[Aaron Poochigian]

Here's my piece on being a full-time poet in NYC:

"Whereas Jonathan Franzen says the novelist should think of the reader as a friend, I say the poet should think of the reader as someone he/she wants to make out with. A poem is an act of seduction."

https://diymfa.com/writing/day-in-th...full-time-poet

[Roger Slater]

Aaron, I do like your poems, but not in that way.

[Aaron Poochigian]

Yes, I guess the "seduction" analogy is bisexual.

[Sarah-Jane Crowson]

lol. But it's exactly how your poems work, and that's good, I think, regardless of our individual sexualities.

I've read enough detached cerebral poetry to last me several lifetimes, and I love much of it, but when I look into the emotive side of it all my favourite poet is probably still Robert Graves, for reasons I don't want to try to articulate and don't make any sense.

Also, I liked your explication of the daily process. That resonates. I might be in the minority, but I find that people tend to assume that making things, be those poems or installations or graphics, are a kind of floaty gentle process, but they're not, they're about balancing promotion, reflection and working from life. And to subsist from that kind of activity reflects what I know as a 'portfolio career' - the teaching, the commissions, the practice held in balance.

Sarah-Jane

[Aaron Poochigian]

Thank you, Sarah-Jane. I love Graves and love that you prefer the emotive to the cerebral.

Poetry as seduction!

[Allen Tice]

Well yes, if the reader might be one you hope to seduce or re-seduce. HowEver, I agree with Slater. One of my favorite Graves titles is “The Reader Over Your Shoulder.”