interview from 101 to 365 poems

Long time, it’s good to hear from you again. Where are you based now and what are you doing with your free time?

I moved back to the United States and am living in Lincoln, Nebraska, the same city where I went to university. I returned to this city out of all the cities in the world because I’m speaking with a man about taking over his business. Since it’s not a done deal I’ll just leave it at that. Besides the business, I’m learning how to game the frequent flyer system in order to travel for free and in general cooking and reading and watching entirely too many documentaries.

Name one lesson you learned over the course of this poetry project. Ready, go!

It’s difficult to name just one….

Just a soundbite, one lesson learned.

Ok, mmmm, I learned that I’d prefer to be a musician instead of a poet. Besides the travel and glamour and recognition compared to solitary nights of self-study, I think music is a more effective way tell a story. When I began this project I started to more closely analyze my surrounding looking for inspiration. Music was an easy source of insight, because it’s everywhere. One of the first things I noticed was how simple lyrics were in truly great songs, like Beatles or Coldplay hits. The lyrics for many songs—you know, just the stripped-down words on paper without instrumentals or a singer’s interpretation of them—are many times not that impressive at all. It’s the music, the atmosphere, the singer as a medium, that turn simple words into the soundtracks to our lives. Poetry can’t jump off the page in the same way.

Will you be moving into music then?

Singing in public makes me nervous and hand surgeries killed my guitar career before it began, so no, I have no plans to become a musician in the traditional sense. I would like to learn how to mix on programs like Garageband, then splice in real-world sound bites, pulling phrases from news programs and political commentary, until songs emerge. Basically, electronic protest music is what I’d like to create. For an example of a song I really like in Spanish, click here.

You’ve written almost one poem a day for the past year. How much time did you dedicate to this project?

If you click through the site it becomes obvious that I spent more time on some poems, less time on others. The time dedicated to each poem had to do with my life situation, if I was busy or traveling for example. On average, I’d say I spent about an hour per poem, or at least 365 hours in all. That’s a low estimate. Editing, learning how to build this website, typing handwritten notes into the computer, and staring off into space until ideas arrived all took time as well.

During the past year you’ve traveled to several different countries on two continents. Is it strange to read about your past experiences?

Yeah, of course. When I compiled the list of what consider to be the 25 most interesting poems it was like traveling back in time. When I re-read my poetry I remember exactly where I was and even in which chair or on which rock I was sitting. The strangest part of being able to revisit the past is knowing that it will never happen again. Looking back at your life, especially at emotional poems about people that impacted you in very real ways, is an existential mind-trip.

You write about a variety of topics but your poetry always seems to have undertones of sadness. Why do you think that is?

Based only on my poetry, you might think I’m a very strange guy. An introspective dude who speaks with dark, robotic verbs and adjectives that nobody uses in the real world. But that’s my poetry persona. That persona expresses my inner emotions, things that wouldn’t come out in a quick conversation at the supermarket, but it’s just one part of the more complete, balanced me. Over the past year I came to realize that my best writing happened during periods of longing and sadness, during times when I really, truly understood just how short life is. And it was during these times that I felt the need to break through that existential block with poetry. When I was happy, I wasn’t in front of my laptop at a desk in a dark room, I was at the beach with friends or exploring the South American countryside on my bike.

Are you a better poet after one year of daily writing? A better person?

My gut tells me to say no, because I’m a perfectionist and still feel that I’m copying others’ styles, most notably my favorite poet, Todd Colby. But as I mentioned in the previous interview, my interest in completing this project was to show a sequential improvement from poem one to poem 365. I think there is a noticeable improvement, but it’s all subjective anyway. My biggest personal critique would be that I’m still writing in a very ambiguous way, and sometimes to the point of non-sense. Poetry fails if the reader doesn’t know what the poet is trying to say. I’m conscious of this grey zone. Perhaps I subscribed too long to the Keraouc’s spontaneous prose philosophy in which anything that comes from the mind is art. It worked for him, but normal people like myself need to structure our thoughts a little more carefully. As far as being a better person, yes. Just like I recognize a very real peace in people who regularly meditate, I’m a more observant and centered person because I’ve forced myself to slow my world down, to pick it apart, then put it back together through poetry.

What is the best way to go about writing poetry?

The best poetry is written out of the need to express something bigger than your body. Sometimes ideas or emotions arrive that almost literally feel as though they’re consuming your body from the inside out, and need to escape. For me that’s a pretty clear sign that it’s time to sit down and put thoughts to paper. Unfortunately, the majority of my 365 poems were not written in this desperate state of needing to be expressed, and that’s why I’m reluctant to give advice about how to write poetry. I still don’t know how to recreate that poetry-writing moment. That desperation to express your inner mind is a rare feeling, which is exactly why you need to listen to it when it blesses you with its presence. Really great lines come out of obeying it, mediocre lines come out of trying to force it. That also could be the fatal flaw of daily poem writing. Too much forcing.

What’s next? Will you continue to write poetry?

For now I’m focusing on my business idea here in Lincoln but will also continue to take short trips around the world using frequent flyer miles that continue to accumulate. In February I’ll visit Japan for a week and the Caribbean is so close I can hear the waves. These sudden changes of scenery tend to spark my poetic side. If I decide to publish my poems in the future, I’ll be sure to make an announcement here on 365poems.

Interview date: Saturday, November 5th, 2011