Interview with Belle Waring and Jeffrey Skinner’s 504 Creative Writing II class at the University of Louisville

Sarabande Books: Welcome to Sarabande in Education!

Sarabande Books: Welcome to Sarabande in Education!

Belle Waring: This looks very welcoming.

Sarabande Books: This is Nickole Brown, Marketing Director at Sarabande. I will be here for the duration of your chat with Belle Waring. If you have any technical or general questions about this chatroom, please ask
me. Belle, by the way, is already here, waiting to talk with you.

Sarabande Books: Ah, yes, WELCOME.... : )

Belle Waring:

Belle Waring: Sorry, disregard previous space.

Jeffrey Skinner: ---just logged on.

Belle Waring: Good afternoon Jeff, good afternoon class.

Jeffrey Skinner: Hi, Belle!

Rendon: ---just logged on.

Belle Waring: Jeff, I've been reviewing the Sarabande webpages including the syllabi and study questions. Everything looks great.

eston: just logged on.

Rendon: Many of your poems are emotionally intense toread and must have been so to write. Do you find writing poetry to be therapeutic, or are the emotions expressed merely for the enjoyment of the reader

Allen: just logged on.

Karen: just logged on.

josh: just logged on.

Doug: just logged on.

eston: hello

Belle Waring: One moment while I think a bit.

emily: just logged on.

Jeremy S: just logged on.

Katy: just logged on.

Erin: just logged on.

Max: just logged on.

Jason Wommack: just logged on.

Apollo: just logged on.

Troy: just logged on.

Jeremy S: just logged on.

Katy: just logged on.

Wanda: just logged on.

Max: just logged on.

Karen: what is the value of form in poetry, and do you ever write in forms?

Sarabande Books: Karen, give Belle a minute... she still hasn't answered Rendon's question.

Doug: Belle, how accessible do you think that modern poetry is to the masses? Not necessarily the availability of purchasing it but more its understanding.

Allen: Since you were a nurse for many years, obviously you sort of floated outside the academic realm--Do you think that it is better for poets to have careers in an acedemic setting or to work in the "real world"?

Sarabande Books: Hey, guys... One question at a time.

Jason Wommack: just logged on.

Jeffrey Skinner: Belle, we're firing lots of questions--sorry. Everyone just got to class, and we're learning how to do this as we go. We'll wait for your answers before asking another.

Belle Waring: Rendon, I think it depends on how you define therapeutic. A classically trained Freudian would file art under sublimation. Certainly art has therapeutic uses; I saw this, and was counting on this, when I was teaching creative writing at Children's Hospital (five years worth). BUT. And this is a big qualification: art exists for
another purpose which has nothing to do with sublimation (the relief of neurosis or psychosis). It is an intrinsic human faculty. Most ancient peoples recognize it a religious function which would take it out of the realm of therapy as we know it. If it entertains the reader I am glad but I think some of those scenes must be pretty harrowing for a lay reader. Also, I have a feeling that when people ask if writing the poems was therapeutic, there is a question behind the question but I am not sure. What do other ppl think?

Jason Wommack: Belle, Did you create the curriculum (and what is it) you use with your children at the hospital (are you even still there?), or were you brought in specifically as an art therapist to work within an existing curriculum? How (if you did) did you implement the program?

Troy: How much say did you have in the layout of the book, "Dark Blonde"--the cover art and poem order? Is there any rhyme or reason to the order of the poems?

Sarabande Books: Jeff, what's going on over there?

Jeffrey Skinner: Nickole--did you see my apology to Belle? We had no time in this class to familiarize ourselves with the procedure. We're getting it straight, slowly.

Jeffrey Skinner: Nickole--did you see my apology to Belle? We had no time in this class to familiarize ourselves with the procedure. We're getting it straight, slowly.

Sarabande Books: Sorry, Jeff. Must have missed it (too busy with all that cutting and pasting).

