Poet Beth McDermott has stopped by today to chat with me about her new collection of poetry, Figure 1.
Bio:
Beth McDermott’s poetry appears in Pine Row, Tupelo Quarterly, Terrain.org, and Southern Humanities Review. Reviews and criticism about art and ecology appear in American Book Review, After the Art, Kenyon Review Online, and The Trumpeter. She’s an Assistant Professor of English at the University of St. Francis and recipient of a Distinguished Teaching Award, an Illinois Speaks Micro-Grant, and first place in the Regional Mississippi Valley Poetry Contest.
What do you enjoy most about writing poems?
Revising poems with editorial feedback is probably my favorite part of the writing process because it helps me feel more confident about how my poem might be interpreted by a reader.
Can you give us a little insight into a few of your poems – perhaps a couple of your favorites?
I really enjoyed writing “Give and Take,” a poem inspired by a line in Charles Wright’s collection Appalachia. The line is: “All forms of landscape are autobiographical.” Although I’ve only been to the Cliffs of Moher twice, they became an opportunity for a sort of “self-portrait”; however, unlike poems in the Romantic literary tradition where the speaker projects themselves onto the landscape they’re gazing at, the speaker of my poem sees herself as quite different from the landscape of the cliffs.
Another poem in Figure 1 is “On Containment” written after a piece in The New Yorker titled “Sixty-Nine Days.” Author Héctor Tobar recounts the collapse of the San José Mine in 2010. When I first read Tobar’s piece, I was stunned by the Chilean miners’ ordeal of being trapped inside a mine. In the poem “On Containment,” I imagine one man returning to work in a mine after having almost died doing the exact same job.
What form are you inspired to write in the most? Why?
I like to write poems in short-lined free verse couplets. I have always appreciated shorter poems where every word counts, as well as highly enjambed poems that forefront how line endings can be instrumental in making the music of a poem.
What type of project are you working on next?
I’m hoping to return to a chapbook of prose poems, though they may not remain prose poems in their final iteration.
When did you first consider yourself a writer / poet?
In college I won an honorable mention for an Academy of American Poets’ prize judged by Edward Hirsch. The prize was a copy of The Hemophiliac’s Motorcycle by Tom Andrews. Here was a situation where one of my poems written for the classroom was acknowledged by a nationally recognized poet and, as a result, I received a book written by a poet who’d studied at the same college as me. I started to think of myself as a poet once I began to see myself as part of a poetic lineage and poetry community.
How do you research markets for your work, perhaps as some advice for not-yet-published poets?
Like most poets do, I look a bit more closely at the publishing credits of a poet whose work I admire. For example, I scan the acknowledgements pages of poetry collections for places to submit. I also read the contributors’ notes for poems published in journals, especially when I’m struck by the poem.
What would you say is your interesting writing quirk?
I usually research before I write a poem. Research may include using the internet to look at an article or painting, or notetaking from a nonfiction book that I’m currently obsessed with reading.
As a child, what did you want to be when you grew up?
I wanted to be either an author or a dancer.
Anything additional you want to share with the readers?
Reviewing poetry collections is a good way to prepare for thinking about how to structure one’s own book. I’m hoping to spend some time reviewing as inspiration for my next project!