What tips would you give someone taking their first steps in creative work? What did you need to hear when you were getting started?

Write badly and just fucking start. That’s very aggressive, but those are two very powerful statements I have needed throughout my writing life. I struggle to give myself permission to write badly, but the plain and simple truth is that you have to. Rarely, if ever, does anything come out in its final form on the first try. I’m almost always going to have to struggle and wrestle and carve and revise over and over as I find the poem and shape it into something I feel is beautiful and right.  It’s not just okay to write badly—it’s necessary.

And just fucking start.  I spend so much time caught up in my head–worried about the poem being bad, worried about potential readers not understanding it, worried that I’m not enough, worried about failure, worried about blah blah blah blah forever—and not one bit of that worrying has ever gotten me anywhere, nor has it ever gotten the poem out. Just start. You’re likely going to mess up a ton. You’re likely going to struggle. There’s no way forward but to do. You won’t bypass the battle of it. Just get started and enjoy the process of making (and, likely, being shaped and grown yourself).

Are there any movies, music, books, or poetry collections (or any media at all, really) particularly inspiring to you?

I spend a substantial portion of my time trying to convince people to listen to Christian Welch and Kevin Schlereth. Christian is one of the very best poets I’ve ever seen perform including amongst all the really famous folks we see on Youtube. Christian’s poetry is unbelievably inspiring and beautiful. I never get tired of hearing it. He performed some new, as-of-yet unreleased, poems at Audiofeed Festival last year that just shook me to my core and have been living in my heart and encouraging me since I heard them. And Kevin Schlereth is probably my favorite artist ever. I would trade all the music in the world for his discography, were it all ever to come down to such an extreme choice.

I’ve also been particularly in love with Rose: Poems by Li-Young Lee and The Many Deaths of Laila Starr by Ram V.  Rose came out in 1986, so I’m obviously very late to the party. I’ve been a fan of his poetry since being introduced in college, but this was my first time reading a full collection. He writes with such brave vulnerability. Though the book came out almost 40 years ago, I found myself frightened for him at points as he wrote so boldly about such deeply intimate feelings. I’ve been so moved by it and have found myself thinking of the rose bush in it so often.

Similarly, Laila Starr has been such a gift to me over the last year since reading it. I’ve teared up several times just thinking of it. I’m new to graphic novels, so don’t be too intimidated or too skeptical if you are, too. This book is so worth the read (and Ram V’s new book Rare Flavours is proving just as wonderful). I entered my thirties as the pandemic began, and I also began seeing signs of my parents’ mortality around the same time. I’m a Christian, so I have a lot of hope about what Christ offers after death. However, having the rubber of belief hit the road of reality over the last few years was more jarring and serious than I anticipated in my younger years. Laila Starr‘s meditation on death and existence, though drawing some different conclusions than my own beliefs, proved so powerfully commiserating, kind, and beautiful to me as I, like everyone else, have been forced these last few years to more immediately think of our fragility and finitude. It’s a truly exquisite book.

More:

I give all of my poetry away for free. My poetry albums are on all the streaming services and can be downloaded for free on Bandcamp. My books are available via Amazon, but I love to send them to folks for free. Anyone can get in touch via Facebook or Instagram, and I can send them whatever I have. Also, my wife has a band called Visitor Pass.  I want everyone to listen to it.

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