Belle Waring: OK, Karen first. FORM. Form is excellent. I used to write nothing but blank verse. I still go back to terza rima, which is a killer, and probably unsuited to Anglo-Saxon. I do have a sense of form but it is idiosyncratic, internally perceived, and based on jazz improv on top of classical music. My mom listened to jazz and light opera and sang both. Also I translated Virgil's Aeneid in high school. That was my school for form in poetry. A prize goes to whoever knows' Virgil's meter. Anyway, this is how I learned to scan. I will post this answer and get to work on Doug's question now.

Belle Waring: Now to Doug. Is poetry accessible? Ach mein grossen schmerzen. Yes and no. I struggle with this ALL THE TIME. It requires an intimate understanding of your audience. But then what? If you give ppl what they already know, they get bored. Well, look at popular art forms. Rap is accessible by definition because it comes from the neighborhoods. Some of rap is just rap, but some of it is poetry. It can be added to Jonathan Holden's free verse analogs. Yet rap can be very difficult to people who are not used to its staccato delivery, its slang, its rage, it's contrapuntal rhythms, its tendency to rhyme Entifada with enchilada. What is accessible isn't always what is good. But what is heartlessly obscure isn't either. Vallejo was difficult but he never lost touch with people. Celan did. And Celan killed himself. Is there a relationship between that kind of inaccessibility and the isolation from society, that kind of isolating grief and trauma that Celan felt? Not a simple question.

Sarabande Books: While Belle is thinking, does anyone want to answer her question about what you think about the theraputic value of poetry?
Jeremy S: Do you use a pen, pencil, typewriter or computer to compose your poetry? And do you usually write in the same (physical) space?

Jeremy S: Do you use a pen, pencil, typewriter or computer to compose your poetry? And do you usually write in the same (physical) space?

Jeremy S: Therapy: But I do believe it is necessary to strive toward a product of the highest art in order for the process of writing to be worth it all.

Jeremy S: Sorry about the question. Ignore please.

Jeremy S: Sorry about the question. Ignore please.

Jeffrey Skinner: Nickole, Belle--we're still working the rules of order here. . .

Sarabande Books: Belle, the third question was from Allen: Since you were a nurse for many years, obviously you sort of floated outside the academic realm--Do you think that it is better for poets to have careers in an acedemic setting or to work in the "real world"?

Belle Waring: Now to Allen. Hm, I wouldn't say I floated outside of academia. I would say I worked in hospitals for 18 years, 10 of that in intensive care. Now, people use the words "real job" and "real world" to talk about the world outside of the university. I think that university teaching is real. It is difficult. (Sit up straight, please, everyone, and listen to this.) It is difficult and not particularly well paid. Teaching is work that is not well appreciated. Often teaching loads are heavy. What makes it seem relatively sheltered is bennies that come with tenure. All right. Fair enough. But there is a question behind this question, and it is a question about class. Somebody who worked in the Ford motor plant or in a coal pit in Pennsylvania might think that is the only real work. What does real mean to you? The main thing is to understand where literature comes from. It comes from history, economics, politics, as much as any individual aesthetic.. This is a little cut and dried but I'm trying to catch up here.

Wanda: Therapeutic value of poetry: poetry is an organized way of trying to figure out life--which we are doing all the time anyway in some form or other.

Sarabande Books: Next, I think, is a question fromJason Wommack: Belle, Did you create the curriculum (and what is it) you use with your children at the hospital (are you even still there?), or were you brought in specifically as an art therapist to work within an existing curriculum? How (if you did) did you implement the program?

Jeffrey Skinner: Belle--I've told students to partake in the conversation, to respond to portions of your answers; but to hold new questions to give you some breathing room. So part of what we enter will be comments; you needn't respond to those.

Aubrey: just logged on.

Jeffrey Skinner: Nickole, Belle--we're still working the rules of order here. . .

Jeffrey Skinner: Nickole, where is Belle now?

Sarabande Books: I think she's answering the next question.

