Episode 111: The Confessional Episode

Dear Listener,

I hope this finds you healthy, safe and peaceful.

I’m still processing and integrating my trip to San Francisco where I recorded a conversation with choreographer Hope Mohr, went to City Lights Books, and read a brand new, hot-off-the-presses (too hot?!) poem at Grace Cathedral in a reading with James Cagney, Henri Cole, Jewelle Gomenz, and Jacques Rancourt organized by my beloved friend D. A. Powell. I had an amazing brunch at House of Nankin with some poetmom friends and then spent a transformative week in silent meditation and learning at Spirit Rock: An Insight Meditation Center. Then back to San Francisco for one night to see “Horizon Stanzas,” a dance inspired by Alice Notley’s feminist epic Descent of Alette choreographed by Hope Mohr. Then the best vegan ice cream ever with D. A. Powell and my friend Michelle Levine and then an early flight home to a literal and emotional flood back in Washington Heights.

I wrote the version of “What We Talk About When We Talk About the Confessional and What We Should be Talking About,” that you’ll hear, about 30 minutes into this episode, at the end of January 2016 while in residence at a beautiful little apartment right next door to (and owned by) The University of Arizona Poetry Center. If you ever have the opportunity to visit Tucson do NOT miss visiting the Poetry Center. It is a poetry-only library and event center that is a kind of sunny, open, inviting and usefully-designed cathedral to poetry. It is a joy to spend time there.

The first night I arrived in Tucson I read poems from what would become my 2019 collection of poems SoundMachine. (Here is a link to video of that reading and to the text of my poem “Confessional,” which was published in Foundry.) I spent the next week reading, thinking and writing “What We Talk About When We Talk About the Confessional…” which became the second essay in Poetics of Wrongness and most of what would eventually become the third lecture in the book. I also had the best burrito I’ve ever had watching the sun set over the desert with TC Tolbert.

Listen to Episode 111: The Confessional Episode

Rachel Zucker is the author of 12 books of poetry and prose including The Poetics of Wrongness, SoundMachine, and MOTHERs. In addition to working as a labor doula and childbirth educator, Rachel has taught writing for over 25 years. She's taught people of all ages at the 92nd Street Y, Friends Seminary (K-4), Basic Trust Day Care, Antioch Low Residence Program, Yale, Columbia and, for the past 13 years, graduate and undergraduates at New York University. She is currently dreaming and working The Commonplace School for Embodied Poetics into being.

For this episode, Commonplace patrons will receive access to:

• a longer, lightly edited version of the conversation between Mike and me

• audio of me reading my poem “Untitled”

• links to many of the poems and books listed in “What We Talk About…” (also available to you as a newsletter subscriber here!)

Please consider supporting Commonplace at any level by becoming a patron here or making a one time donation! Rachel will send a signed copy of either The Poetics of Wrongness or SoundMachine to anyone who becomes a patron at the level of $15 or more during the months of April or May!

Many thanks to Wave Books for offering a discount code to Commonplace listeners, patrons and newsletter subscribers! Simply order The Poetics of Wrongness from Wave Books and enter promo code “BWLS” when you checkout.

Stay tuned for three guest-hosted episodes: Gabrielle Octavia Rucker (with Commonplace Producer V Conaty), Moheb Soliman (also with V), and Charif Shanihan and Safia Elhillo (with Isaac Ginsberg Miller) as well as more episodes from my lectures, my conversation with Hope Mohr and much, much more!

Speaking of future episodes, I NEED YOUR HELP! For the next lecture-episode of Commonplace (“A Very Large Charge: The Ethics of ‘Say Everything’ Poetry”) I’m crowdsourcing audio responses to these questions from Commonplace listeners, former guests, patrons, etc. I’d be so grateful if you’d answer one or more of these questions as a voice memo and email it to me at rachel [at] commonpodcast.com or leave a message through “speakpipe” at the bottom of the landing page of our website.

1. Do you have taboo topics or categories? Things (or people or stories) you’d NEVER write about or ways you’d never write about something? (Perhaps you have none, which is great to share as well.)

2. In what ways can a poem be unethical? (Perhaps you think “ethical” is not a quality you would measure or judge a poem by, please share!)

3. Do you have any writing guidelines you try to follow? What are they?

This doesn’t need to be long or take much of your time! I don’t want people to be intimidated by the weighty questions or burdened by the request, but I’d really LOVE to hear what you think and possibly use it (anonymously) as part of this episode. I’m not going to comment on or judge particular responses. I’d really just like to include some voices and thoughts about these questions!

If you’d like to answer these questions but don’t like audio, you can respond via this google form.

In my next newsletter to you I’ll say more about The Commonplace School including a few more classes that will be running this summer, our soft opening, and our core class, “Foundation, Form, Flow” that will hopefully begin in October.

Until next time,

Thank you for listening,

Rachel (& the Commonplace team)