INTERVIEWS

Christine Potter

What’s your creative process like?

I read a lot—sometimes other poetry, sometimes fiction (both high and low-brow; I’ve written a bunch of YA time travel, and I have a soft spot for that sort of thing). Sometimes I read the news and op-eds; I’m from a wildly political family, and I think about politics often. I’m lucky to be done with my work teaching—I’m in my seventies—so I get to write during the day. I usually scan social media when I first get to my desk, say hi to a few poet friends, do ONE word puzzle, and read for a while. Then I start writing, usually by revising something I’ve already drafted. Often I don’t get to new, from-scratch work until later in the day. But that’s fine. If I can squeeze out the first two or three lines, I have a poem to develop. Mark Doty said he starts with an image. That’s a good way to do it.

Who are you hoping to reach with your work? Do you have a target audience? Who do you hope to inspire?

I want to reach people who might need reassurance that you can move from darkness to light, which I firmly believe. I want to reach as many of those people as I can. I’m answering this question in May, and I just read this morning about how NASA was able to fix the computer code in Voyager from 15 billion miles away. To me, that is peak human activity. I think poetry can do that, and I keep trying to write the poem worthy of it, which is a freaking tall order. (Cue “What Do You Do With a BA in English” from Avenue Q.) I just want to keep sending back data—to everyone.

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

This changes wildly day to day, but there are a few North Stars: Robert Bly—everything, but especially, for some reason, his collection Morning Poems. Marge Piercy’s To Be Of Use, which changed my life as an undergraduate and is still wonderful today. Most everything by Thomas Lux. Marie Howe’s What The Living Do. I don’t watch much contemporary film because I find it too violent, but I love pre-Code bawdy comedies—pretty much all of them. TCM deals them out generously. I have been unexpectedly blown away by the rebroadcast of the old 1990’s CBS series Northern Exposure on Prime—just charming, super smart, and better than Schitt’s Creek, which I also loved. For music? Big ears: everything from Miles Davis to the British singer-songwriter Robyn Hitchcock, long a hero of mine. And Vaughan Williams Serenade to Music, the choral version (lyrics by Shakespeare, so yeah).

Christine Potter lives with her patient husband and two spoiled cats in a very old house in the Hudson River Valley. Her poetry has been in Rattle, Autumn Sky Poetry Daily, The McNeese Review, Does It Have Pockets, Thimble, Consequence, and on ABC Radio News. Her time-traveling YA series, The Bean Books, is published by Evernight Teen. Her latest poetry collection, Unforgetting, is on Kelsay Books.

Read “Eighty-four degrees, Late April,” “My House Sits Right On The Road,” and “Voting” in our first issue.

INTERVIEWS

Christine Potter

What’s your creative process like?

I read a lot—sometimes other poetry, sometimes fiction (both high and low-brow; I’ve written a bunch of YA time travel, and I have a soft spot for that sort of thing). Sometimes I read the news and op-eds; I’m from a wildly political family, and I think about politics often. I’m lucky to be done with my work teaching—I’m in my seventies—so I get to write during the day. I usually scan social media when I first get to my desk, say hi to a few poet friends, do ONE word puzzle, and read for a while. Then I start writing, usually by revising something I’ve already drafted. Often I don’t get to new, from-scratch work until later in the day. But that’s fine. If I can squeeze out the first two or three lines, I have a poem to develop. Mark Doty said he starts with an image. That’s a good way to do it.

Who are you hoping to reach with your work? Do you have a target audience? Who do you hope to inspire?

I want to reach people who might need reassurance that you can move from darkness to light, which I firmly believe. I want to reach as many of those people as I can. I’m answering this question in May, and I just read this morning about how NASA was able to fix the computer code in Voyager from 15 billion miles away. To me, that is peak human activity. I think poetry can do that, and I keep trying to write the poem worthy of it, which is a freaking tall order. (Cue “What Do You Do With a BA in English” from Avenue Q.) I just want to keep sending back data—to everyone.

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

This changes wildly day to day, but there are a few North Stars: Robert Bly—everything, but especially, for some reason, his collection Morning Poems. Marge Piercy’s To Be Of Use, which changed my life as an undergraduate and is still wonderful today. Most everything by Thomas Lux. Marie Howe’s What The Living Do. I don’t watch much contemporary film because I find it too violent, but I love pre-Code bawdy comedies—pretty much all of them. TCM deals them out generously. I have been unexpectedly blown away by the rebroadcast of the old 1990’s CBS series Northern Exposure on Prime—just charming, super smart, and better than Schitt’s Creek, which I also loved. For music? Big ears: everything from Miles Davis to the British singer-songwriter Robyn Hitchcock, long a hero of mine. And Vaughan Williams Serenade to Music, the choral version (lyrics by Shakespeare, so yeah).

Christine Potter lives with her patient husband and two spoiled cats in a very old house in the Hudson River Valley. Her poetry has been in Rattle, Autumn Sky Poetry Daily, The McNeese Review, Does It Have Pockets, Thimble, Consequence, and on ABC Radio News. Her time-traveling YA series, The Bean Books, is published by Evernight Teen. Her latest poetry collection, Unforgetting, is on Kelsay Books.

Read “Eighty-four degrees, Late April,” “My House Sits Right On The Road,” and “Voting” in our first issue.

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