Belle Waring: There was a question about order, I made a note of it and now I can't read my own writing. Ack. OK, somebody asked about curriculum at CHildren's. FOr the kids one-on-one, or 2-on-1 in the medical units, I assessed them and let them decide what they wanted to write. I had a question tree in my head and helped them focus (Do you want to write something real or made up? If real, about you or someone
else? and so on.) For the teenagers on the inpatient adolescent psychiatry unit, I spoke with the nurses and worked out what that particular population needed that week, and if they were high or low functioning. I made a handout with a poem on it, or two, then turn the page over and you get yr writing exercise. THe class is very tightly structured so I don't lose ppl. BUT if somebody has a burning issue, they are free to ignore the exercise, as long as they write what is on their mind. So it was very tight, and very loose. If you are too tight, it is bad. It's like being a boxer in the ring, all defense. You burn up your stamina. THere's no mystery in it. Kids hate that. So do teachers. So you have to balance it out.

Sarabande Books: Unless you mean literally... she's in Washington, D.C.

Jeffrey Skinner: No, Nickole--I meant where is Belle, physically?

Belle Waring: Jeff, I'm at my desk. Where are you guys?

Katy: Belle, Tell us about your revision process: Do you ask friends and/or colleagues to read your drafts and revisions and provide comments, or do you like to keep the poem to yourself until you feel it's finished?

Jeffrey Skinner: We're in a room at UofL, filled with terminals, with a projection screen showing my lousy typing up at the front of the class. All the students have their own terminals. It's a beautiful, 75 degree day here.

Belle Waring: To Katy: about revision. Two ways: one is if the draft is so embarrassing, I keep it to myself. Usually this is a sappy love poem, you know the kind: "I love my baby so much, I love the creases in his
shoes. Oh baby." Then the guy goes back to his old girlfriend and you need to revise it a little. Seriously, I show my friends my work, esp. my friend Tony WHedon who is a genius and writes essays, poems, etc. I
dedicate "T'ao Ch'ien" to him. He is a jazz musician and he has a great ear. He lives in Vermont, and I call him up and read him the poems over the phone. THey are read aloud and he helps me revise by ear. The prose I write I tend to mail to him, though. Our phone bills are atrocious. Anyway, when is a poem ever finished? SOme French guy, Jeff, youwould know, Valery or somebody said, you don't finish a poem, you abandon it. Anyway, see Dick Hugo's Triggering Town for a bit about how you write off the subject. Jeff will tell youa bout it. Hugo also said, "The problems of the poem are as much psychological as they are literary," meaning when you are having trouble with words, it's really deeper than that. It's very hard to tell the emotional truth. It's very tough. Don't you think?

Katy: Yes, absolutely. I agree - telling the emotional truth is hard and scary.

Belle Waring: I have a feeling I missed a question down the track. How are we doing with that? This is like delivering a baby by phone with writing contemporary love poems you like and could suggest tounderseas cable and a 15-second delay. Ack.

Jeffrey Skinner: Yes, Hugo is terrific on revision, as on many things. Thanks for suggesting him. Speaking of love poems, don't you think they are among the MOST difficult to write, without sap? Is there anyone writing contemporary love poems you like and could suggest to us?

Jeremy S: This sounds like it speaks to the question of therapy as well.

Sarabande Books: Jeff, would you like me to re-post Troy's question, or should we just move forward?

Jeffrey Skinner: Belle, just go on to answer whatever's fresh in your mind (or on your screen). Your answers to all are wonderful.

Jeffrey Skinner: Nickole--yes, please repost Troy's question.

Max: "...you don't finish..." sometimes when i took my drawing classes,
i'd draw a really good drawing, but i don't stop, and i ruin it

Belle Waring: Jeff, good question, let me think. I have been reading Lorca again and he ruins me for anyone living, or anyone heterosexual for that matter. Am I going to get in trouble for this? Are you guys all over 18? What I mean is, he's Mr. Lyrical. He's very sappy. I love him. OK let me think about someone contemporary. I'll quit stalling, one moment please.

Jeremy S: Duende!!!

Jeffrey Skinner: Don't worry, we're all grown-ups here (or, have the appearance of grown-ups, anyway).

Sarabande Books: Belle, Troy asked you: How much say did you have in the layout of the book, "Dark Blonde"- the cover art and poem order? Is there any rhyme or reason to the order of the poems?

emily: Yeah-why not "dirty blonde" or better, "dishwater blonde?"

