I'm more than a little suspicious of humor in poems, because I think it can at times be a way of getting a reaction out of a reader, or an audience, that is something closer to relief: i.e., thank god… — Matthew Zapruder Copy Share Image
I think it is our job as poets to refuse the terms that society so often sets for usefulness. That, for instance, is what Dickinson did: she refused to be a wife, a homemaker, a standard member of her community.… — Matthew Zapruder Copy Share Image
It is funny, and also a bit sad, that poets are so often asked to justify our vocation. There seems to be something vaguely… — Matthew Zapruder Copy Share Image
The question does arise if how and why to write poetry in this time. It feels both completely essential and also quite difficult. But… — Matthew Zapruder Copy Share Image
That name, SUN BEAR, just sounds like an ideogram to me. Super resonant. By the way, this all might be related to Tomaž Šalamun's… — Matthew Zapruder Copy Share Image
Music and songs have always been a constant part of my life, and still are. My brother Michael, who is a songwriter and composer,… — Matthew Zapruder Copy Share Image
My own experience as a reader and writer has been that the more I read, and the more I live, the more different "types" of poetry I grow to love. I might not even believe anymore that there are "types" of poetry at all. I've come to love things I once would snootily have dismissed. Of course I still have… — Matthew Zapruder Copy Share
Thinking in prose is different. I gained an immense amount of respect for people who write prose, and also felt even more sure that… — Matthew Zapruder Copy Share Image
Something can be symbolic without being a mere stand-in or vessel, which just brings us away from the true mystery and dread, into some boring version of what we already know. So what you say is true, in that the bear is a kind of parallel to the speaker, or imagined as such, but also very different. So if it's… — Matthew Zapruder Copy Share
It may very well be that we have entered another time when most poets will feel compelled to use poetry to stop things from… — Matthew Zapruder Copy Share Image
The speaker tentatively reaches out with that feeling and realizes that it's kind of absurd, or at least a dangerous consolation, which is what… — Matthew Zapruder Copy Share Image
I've noticed that there can be a visceral reaction to strong statements about poetry, as if anyone who has an opinion and expresses it is shutting people down. It's funny to see that expressed, and then to go back and read poetic statements by the great poets of the past: they are full of a passionate conviction! It is clearly… — Matthew Zapruder Copy Share
Somewhere back a whiskey or so ago I wrote that thinking was a real thing in the world, just like anything else. I mean… — Matthew Zapruder Copy Share Image
If freedom in the imagination is a privilege, it's one I believe everyone should have, as a basic human right. I also believe that… — Matthew Zapruder Copy Share Image
