'Everything I write is a poem'

Are you still writing poetry?

I did an event recently and one of the other writers taking part – someone I admire – I’d known first as a poet. Now she has a very successful career writing novels, children’s books, and memoir. Do you still write poetry? I asked her. I was curious because it’s something I’m asked a lot too. She replied that ‘everything I write is a poem’. In other situations, or perhaps more accurately from another person, I might have found this a bit haughty. In the moment I felt hotly aware of my tendency to be dismissive whenever I hear writers talk in ways that aggrandize being a writer, but I instantly knew what she meant. Or at least I realised I felt the same way. It’s not that I feel I’m actively writing a poem, or even writing poetically, it’s that I bring my poet-self to whatever I write. It was nice to realise this, that I’d not abandoned my poet-self.

This past year I wrote only one poem. It was commissioned by a magazine, and I doubt I’d have written it without being asked to do so. I approached writing it with trepidation, as though I no longer had poet privileges. But I have done several poetry related things. Recently I taught two workshops on poetry and fashion for students at Central Saint Martins. Some of the texts I used in those poetry workshops I use regularly in my workshops on the essay and non-fiction. For instance, Sheila Heti’s ALPHABETICAL DIARIES and Christina Sharpe’s ORDINARY NOTES. Neither of these books are marketed as poetry but when I read them, I felt like I was reading poetry; I found myself reading sections aloud – they invited recitation. I have little interest in arguments about what is and what isn’t poetry, I believe that genre definitions are useful only insofar as they help the author think about their intent, what the reader then makes of the result is their business. I wish I’d come to this understanding earlier in my writing life because it’s clear to me now I was self-limiting in defining myself as ‘a poet’ not ‘a writer.’ As if poetry isn’t writing! As if Poet were a job description I wasn’t prepared to work outside of! Still, the conversation with this other writer at the event made me think about how I’m drawn to this poet identity, even if I’m figuring about what it might mean to me when I’m not writing poetry or reading as much of it as I used to. My Instagram bio still says poet/writer and to my embarrassment I’ve just remembered that I even quoted one of my own poems in an event I did with Sheena Patel the other week. It was relevant to the conversation, but I still feel it was a bit like being caught checking my own reflection, it was something I didn’t want others to see.

Photo from my old diaries where I listed the poems I’d written