Belle Waring: Max: good point. This is what teachers and friends are for. THey say: "Save your drafts!" I remember my eighth grade art teacher: "A good artist knows when to stop." This takes practice, right? I bet you never ruin the same kind of drawing the same way twice. You have to look at a lot of art, read a lot. Say, oh, the poem should stop two lines up, or oh, the poem is too tight. You will learn from reading how to revise your work. YOU HAVE TO READ A LOT>A LOT> OTHERWISE YOU"LL NEVER CUT IT AS A WRITER. OK, now for love poems: I'm still thinking. THis is disgusting.

Jeffrey Skinner: Yes, Belle, I'm not letting you off the hook for the love poems. But you can go on to someone else's questions.

Katy: Where do you all find the time to read so damned much??

Belle Waring: sorry, hit the wrong key. Continues

Apollo: Belle, do you ever go through long periods in which you have nothing to say or express and therefore do not write or are you always writing?

Allen: too tight is tough, I mean how do you "loosen up" a poem

Belle Waring: Seriously, Sarah and Jeff were true editors. They took the time. Do youguys know how rare this is? This is me telling you this. The cover art, I picked. I did not know Balthus was such a complete pervert,
and I saw this painting in a b&W repro, and graphically it got me. It had that WWII look. I saw this woman (and she is a grown woman and not a nymphet) reading her cards, after which she is going to blow up a Nazi troop train.

eston: just logged on.

Jeremy S: Love poems: I've heard it said that there are only three themes in art: love, death, and birth (not necessarily in that order).

Wanda: Is your identification with black culture a natural inclination or a goal toward which you work?

Jason Wommack: jeremy, what about taxes?

Belle Waring: Apollo, you have a great name. Yes. I hve terrible dry periods. If this happenes to you do not worry. Read a lot and go to the movies, and be good to your friends. You will see that this helps. Allen, to loosen up means: vary sentence structure, play around with fragments, run ons. Pick up a book at random and whatever word your eyes fall upon must be in the next sentence. Read "Dispatches" by Michael Herr. He was listening to rock and roll in that book, so listen to music and jump around the room. Loosen up physically. Ali was loose in the ring, but not too loose. He danced. He had grace. But he had structure too. He could take a punch. Jeff will explain this.

Aubrey: Why, can Jeff take a punch?

josh: jeff has an iron chin

emily: Are there subjects that you are hesitant to address..how much distance do you need from something to write about it?

Aubrey: As to "So Get Over It Honey," you use a 12 point structure with the repetition of "first" as the beginning of each thought. Did your use of 12 indicate something as to the content of the poem? It came into discussion that perhaps the use of 12 indicated alcoholism as opposed to the natural assumption that you spoke of a lost relationship.

Jeffrey Skinner: Yes, Aubrey; I too float like a butterfly...etc. Now, pay attention!

Jason Wommack: the bee part comes when the grades have to be given?

Jeremy S: George Harrison wrote the son "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" by picking up a book at random and seizing on the phrase "gently weeps"

Erin: Belle, we are in a workshop style class, so we read and critique other's work. Can you think of any particular critique, negative or positive that particularly helped you, or that you found really ridiculous?

Sarabande Books: FYI-- Whomever wants a copy of this hail storm / interview... register in the beginning of the discussion area of the website, and I will send you a copy via e-mail.

Belle Waring: Jeremy, yes, for lyric poetry, but for narrative or epic you get more choices, like the history of your generation and how they survivied the latest war. Wanda, I grew up with/around black ppl, in a black town,worked 18 in DC hospitals with (mostly) black women from the US and all over the african diaspora. It's not a goal per se, it's just a reflection of a deep and abiding influence. Unless you want to count my obsession with social justice as part of that. I suppose it is a part of that. But it is not a reductive type goal. It is not abstract. You can't identify with a disenfranchised group out of solely abstract principle. You get your ass kicked and you have nothing but abstraction to fall back on. I think this is what happened to Simone Weil. She went to work in the car factory and burned out fast. IT wasn't part of her. She had no stamina and she fell apart, and God bless her.

doug whitworth: just logged on.

Belle Waring: Aubrey, no that 12 was just random. I got lucky.

Jeremy S: Difficult waiting for god around so many cars.

