Michael J. Rosen: ‘Use Volume and Tone…’

By Maryann Yin 

Michael J. Rosen PortraitHappy National Poetry Month! All throughout April, we will interview poets about working in this digital age. Recently, we spoke with haiku specialist Michael J. Rosen.

Q: How did you publish your first book?
A: 50 Odd Jobs, sillier verses about unusual occupations, came out of my work as a visiting writer where I would prompt elementary students to start with something they didn’t know about, rather than just lazily ramble about something they knew. So they wrote from unfamiliar points of departure that required them to shift into gear, rather than just “idle”: Imagine, Remember, Research, Puzzle, and so forth. The book sold in the mid-80s to a company that specialized in school book fairs. And this method of encouraging creativity—start with “I don’t know…” rather than “Oh, I know!”—continues to be central to how I write and teach.

Q: Has the Internet changed the way you interact with readers?
A: Thirty-some years ago, when I first began publishing, writers hardly “interacted”—they were hardly seen! An especially interested reader might attend an event on a college campus; bookstores were just beginning to host authors. Aspiring writers met other writers at conferences and MFA programs—but there were only a few back then.

Some of the biggest names were certainly featured in interviews or stories that might coincide with a new book. But, I’d have to argue, at the start of my career, “interacting” with a writer meant sending a fan letter in care of the publisher. There was no social media. No Websites or Facebook fan sites. No giveaways on blogs and GoodReads. No book festivals. No audio books.

So it’s not just the Internet, but how we live—plugged in and commenting and rapidly, rabidly consuming media—that has changed everything. For better? For worse? The only point is to write books that are aware of this appetite, to create works that stand out—however briefly—on this reeling menu of options.

Q: What type of research process do you undergo for when you’re writing poems?
A: For my haiku practice, there’s rarely research; it’s mostly observation and revision. That said, for the three volumes published by Candlewick Press—including the just released The Maine Coon’s Haiku and Other Poems for Cat Lovers—I studied about the more unfamiliar felines because I tethered each poem to a different breed.

But many of my poems do involve the environment, earth science, and zoology, and I’d say that “research” for those poems is really the discovery of the poems themselves. It’s that closer study of almost anything—raccoon, wood duck, paw-paw tree, mourning cloak butterfly—that reveals the poetry itself…if, by poetry, we mean something that makes us gasp with awe at the everyday and the undervalued; that offers our emotions a chance to hone their edges dulled by overstimulation and haste; that surprises us into a vulnerability that can actually strengthen our resolve to be more empathic, aware, appreciative, hopeful.

Q: Do you have any tips for people who want to read and perform poetry in front of an audience?
A: Be loud enough, enunciate, read patiently, and also confidently so that your voices shows the audience what they can’t see on the page. Give a suggestion of how the lines break—poets start and end lines with intention. Use volume and tone and facial expression to reveal, not merely, recite, the poem. Some experience(s) prompted the poet to create the poem. The resulting language creates its own, different experience for someone reading the poem. Just so, reading aloud creates yet another experience—not just a repetition of words—for listeners.

Q: What advice can you share for aspiring poets?
A: Given that being published by a significant press isn’t a likelihood—and even that hardly ensures one’s livelihood—be certain that you can sustain the rewards of this art. How will you maintain the self-imposed discipline necessary to pursue a craft that’s difficult to monetize?

Q: What’s next for you?
A: Something entirely new for this fall. Illustrated with 24 watercolors by Stan Fellows, and designed with the look of a “classic tale”—something that’s shared and treasured for generations—The Tale of Rescue, is the story of a working cattle dog who rescues a Florida family who has traveled to rural Ohio to experience a weekend of winter, and is caught in a blizzard.