Blog / Interviews

10 Questions for Jesse Bertron

December 6, 2019 - By Catherine Fox

I flushed that flock of doves three times.
An hour’s worth of wingbeats in a rush
and then a rush and then a rush.—From “Walking on a Path by Fisher Creek, I Flushed a Flock of Doves,” Volume 60, Issue 3 (Fall 2019)

Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote.
The first thing I wrote that I think still holds up, I wrote when I was about fifteen. I had a Livejournal, which was an early blogging platform. And some of the stuff on there I still find very funny. There were some poems, but mostly just silly riffs. Like here's one I went back and found:

There are three towels in my room.

These clearly represent the three wise men.

10 Questions for Jenny Grassl

November 25, 2019 - By Catherine Fox

 maybe we’ve got it wrong     postponing fire    dowsing

 the stone  earth     for whitewater    whelping green and breathe

 how breathtaking    the last river in estrus    dried     a centipede

 seen from above    fern    fen    and fringe    of locust and its honey
 —From “heavenly body menopausal,” Volume 60, Issue 3 (Fall 2019)

 Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote
   In second grade...

10 Questions for Chad Parmenter

November 22, 2019 - By Catherine Fox

Photo by Stacie Pottinger of Rogue Studios 

There are so many ways
of burning things, but
not many of containing
the flames they become
that last. —From “When I Discovered Sacrifice by Fire,” Volume 60, issue 3 (Fall 2019)
 

Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote.
"Detour, Missouri" was really a goodbye to a place rather than to a particular person, and that...

10 Questions for Alison Prine

November 18, 2019 - By Catherine Fox

I know you less and less,
but forgive your miscalculations,

the distances you thought you might travel,
and your desire to be good.

Time grows between us
With a mechanical agency. —From “To My Younger Self,” Volume 60, Issue 3 (Fall 2019)

Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote.
When I was nine years old I wrote a poem for a girl I was in love with. The poem was concerned with war, poverty and finding solace in connection. I don’t know that I have written another poem with such a sweeping scope since. But the gist of the poem ¾ reaching from the awful toward the beautiful, is still at the core of my work.

What writer(s) or works have influenced...

10 Questions for Zachary Frank

November 13, 2019 - By Catherine Fox

"I came back warm from a long winter run to find my daughter on the couch, feet raised, arm wrapped in a wet towel, a glass of chocolate milk on the end table where her father’s ashes used to be."—from “Dark Smoke Rose,” Volume 60, Issue 3 (Fall 2019)

Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote.
I’ll let it speak for itself (and for how I ugly I found the world in the third grade):

The Stunningly Ugly Witch and the Repulsive Pheasant

One day on Halloween night a stunningly ugly witch flew on a broomstick to a graveyard. She put out a bubbling cauldron and said “itchky...