A Stimulating Conversation with John Barr
Courtesy of the artist
Over the past 30 years, John Barr's poems have been published in six books, four fine press editions and many magazines, including The New York Times, Poetry and others. He was also the Inaugural President of the Poetry Foundation. His newest book, The Boxer of Quirinal, was published by Red Hen Press in June 2023.
I had the pleasure and honor of asking John if there is a perfect time to write, what the word poetry means to him, his role as President of the Poetry Foundation, and so much more.
UZOMAH: What is the most critical part of a poem?
JOHN: A poem must engage with life in some primary way. And it does that by saying something new about something old. So the most critical part of a poem is the discovery it makes for both the poet and the reader. As Frost said, “No surprise for the poet, no surprise for the reader.” His essay “The Figure a Poem Makes” has been on my desk for years––I go back to it all the time.
U: After getting your BA in English, you entered the Vietnam War, and upon returning, you went to business school. What made you go into business?
J: My father was a businessman so that was the model I knew. He and his friends all worked for the railroad (this was the mid-20th century) and their common talk was about how they hated their jobs. It was a revelation for me to hear a neighbor say he loved his work. I was lucky to go from business school into a career that I also loved.
People often think of business and poetry as antipodes, polar opposites. But the business of both is to create order out of chaos; for the businessman it’s external chaos, for the poet it’s internal chaos. But both draw their waters out of the same well.
U: Where do you get your greatest inspiration from that aids your writing process?
J: There are about 1,600 poetry collections in my personal library, which includes the ancient classics, such as Virgil, as well as the contemporary great poets, such as Richard Wilbur, Walt Whitman, and Emily Dickinson. When I walk in in the morning to start writing, I’m greeted by 1,600 voices. So it’s sort of like Grand Central Station in my head.
U: How can writing be therapeutic to soldiers returning from active duty who face substance abuse and other mental illnesses?
J: Aristotle, one of the characters in my book Dante in China, says:
“For the true benefit of writing is to produce
not action or even understanding, but the peace
of mind that comes with the act of articulation.”
U: Is there such a thing as the perfect place to write or the ideal time to write? If so, where and when? Do you have a particular spot where you write the most or time?
J: One of my teachers once said, “You don’t choose the poem, the poem chooses you.” It could choose you at 2 a.m. or standing in a check-out line. I carry 3 X 5 cards so I won’t miss that first line when it comes. Another writer-friend said that when he goes to live in a new place, the first thing he does is find the place where he will write. Could be the kitchen table.
My own favorite place to write is my studio, which is often visited by a heron. (The heron inspired the first poem in my latest poetry collection, The Boxer of Quirinal: “Heron.”) It was designed by Eric J. Smith, and it (as well as the “Heron” poem) was featured in The New York Times in 2019.
U: Who are some of the most influential poets in your poetic style?
J: The first book of poetry I ever bought was as a college freshman, and I bought the collected poems of William Butler Yeats. To me, Yeats is a very great poet, maybe the greatest of the 20th century, and he has definitely been an influence for me. He gave poetry its 20th century voice, which is why people still read his poems. He was revolutionary in that he talked in his poetry like all of us talk today.
I think that, until the age of 40, I was writing poems that sounded like bad Yeats. And then eventually, over a long period of time, you write poems that are in no one’s voice but your own.
U: During your time as President of the Poetry Foundation, how did you use business models to achieve the goals that made the foundation work better and enrich the demand for great poetry?
J: I organized the Poetry Foundation as a holding company: Finance, HR and public affairs were kept small and centralized. All of our programs were the subsidiaries of the holding company. Each one operated with complete editorial independence from the Foundation management.
U: How important is it to have establishments for poets and nonpoets alike, such as the Poetry Foundation?
J: William Logan, the poetry critic, recently said, “Poetry has always been a major art with a minor audience.” Nonprofit organizations like the Poetry Foundation exist to give poetry the national readership it deserves. In the last year of my decade with the Foundation, our programs brought poems of the highest quality to 20 million people who would not have otherwise seen or heard them.
But your word “important” is important. Writing a poem is a fiercely independent act and will always be written, with or without institutional support. Poetry is the animal that always escapes.
U: What does the word poetry mean to you?
J: Poetry's place is on that perimeter where spirit and values intersect, where irreverence and responsibility are equally likely to occur.
U: Do you prefer to hear a poem spoken aloud or read it for the first time? Which one has the most impact on you?
J: Given the way information travels through our culture these days, my first encounter with a poem is more likely to read it than to hear it. But hearing the poem is essential to its meaning. A poem is a sound train. Airy aspirates, diphthongs, fricatives, apocopes: Poetry is sound bites indeed.
You can find more about John’s writing on his website and follow him on Instagram. You can also find his latest book here.
