Up the Staircase Quarterly: Len, you have some history with us here at UtSQ. You first appeared in the journal in 2016 as a contributor. You then joined our staff as Poetry Reader for a couple of years, which I look back on fondly. I am so happy for your success and to see you continually progress as a writer, editor, and educator. Congratulations on your newest book, New Names for Stars, which was selected for the Lit Fox Award by Mary Biddinger for Lit Fox Books. From Biddinger: "Len Lawson’s remarkable poetry collection New Names for Stars is a journey and a companion for that journey, exploring Afrofuturism, superheroes, mental health, social justice, and beyond, with narratives ranging from personal to universal...Every poem in this collection provides readers with the gift of wisdom, opening a conversation with history both distant and near, enlightening as it delights." What has it been like working with Lit Fox for the publication of this book? What are you most excited about or looking forward to with the release of New Names for Stars?
Len Lawson: Well, first I want to say thank you so much for giving both me and my work a space at Up the Staircase. I learned a lot about the other side of poetry publishing. Lit Fox has been kind to me and my work. I felt like we were partners in the editing process. The book is probably the one where I’ve taken the most risks and tried to stretch myself as a poet. The focus was really on worldbuilding but also building (or rebuilding) the self. I’m happy these poems have a place in the world.
UtSQ: The approach you used to voice many of the untitled poems in Part I of the book was spoken about over at Weekly Hubris. You were quoted as saying: “For this group of poems, I adopted the prose form to invoke the voice of an anonymous speaker, perhaps snatching truth and wisdom from the four corners of creation, independent of time and space. They are in a sense proverbial yet probing the very fabric of existence—not deified but as witness. They endured many drafts and sequences.” I would love to hear more about those drafts and sequences. Were the poems conceptualized over a period of time, or were they written close together? Were you consciously setting a specific tone or strategy for these works, or was the process more natural?
LL: I had phenomenal instructors in my MFA like Morrie Creech and Marcus Jackson who challenged me to tease and parse out the lines, almost like wringing out a sponge, for just what was needed and not a drop more. This ubiquitous voice, I feel, would be judicious with their words too. Part One is really a season of writing for me where I didn’t have an agenda or overarching theme I was writing toward. My mind was a blank canvas, and I let the voice come to me in the form it desired. But now, I also really liked the prose, block form at the time because it seemed so pristine to me while being concise with words down to a science—surgical even. I love the structure and making it tell completely different stories. You could say it was like hearing an African griot tell these tales.
UtSQ: You split your poems into three different sections titled New, Names, and Stars. I’m curious how the book's ideas came together as a whole. What was your process for weaving together these poems into a beautifully cohesive arc? From a craft standpoint, did you face a challenge with a particular poem in this collection? Which piece came “easiest” to the page?
LL: I appreciate you using those words beautifully, cohesive, and arc. Again, that was not the plan. Perhaps when I began seeing the collection of poems together, I saw that, okay, yes, I’m writing about my mental health, and yeah, okay, the mental health of black people (which I focused in my last book), and then, yeah okay, key historical and contemporary figures who have dealt with these things, all while imagining futures.
Such great questions! Perhaps the most challenging poems for me are the ones where the tone and theme are most obvious, you know? Like, I don’t want to say what’s been said a thousand times already which is why I don’t write love poems. But, I mean, in poems like “A Delivery Truck Flies the confederate flag” or “My CWP Instructor”, we know where this is going just from the title, so I want to really honor the moment and not be cliché. On the other hand, being in the moment with incidents like that is like ekphrasis. You’re there on the canvas during the event and have to take yourself out of it and look at it as a painting or a sculpture—interpret it that way without the emotion, I suppose. Or even like “Chadwick Boseman”, we know it’s an elegy, so what’s the way in? Sometimes that can be like putting together a Rubic’s cube.
Of course, I have fun writing the superhero stuff because I can talk about it for days. Poems like “Venom” or The Amanda Waller Suite feel like home because I’ve known these characters since I was young and can approach them from all sides like a director or comic book writer. Never gets old.
UtSQ: I would love to know more about the artwork found on and in New Names for Stars, from the impressive cover, to the gorgeous Parts pages, to the photograph from South Carolinian photojournalist Crush Rush. Can you tell us about the artists, what drew you to their works for this collection specifically, and how these pieces were selected for the book?
LL: The cover’s amazing, right? Lit Fox showed it to me from a group of suggestions, and I was like, That’s it! The elephant signifies on the poem “Panic Attack” with the mastodon imagery, and it’s also not so on-the-nose with the celestial, space motif. You’ve got to see the promo video Lit Fox created on Instagram to accompany the launch—stunning! They partner with amazing artists and creatives.
