Q&A
Basics about you and your writing
Q: Where are you from, and where do you live now?
A: I’m a native New Yorker transplanted to Georgia. In New York I experienced living in the suburbs, the big city, and the gorgeous expanse of upstate near the Catskill and Adirondack Mountains. The small town where I now reside is in the northwest part of the state about ½ hour drive from Atlanta. Surrounded by trees and foliage in a small apartment community I can see incredible sunsets from my balcony, feed the ever-increasing brood of ducklings at the edge of the pond, and take daily walks in nature, or just outside this little enclave to the myriad shopping and restaurant opportunities nearby. It is quite the ideal place.
Q: Which schools did you attend/degrees you hold?
A: I graduated from S.U.N.Y Farmingdale with an associate’s degree in secretarial advertising and later attended Hunter College’s Fine Arts Program. After my makeshift arts career failed, I attended the NYU Summer Writing Workshop and followed up with several classes in poetry and playwriting with William Packard, founder of The New York Quarterly.
Q: Explain your passion for poetry.
A: Writing poetry is a fulfilling activity, like work. With the barest essentials – a pen and paper – I can create a dream-world that is stimulating, exciting, sometimes dangerous, always nurturing, and filled with a sense of unconditional love. Poetry is a gift from God that I may share with others.
Q: Tell me about your poetry training.
A: Not much formal education. Most of my learning came from reading the works of other poets. In the beginning I would just wing it, and oddly enough I was published in several anthologies. When I really got serious about writing poetry I wrote fast and furious, anything that came to my mind. The poems were generally highly abstract and most of that got trashed. Once I had a body of work that I felt was ready to publish, I had a poet laureate edit it. He pointed out gaps and abstract leanings that helped correct my habitual tendencies. Now I run a small poetry critique group where I get feedback from other poets.
Q: What’s the theme that runs through your work?
A: It is cerebral stuff, touching on how people respond to their senses, to situations, beauty, and themselves. The thoughts and actions that drive us and make us all human.
Q: What inspires you to write poetry?
A: It is so much a part of me, like breathing. I believe the reason I did not recognize any talent until late in life was that poetry was so close to me, so much a part of me, that I could not see it. In fact, only after a psychic told me I had the ability to write did I even consider it. I do not recommend going to a psychic, as that can get pretty weird.
Q: Explain your writing process: Do you write every day? Do you create several drafts that you edit endlessly? Is your approach methodical or totally creative?
Basics about you and your writing
Q: Where are you from, and where do you live now?
A: I’m a native New Yorker transplanted to Georgia. In New York I experienced living in the suburbs, the big city, and the gorgeous expanse of upstate near the Catskill and Adirondack Mountains. The small town where I now reside is in the northwest part of the state about ½ hour drive from Atlanta. Surrounded by trees and foliage in a small apartment community I can see incredible sunsets from my balcony, feed the ever-
Q: Which schools did you attend/degrees you hold?
A: I graduated from S.U.N.Y Farmingdale with an associate’s degree in secretarial advertising and later attended Hunter College’s Fine Arts Program. After my makeshift arts career failed, I attended the NYU Summer Writing Workshop and followed up with several classes in poetry and playwriting with William Packard, founder of The New York Quarterly.
Q: Explain your passion for poetry.
A: Writing poetry is a fulfilling activity, like work. With the barest essentials – a pen and paper – I can create a dream-
Q: Tell me about your poetry training.
A: Not much formal education. Most of my learning came from reading the works of other poets. In the beginning I would just wing it, and oddly enough I was published in several anthologies. When I really got serious about writing poetry I wrote fast and furious, anything that came to my mind. The poems were generally highly abstract and most of that got trashed. Once I had a body of work that I felt was ready to publish, I had a poet laureate edit it. He pointed out gaps and abstract leanings that helped correct my habitual tendencies. Now I run a small poetry critique group where I get feedback from other poets.
Q: What’s the theme that runs through your work?
A: It is cerebral stuff, touching on how people respond to their senses, to situations, beauty, and themselves. The thoughts and actions that drive us and make us all human.
Q: What inspires you to write poetry?
A: It is so much a part of me, like breathing. I believe the reason I did not recognize any talent until late in life was that poetry was so close to me, so much a part of me, that I could not see it. In fact, only after a psychic told me I had the ability to write did I even consider it. I do not recommend going to a psychic, as that can get pretty weird.
Q: Explain your writing process: Do you write every day? Do you create several drafts that you edit endlessly? Is your approach methodical or totally creative?
A: Actually, I just wrote an essay on poetry and imagination which considers this question. I think you have to be both methodical and creative, a sort of going back and forth between the two. Otherwise you might have a big gooey mess of emotion, or a boring chronological list of events. When I was in learning mode I wrote every day, sometimes two or three poems. I would edit endlessly. I now write as the call comes, or deliberately when I feel I have gotten too far away from writing. I seem to be able to write a basically complete poem at one or two sittings, with slight revisions after getting some distance and perspective on it.
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