Wright: There’s also a significant amount of what could be called black humor in your poetry. You end “Once in Awhile,” a seemingly optimistic poem, like this:
“spontaneous realizationAm I wrong in assuming that the end of that poem is supposed to be funny?
is true bliss
you can only hope the
moment of death
is like that
but it’s probably not.”
Osel: Take what you want from it. This is what psychologists call projection. Coincidently, it’s this projection that allows the reader to consume a poem with very vague language and still take pleasure in it. In the case of the poem you’re referring to, the end is meant as a jab at optimism. So if you’ve got pessimistic tendencies then I suppose it’s funny. Sometimes the reader’s projection reflects the author’s intention and sometimes it doesn’t. In this case you’ve matched my intention.
Wright: Your poetry has received mixed reviews. While it’s been admired by various small press critics a reviewer from The Stranger (one of Seattle’s major weeklies) called your poetry “viciously thin” and “self entitled.” What does it feel like when a paper with a circulation of 80,000 criticizes your writing so harshly, and in your home city no less?
Osel: I guess I understand it, even through I clearly disagree. The author of the review also wrote that poetry by definition is hard to comprehend. I presume that’s where the ideological split occurred. Simply put, he thought that my writing was too direct. There are plenty of people that want to be dazzled by a poem like it’s a magic trick. They think that mysterious language is a poet’s obligation, a requirement; that straightforward poetry is a contradiction in terms. It makes them feel elegant and superior. They don’t want to be caught reading something that any manual laborer can understand. It’s a form of literary snobbishness — an infection of narcissism. In other words, given the reviewer’s statements about poetry, I’m pleased he doesn’t like my work; I’d be disturbed if he did.
Wright: Tell me about your muse.
Osel: She never stops tapping; I pull from everything. I get plenty of ideas from observation but I’ve been deeply influenced by the theoretical as well; I enjoy the mixture.
Wright: What or who have been your five or six major influences?
Osel: Six? How about… being, Camus, Sartre, Bukowski, Ice Cube, and the feral goat.
Wright: Do you mean Ice Cube as in the rapper and goat as in the animal?
Osel: Absolutely. I’m part of the first generation of poets to be influenced by Hip-Hop music; Ice Cube appeals to me — he’s sort of like the Céline of Hip-Hop. And the goat, well, the goat is a fantastic creature. I identify with the feral goat on a very core level. If I wasn’t a human I’d probably be a goat.
Andrew Wright’s work has appeared in a variety of publications. He holds a master’s degree in creative writing and is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in comparative literature.
Ananda Osel’s autobiographical poetry has been published by all the usual suspects. New work is forthcoming in New York Quarterly and others. He is the founder and Editor-In-Chief of The CommonLine Project, a literary magazine of verse, interview and review. He is currently at work on a manuscript entitled La Poésie de Sisyphos, a collection of existential verse. His next chapbook, Dispatches from the Third World, will be published in 2009 by The Proletariat Press.
Ananda has contributed two poems to our library to accompany this interview:
