Michelle Castleberry interview by Clifford Brooks 1) What about your youth swooned you into the life of a poet? How did your teen years and young adult life play into it? How do you feel about the poet inside today? A middle school teacher gave me and a friend access to a closet full of discarded textbooks. I found a contemporary poetry anthology. It was already over a decade old but that introduction into free verse was like a message from another civilization. Maxine Kumin, Dorothy Parker, E.E. Cummings, Langston Hughes...here were people using language in a way that was so new to me. That was like reading a book of spells. I was hooked. 2) What are you reading now, and what music has your full attention? Recently, I have been reading more nonfiction (White Trash by Nancy Isenberg) and fiction (We the Animals by Justin Torres). Savannah Sipple's book of poetry, WWJD, is a barn burner. On my to-beread pile: In Whatever Light Left to Us by Jessica Jacobs, This Day by Wendell Berry. 3) What is your ritual to warm up to and then come back from writing? I could probably use more ritual in my writing life. Usually, I keep things pretty compartmentalized (that mythical work-life balance). I work full-time as a therapist and in some ways that work feeds my attention to words. My mentor taught me to keep a daybook where I collect reading notes and ephemera. All of the image and language gathering eventually informs the work. 4) If you could meet your top 5 favorite writers (dead or alive) who would they be and why? I met C.D. Wright once but I wish I'd had more time with her and been brave enough to ask more questions. Through my studies with The Makery at the Hindman Settlement School, I have had to opportunity to meet people like Rebecca Gayle Howell, Savannah and Jessica mentioned above, and Nickole Brown. All of these are strong women writers whose voices are deeply informed by place. They also have shrewd eye on the forces at play in history, both personal and at large. 5) What books do you have out, what fire burned them out of your soul, and where can we find them - or other single-poem publications? Dissecting the Angel and Other Poems is my only book so far. It accrued over seven years of writing and a time of great change in my life. You can get it through the Barnes and Noble in Athens. More recent work can be found on my website where I link to places like Philadelphia Stories, Freezeray, and The Chattahoochee Review. The most recent Atlanta Review is the most current, in print only.
Issue 14 | Blue Mountain Review | 126