Troy: just logged on.

jason: just logged on.

Jeremy S: .....just logged off!

Katy: just logged on.

Belle Waring: I never learned a damn thing in workshops. I learned one on one. This is why I can't teach workshops. I didn't learn that way so I can't teach that way. I wish I could. My professsional life would now be a lot smoother. This is nothing against workshops. THis is just how I happened to learn, or not learn. But many ppl do learn this way and THAT IS GOOd.

jeremy s: just logged on.

jeffrey skinner: just logged on.

Aubrey: Then how do you determine a form or structure for a poem like
"So Get Over It Honey," or does the form naturally come of the poem?

jason: just logged on.

Sarabande Books: Belle, I think everyone is coming and going to register
/ get a copy of your interview.

Rendon: .....just logged off!

troy: just logged on.

doug: just logged on.

jeremy s: just logged on.

Ktay: just logged on

emily: Most of your poems deal with emotionally intense subjects. Are there subjects which are taboo foryou? How much distance do you need from a subject to address it?

Erin: just logged on.

Belle Waring: Jeff, are you winding up? Is there anything I missed? You have a lively bunch there. I really think you should show them a clip of Ali in the ring and then with Howard Cosell ("The no Vietcong ever called me - "). Metaphor for the artist making a choice that comes with a cost. THere is an ultimate glamour in that, but still it has a cost.

Rendon: just logged on.

jason: we tend to trust our friends more readily for their advice; with a workshop it takes time and communication to establish trust and then a workplace

Allen: we all live in Louisville...

jason: we tend to trust our friends more readily for their advice; with a workshop it takes time and communication to establish trust and then a workplace

jason: .....just logged off!

Max: my e mail has been dead for years

Aubrey: People seem, in workshops, to so desperately want to participate that they lose perspective, lose sight of an end goal by drowning in the minutia.

Erin: Thanks for your time, Belle. It was great to "speak" with you.

jason: thank you belle

emily: minutia-i like that word..bye bye Belle! Thanks for talking to
us- appreciate the answers!

jeremy s: .....just logged off!

Aubrey: Bye-bye Belle, hopefully we can do this again. Thank you for
your thoughtful responses.

Karen: .....just logged off!

Allen: goodbye Belle, goodbye

jason: just logged on.

Max: bye

eston: .....just logged off!

Rendon: goodbye!

josh: byby

Apollo: Happy sails,

Aubrey: "speak"

Belle Waring: OK, distance. Yes, definitely taboo if the person is still
living and doesn't deserve to see his life exposed by me on the page. I
needed a whole lot of distance from nursing before I could write about
it, that, and time. I needed to grow up a bit, and thaw out emotions
that had been "fwoze up" -- so if there is something you want to write
about and can't yet, push yourself a little but don't expect it to work.
Come at it sideways. I create characters to take the heat. Not all the
1st person speakers int he poems are me. They are me and not me. THey
are sort of me, maybe. You can do this. Make things up. Personae work
for the very good reason that they offer form and distance from feeling.
Sometimes you need that.

Erin: Thanks for your time, Belle. It was great to "speak" with you.

jason: thank you belle

emily: minutia-i like that word..bye bye Belle! Thanks for talking to
us- appreciate the answers!

jeremy s: .....just logged off!

Aubrey: Bye-bye Belle, hopefully we can do this again. Thank you for
your thoughtful responses.

Karen: .....just logged off!

Allen: goodbye Belle, goodbye

jason: just logged on.

Max: bye

jeffrey skinner: Nickole, thanks. We'll talk soon. We're going to try to get as many emails to you as possible.

Ktay: .....just logged off!

Aubrey: .....just logged off!

Allen: .....just logged off!

emily: .....just logged off!

Apollo: .....just logged off!

josh: .....just logged off!

Belle Waring: You are all most welcome, and thank you to Jeff and Nickole too.

Wanda: .....just logged off!

Max: .....just logged off!

Belle Waring: Nickole, would you like me to stay on a bit after class is over?

Sarabande Books: Belle, go ahead and log off. I'll call you in a few minutes.

jeffrey skinner: .....just logged off!

Max: .....just logged off!