So, I was asked to collaborate with Crush for the Columbia Museum of Art in South Carolina and write a poem based on his photography. This was shortly after the massive protests following George Floyd murder and following the Occupy Movement. I think “Hypotenuse” came most naturally to me because, like I said, I dig ekphrasis. I feel comfortable writing poetry when there’s visual inspiration, probably because I learn and remember things best visually. Crush’s photo “Catch 22” was so moving to me considering the times, but it got me thinking about not only the racial implications but, again, the structure of the photograph, and I remembered some middle school geometry, and voila.
UtSQ: You incorporate important and influential historical, political, and pop culture references throughout the book, particularly in Part III: Stars. Was there a particular piece of media or a medium that you can remember consuming or researching while writing New Names for Stars; perhaps a book, album, or film that might have brought inspiration or aided you through the process of writing this book? Who was your favorite Star to write about?
LL: Anything I write is an amalgamation of a lifetime of consuming pop culture, history, and current events. It wasn’t like my last book Negro Asylum for the Lunatic Insane where I researched black mental health in South Carolina thoroughly. Again, I just mined what was in me and leaned into what was around me really to imagine and create art. I like the blend of real and fictional figures there. Don’t make me choose one. That’s the beauty of a book like this. You can talk to Simone Biles, then Honey from The Incredibles, then Slave Gordon, then Venom, and the rest. I’ll say I didn’t expect the Chadwick Boseman poem to end up in an anthology that one an NAACP Image Award last year like This Is the Honey did! That was pretty cool.
UtSQ: Let’s shift gears a little. Tell us about your first significant literary encounter. How did this experience inspire you, or shape you, into the writer you have become?
LL: Aside from reading like crazy as a kid, taking books with me everywhere (and still do), reading Toni Morrison in high school really ignited something in me, not just for literature, but maybe even as a writer. But Song of Solomon truly taught me what is possible through the impossible in literature. I’m able to teach Morrison, Zora Neale Hurston, and so many more writers I loved back then now because I followed this crazy idea that those beautiful moments with books could last a lifetime. Now I get to pass them on to my students and even my own kids which is the real gift.
UtSQ: Finally, Len, if you could have a meal with anyone, dead or alive, real or imaginary, who would it be, and what on earth would the two of you eat?
LL: Thanks again for talking with me about this new book! Very grateful for this space. I have to choose Jesus Christ. I have been a believer from a young age. The Bible too has been an essential book to my growth as a poet, writer, reader, professor, scholar, and anything else I will become. I’d want us to have my mama’s Mexican cornbread; it’s got ground beef, cheddar cheese, onions, peppers, and corn baked into it—one of the closest foods to heaven on earth.
Len Lawson: Well, first I want to say thank you so much for giving both me and my work a space at Up the Staircase. I learned a lot about the other side of poetry publishing. Lit Fox has been kind to me and my work. I felt like we were partners in the editing process. The book is probably the one where I’ve taken the most risks and tried to stretch myself as a poet. The focus was really on worldbuilding but also building (or rebuilding) the self. I’m happy these poems have a place in the world.
UtSQ: The approach you used to voice many of the untitled poems in Part I of the book was spoken about over at Weekly Hubris. You were quoted as saying: “For this group of poems, I adopted the prose form to invoke the voice of an anonymous speaker, perhaps snatching truth and wisdom from the four corners of creation, independent of time and space. They are in a sense proverbial yet probing the very fabric of existence—not deified but as witness. They endured many drafts and sequences.” I would love to hear more about those drafts and sequences. Were the poems conceptualized over a period of time, or were they written close together? Were you consciously setting a specific tone or strategy for these works, or was the process more natural?
LL: I had phenomenal instructors in my MFA like Morrie Creech and Marcus Jackson who challenged me to tease and parse out the lines, almost like wringing out a sponge, for just what was needed and not a drop more. This ubiquitous voice, I feel, would be judicious with their words too. Part One is really a season of writing for me where I didn’t have an agenda or overarching theme I was writing toward. My mind was a blank canvas, and I let the voice come to me in the form it desired. But now, I also really liked the prose, block form at the time because it seemed so pristine to me while being concise with words down to a science—surgical even. I love the structure and making it tell completely different stories. You could say it was like hearing an African griot tell these tales.
UtSQ: You split your poems into three different sections titled New, Names, and Stars. I’m curious how the book's ideas came together as a whole. What was your process for weaving together these poems into a beautifully cohesive arc? From a craft standpoint, did you face a challenge with a particular poem in this collection? Which piece came “easiest” to the page?
LL: I appreciate you using those words beautifully, cohesive, and arc. Again, that was not the plan. Perhaps when I began seeing the collection of poems together, I saw that, okay, yes, I’m writing about my mental health, and yeah, okay, the mental health of black people (which I focused in my last book), and then, yeah okay, key historical and contemporary figures who have dealt with these things, all while imagining futures.
