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Sliced Dark: a collaboration of poems and pictures
by Wendy McVicker & John McVicker
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Sliced
Dark: An Interview with Ohio Poet Wendy McVicker
Wendy
McVicker
is a gem in SE Ohio. She is a poet and Ohio Arts Council teaching artist. Wendy
is the author of several books, including her most recent, a collaborative book
project with her husband, John McVicker, Sliced Dark. Spending time with Wendy earlier this year at
a local poetry workshop was inspiring. She has a handle on writing poetry; it
comes from deep within, the place where all great poetry resides.
Sliced
Dark is
recommended reading and one of my favorite poetry collections. Recently, I
caught up with Wendy and we talked about her poetry and much more.
Welcome,
Wendy!
GM: At what age did you write your first poem?
WM: I started writing stories for my younger brothers as soon as I
learned to write. I think my first poem was a celebration of horses, written in
the 3rd grade. I’m sorry I can’t share it with you, but that’s
probably just as well. I remember writing a Poe-like poem in 9th
grade about an abandoned mansion deep in the woods near my neighborhood — I was
working on it in science class, and my science teacher called me in after
school and told me I wouldn’t amount to much if I didn’t focus better in class!
In high school I wrote moody pieces I called “thingies,” which I realized much
later were prose poems. They’re all lost, too, thankfully! I only shared them
with my two closest friends.
I
went on to college and majored in philosophy, so I wrote a lot of abstract papers,
and letters to my friends far away. I took lots of English classes: I was (and
am) a fiction junkie. My dream of writing, as old as my awareness of books,
went underground, but if I thought about it at all, I assumed I’d write
fiction.
After
college, where I met my now-husband, creative- and life-collaborator, we moved
to French-speaking Switzerland, where he had a teaching job. Fumbling through a
new language, I turned to dance for my creative expression, and did that for a
few years until we had our first child and decided to return to the States. Our
second child was born in Kansas, where John was in grad school and I was
falling in love with English all over again. This is when I started writing
poetry, in secret, in those brief moments of quiet that were naptime. The first
poem I remember completing was about the silvery olive trees outside the
Friends Meetinghouse window — sadly, I’ve lost that notebook in various moves.
I did write my first published poem, Evening
Dishes, there.
We
moved to Athens in 1985, when John got a job teaching English to international
students at Ohio University. I was still a closeted poet, but when the clerk of
the Friends Meeting arrived on our doorstep with flowers and tomatoes from her
garden, I wrote her a thank you note that was really a sort of poem. She
immediately called me up, said, “You’re a poet!” and pulled me out of that
closet for good. She turned me on to the publication Friendly Woman, where I had my first publication, to a poetry
workshop at Communiversity (remember that??), to Wayne Dodd’s graduate poetry
workshop at Ohio University: to a whole new world I’ve been exploring ever
since.
GM:
You collaborated with your husband, John, on your current book, Sliced Dark.
Tell us about the process...
WM: John was a Fine Arts
(painting) major in college, but as you’ve seen, life took him in other
directions. In retirement he has returned to this first love, and to
photography, which had always been part of his creative process. Our first
collaborations were in the form of “poem cards,” for which we paired a poem
with a photograph he had taken. At some point, he began to feel that these were
too illustrative, and he wanted to “riff” more on the poems. He was also
interested in honing his skills in digital collaging. Thus, this project began:
with his asking me for poems to meditate and “riff” on. First came broadsides,
and then the book collection.
GM:
Do you have a favorite poem of your own?
WM:
I always feel that poets say their most recent poem is their favorite: it still
has the sheen of birthing on it! Thank you for mentioning The Names of Things; I love it, too, in part because I am deeply
grateful to my father for having passed on to me a love of language and
literature. But another fave is oh it’s
snowing, in part for the memories it evokes for me, in part because I am
happy when I feel I have (as Alicia Ostriker said) “pressed the most matter and
spirit into least space” — or at least come within sight of this goal. I am
fond of the lines “When you have become cloud/I will wait for rain” in Seawalls. They were a gift, dropped from
the sky, and I continue to be grateful for them: my muse is rarely so generous!
GM:
How do you maintain thoughts and ideas?
WM:
Well, of course, I don’t always, like anybody else! But I do carry a notebook
and pen with me, and I try to note down things I hear, things that come to me,
phrases, images. I used to be much more casual about this; now I know that this
is my toybox, and I need to keep it filled!
GM:
What are you currently writing?
WM:
I have been involved in a residency in Cincinnati, at the Kennedy Heights Arts
Center, for the past month, in collaboration with my friend and gifted fabric
artist, Nancy Gamon. Our project is called Common
Threads, and we invited people to write and then get their words (stories,
poems, thoughts) onto an already-existing garment, thus creating wearable art
and (we hope!) connections. I have been working on several poems about hands
(all that hand work! not my forté, exactly); a poem about aging; and reworking
a couple of older poems. I’m not ready to share any of these just yet! But
here’s a piece:
These hands
have work to do:
Grabbing hold
and getting to know,
taking notes, recording:
This is their work
and they won’t let go
GM:
Beautiful, Wendy. I love reading your poetry. In your opinion, what makes the
perfect poem?
WM:
Oh my gosh! I love a poem that is economical in its language, touches my
senses, speaks to something deep — without being heavy, without telling me what I should think or feel. I
love rich imagery and the sounds of language — I want these to play off each
other in a poem. Some poems touch me at a particular moment, and then lose
their power — others stay with me, reading after reading. These become
favorites.
GM:
Who is your favorite poet? Do you have a favorite poem?
WM:
I never know how to answer this: there are so many poets and poems that speak
to me at different times. Poets I return to over and over are William Stafford,
Mary Oliver, Mark Strand, Anne Carson…for different reasons, but all because
they can go deep with apparently simple language, and with rhythms and imagery
that stir me.
GM:
Do you have advice for novice poets and those looking to put their thoughts on
the page?
WM:
Two of my favorite writers have what I consider to be great advice: Grace Paley
said, “…if you say what’s on your mind in the language that comes to you from
your parents and your street and your friends, you’ll probably say something
beautiful,” and William Stafford said, “Each poem is a miracle that has been
invited to happen,” and “Poetry is language with a little luck in it.” I
encourage people who feel compelled to put their thoughts, musings, words, on
paper or screen, as many of us do, to trust
that impulse, and trust the language that comes to them. Also: read, read,
read! Read what you wish you could write, read to learn as well as for pleasure.
Carry a notebook. Scribble. Let your hand and your mind develop the habit of writing. When it gets scary or
hard, know that you are really doing it, and the rewards of living a deepening
life are well worth it.
About Sliced Dark (from blurb.com)
Poet
Wendy McVicker and artist John McVicker have created a collection of twenty-one
poems, each with an accompanying digital collage on a facing page - each image
is a sort of meditation on the poem with which it is paired. The book explores
love, loss, and roads not taken, and the poems and images are intended to
invite repeated reflection, producing thoughts and visions that weave
themselves into your dreams.
“The choreography between the words and images in this quietly visionary
project is luminous and unsettling. Look, then look again.” Claire Bateman,
poet, author of The Bicycle Slow Race
“The waters run deep in this modest, evocative tome and it deserves to be read
and read again, with each new reading providing new revelations.” John Zorn,
musician.
More poetry from Wendy...
