s a great question. The most immediate way is that I actually consider writing to be fundamentally a kind of motion so when I'm moving I am writing and the act of later putting those words to paper is almost an afterthought. So I consider the movement itself is actually the original source of stories and ideas and characters and I then translate that motion into a more conventional written word format. More specifically, while physically moving, I often consciously and subconsciously conceive of story elements and much of the inspiration comes from the environments thru which I move. Sometimes I daydream about a story while in motion and sometimes I think through the mechanics of the story. And sometimes I think about something else or nothing at all and let the story develop on its own.

So are you always working while riding your bike?

No, I think its important to take time off for a lot of reasons that can include safety, enjoyment, efficiency and other activities.

Why is the bicycle your preferred method of moving through the world?

A lot of reasons. I love bicycles. Bicycles are fun, efficient, good exercise, good for the environment, good for cultural travel and they help to form community.  Also they’re really cool and they can go anywhere. Being exposed to the world, you’re forced to experience it directly. You're thrust into the same space, forced to breath the same air. You basically have to interact immediately with the places and people instead of a car or plane where you’re shooting through obliviously to the location.

What are the challenges of being a restless writer?

There are many. The first challenge is to be a restless writer in the first place. It takes immense courage, effort and logistic prowess to be able to move around constantly and write. Psychologically, its extremely difficult because so much of life is rapidly changing all the time. lacking any type of solid or stable foundation, it becomes an extreme challenge to write consistently while living life on the road.

Given these challenges, why do you choose to live in this way?

Because, first and foremost, I love the freedom and joy and novel experiences and interactions with so many different people of so many different cultures. A lot of the things I get to do in the course of this life fulfill my lifelong dreams of exploring the world and writing about it and living an adventure.

The Riding Writer at Work!

What projects do you have coming up next?

My big project extends my existing Worlds O Wisdom project, adding a new world development concept that involves life itself. It’s educational and fun and revolutionary. Stay posted on these developments!

Anything else you want to add?

Really to me it’s a kind of liberation to go through these processes that constitute living as a restless writer. While I realize its much of a personal quest, I also believe that more generally its extremely valuable for people to each pursue their own quest and that whatever yours is, you give it a shot. 

Wild Women and their Wild Words

Last weekend, I got the chance to be in the presence of two women wordsmiths that I greatly admire.

On Friday, I went to see Ani DiFranco play a show in Orlando. I’ve seen her perform before, a few years ago, but I’ll jump at the chance to see her play any day of the year. She’s got a stage presence that’s electric, and everything about her shouts “POWER!”

Midway through the show, she says, “You didn’t know you walked into a radical feminist poetry night, did ya?” And then she gave one of her great laughs. But it took her saying it to make me realize that this is poetry, and she is one of our generation’s greatest troubadours.

On Saturday, I spent the afternoon in a yoga studio with Jen Pastiloff and 40 other women. Wielding journals and yoga mats, we took off on a three-hour journey, stopping in the middle of a plank to pick up our pen and write furiously for a few minutes. And then it was back to sun salutations.

Photo Credit

Ani DiFranco has been making and sharing her music since the 90’s. She started her own record label, Righteous Babe, at the age of 18, she’s put out over 20 albums and she’s not stopping any time soon.

Jen Pastiloff is the creator of an online magazine, TheManifest-Station, and she’s amassed a cult following on social media. She’s published many pieces of honest writing all over the web, and she’s in the process of writing a book for teenage girls.

I recently read this interview with Isabelle Allende, a writer that I admire very much. In it, she says, “There is no message. I think that fiction should not be trying to give messages. Just tell a story. Some people connect with a story and may find between the lines something that might be useful to him or her, but that's not the intention of the author, I think. At least not mine.”

Ani and Jen definitely have a message and they use their writing to share it. Ani speaks the truth about fossil fuels, racial politics, gun violence, climate change, violence against women, homophobia, poverty, reproductive rights, among other social issues. She uses her songs to encourage people to vote and think deeply about the democrazy we are a part of.

Jen and I after her workshop

Jen uses her writing, her workshops, and her magazine to give women back their voice. She insists that no topic is taboo; keeping secrets is the seed of dysfunction, and telling your truth is the way to freedom. 

Maybe that’s the difference between fiction and nonfiction. Both have messages to share with their readers, but nonfiction is more transparent about it.

Either way, I am grateful for the  work that these women use the written word to undo patriarchy and restore balance—emotional, social, ecological, spiritual—on this crazy beautiful planet we all share.

The End/Beginning Effect: Returning to the Writing Desk

I’ve survived week one of a new semester. I feel like I’m standing on the rim of a canyon, looking into the great wide empty divide. Critical responses, book reviews, peer feedback letters, blog posts, novel chapters, short stories, essays, magazine pitches—all of this work lies before me, and my head is spinning.  

Photo Credit

In contra dancing, when you get to the end of the line, you wait out a round before getting back into the dance. (Dancers are free to spend this wait time however they like—swinging their partner is always encouraged!)  When you start up again, the dance moves are all the same but you’re moving in the opposite direction. For a few rounds, dancers can dazed and feel out of sorts; we call this the end effect.

I’ve been sitting out of the writing dance for the past few weeks. Don’t get me wrong – I’ve been doing other writerly-related activities: reading lots, editing and polishing existing pieces, sending and receiving feedback from fellow writers, and pitching to magazines.

But mainly, I’ve been laughing with my sister, giggling with baby cousins, smiling at the sky from the tops of mountains. I’ve been taking long hikes and staying up too late in packed bars jiving to brass music. I’ve been dreaming.

In Venice (LV!) with the baby sister! 

At Red Rock Canyon, Nevada

Cutie cousins!

Treme Brass Brand, NOLA

I have to remind myself that this is normal. I actually do know how to write, even if I haven’t done it in a while. It’s like I’m looking at a faucet and willing it to turn on. The minute I put some energy in that direction, the water’s going to gush out.

But for now, I’m taking it slow. making lists. Journaling. Getting my hand used to the grip of the pencil. I’m readying my space, clearing off my desk, throwing away papers and organizing stacks of magazines and books. I’m sitting at my desk, reacquainting myself with the view outside my window, counting cardinals, adjusting the height of my swivel chair. This is the pre-show, the sound check.

From where I stand, looking into that great divide, I know I’m going to have to fly and soar and make some magic happen to get to the other side. I’m going to get a ton of writing done this semester, and it’s a beautiful feeling to be on the brink of that wild creative ride, in that teetering cart at the top of the rollercoaster. 

The Task-Master