Such great questions! Perhaps the most challenging poems for me are the ones where the tone and theme are most obvious, you know? Like, I don’t want to say what’s been said a thousand times already which is why I don’t write love poems. But, I mean, in poems like “A Delivery Truck Flies the confederate flag” or “My CWP Instructor”, we know where this is going just from the title, so I want to really honor the moment and not be cliché. On the other hand, being in the moment with incidents like that is like ekphrasis. You’re there on the canvas during the event and have to take yourself out of it and look at it as a painting or a sculpture—interpret it that way without the emotion, I suppose. Or even like “Chadwick Boseman”, we know it’s an elegy, so what’s the way in? Sometimes that can be like putting together a Rubic’s cube.
Of course, I have fun writing the superhero stuff because I can talk about it for days. Poems like “Venom” or The Amanda Waller Suite feel like home because I’ve known these characters since I was young and can approach them from all sides like a director or comic book writer. Never gets old.
UtSQ: I would love to know more about the artwork found on and in New Names for Stars, from the impressive cover, to the gorgeous Parts pages, to the photograph from South Carolinian photojournalist Crush Rush. Can you tell us about the artists, what drew you to their works for this collection specifically, and how these pieces were selected for the book?
LL: The cover’s amazing, right? Lit Fox showed it to me from a group of suggestions, and I was like, That’s it! The elephant signifies on the poem “Panic Attack” with the mastodon imagery, and it’s also not so on-the-nose with the celestial, space motif. You’ve got to see the promo video Lit Fox created on Instagram to accompany the launch—stunning! They partner with amazing artists and creatives.
So, I was asked to collaborate with Crush for the Columbia Museum of Art in South Carolina and write a poem based on his photography. This was shortly after the massive protests following George Floyd murder and following the Occupy Movement. I think “Hypotenuse” came most naturally to me because, like I said, I dig ekphrasis. I feel comfortable writing poetry when there’s visual inspiration, probably because I learn and remember things best visually. Crush’s photo “Catch 22” was so moving to me considering the times, but it got me thinking about not only the racial implications but, again, the structure of the photograph, and I remembered some middle school geometry, and voila.
UtSQ: You incorporate important and influential historical, political, and pop culture references throughout the book, particularly in Part III: Stars. Was there a particular piece of media or a medium that you can remember consuming or researching while writing New Names for Stars; perhaps a book, album, or film that might have brought inspiration or aided you through the process of writing this book? Who was your favorite Star to write about?
LL: Anything I write is an amalgamation of a lifetime of consuming pop culture, history, and current events. It wasn’t like my last book Negro Asylum for the Lunatic Insane where I researched black mental health in South Carolina thoroughly. Again, I just mined what was in me and leaned into what was around me really to imagine and create art. I like the blend of real and fictional figures there. Don’t make me choose one. That’s the beauty of a book like this. You can talk to Simone Biles, then Honey from The Incredibles, then Slave Gordon, then Venom, and the rest. I’ll say I didn’t expect the Chadwick Boseman poem to end up in an anthology that one an NAACP Image Award last year like This Is the Honey did! That was pretty cool.
UtSQ: Let’s shift gears a little. Tell us about your first significant literary encounter. How did this experience inspire you, or shape you, into the writer you have become?
LL: Aside from reading like crazy as a kid, taking books with me everywhere (and still do), reading Toni Morrison in high school really ignited something in me, not just for literature, but maybe even as a writer. But Song of Solomon truly taught me what is possible through the impossible in literature. I’m able to teach Morrison, Zora Neale Hurston, and so many more writers I loved back then now because I followed this crazy idea that those beautiful moments with books could last a lifetime. Now I get to pass them on to my students and even my own kids which is the real gift.
UtSQ: Finally, Len, if you could have a meal with anyone, dead or alive, real or imaginary, who would it be, and what on earth would the two of you eat?
LL: Thanks again for talking with me about this new book! Very grateful for this space. I have to choose Jesus Christ. I have been a believer from a young age. The Bible too has been an essential book to my growth as a poet, writer, reader, professor, scholar, and anything else I will become. I’d want us to have my mama’s Mexican cornbread; it’s got ground beef, cheddar cheese, onions, peppers, and corn baked into it—one of the closest foods to heaven on earth.
Len Lawson is the author of three poetry collections and editor of two poetry anthologies. He has received fellowships from Tin House Summer Workshop, Palm Beach Poetry Festival, Callaloo Barbados, Vermont Studio Center, and Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, among others. His poetry appears in African American Review, Callaloo, Mississippi Review, Ninth Letter, Verse Daily, and has been translated internationally. Len earned a PhD in English Literature and Criticism at Indiana University of Pennsylvania and an MFA in Creative Writing at Queens University of Charlotte. Born and living in South Carolina, he is Director of African American Studies and Assistant Professor of English at Newberry College.
