John B. Lee... featured poet October 8th, 2019 7 pm at the Mykonos
"Refuse discouragement. It is a waste of mind. Everything in our culture works against the writing of poetry. It is devalued, undervalued, disregarded and aggressively ignored, except by an exceptional few. And poetry is a lifeline for humanity."
Poetry: hobby or passion? [Career?] I love reading poetry, writing poetry, discussing poetry, breathing poetry, living poetry. Those who write poetry fall in love with language and the world. Dictionary music and chasing the feeling when the work is going well … I recently wrote a poem, sent it to my friend Marty Gervais (poet, publisher, photographer, editor, Poet Laureate of Windsor) and he wrote back “Wow! This is the best poem I have ever read.” Now praise like that keeps me going. Does love help? (If so, what kind?) John Lennon sang “All You Need is Love,” and he wrote that song and sang those words without a hint of irony. I recently wrote in a letter to my elder son, “kindness is love manifest in the world”. Love of life. Love of the universe. Love writ large. Dylan Thomas said it best in the prologue to his Collected Poems - “These poems, with all their crudities, doubts, and confusions, are written for the love of Man and in praise of God, and I’d be a damn fool if they weren’t” Is the creative act political to you? Inherently subversive? Inherently a social service? Not political in the sense that is usually meant by the word ‘political’. Poetry comes from the inner life of the creator and it speaks to the inner life of the reader/re-creator. In that poetry has the potential to make a connection between two human beings in service of deep need, poetry shares this quality with the qualities of prayer. The best words in the best order spoken aloud in silence remind the alienated self that the otherness that infects us over time need not be a verdict. How does inspiration work for you regarding individual poems? Each poem I write involves chasing the feeling one feels when the work is going well. That involves blurring of the self and vanishing into the act of writing as an act of discovery. Who or what triggered you to begin writing? I started writing the night I saw the Beatles on television. I woke up to new possibilities in writing, after reading Dylan Thomas's “Fern Hill.” Creatively, whom do you look up to, if anyone? Paul McCartney, Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, Dylan Thomas and dozens upon dozens upon dozens of poets.
Walk us through your typical creative day. Every day is a creative day for me. So, there is something of a sameness to my days, interrupted by accidental variations. I rise at 6 or 7 a.m.. Make coffee, check my email, read the paper, read a chapter or two from whatever book I’m reading, go to my desk, crack the cover of a poetry book, read a line or two, look out the window and pick up my pen and write. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn’t. After an hour or so, I go for a walk with my dog and my wife on a local trail. Then cycle to the gym for an hour. After I get home, I usually go to my desk and work for an hour or two, then read some more. Walk again. Make supper, and spend the evening watching TV with my wife and it’s off to bed by midnight. This from a young poet: Any tips for staying motivated when discouragement hits? Refuse discouragement. It is a waste of mind. Everything in our culture works against the writing of poetry. It is devalued, undervalued, disregarded and aggressively ignored, except by an exceptional few. And poetry is a lifeline for humanity. Where else do we conserve and value the contemplative, the slow-to-yield truths that sustain the heart, the soul, the mind, the body and the spirit in one surround? I recently wrote a brief paper I gave at a talk. The title of that paper was “What Means Tomorrow: reading and writing poetry in the digital age,” and the primary intention of the talk involved keeping the faith. The world of popular culture seems to be saying “we don’t want poetry, we don’t need poetry, we won’t have poetry” and yet, it survives, and it even thrives when it falls in the fertile ground of the hungry mind. For her part, the late Nobel Laureate Toni Morrison wrote these words after the discouraging re-election of American president George W. Bush: “There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.” (Toni Morrison)
In 2005 John B. Lee was inducted as Poet Laureate of Brantford in perpetuity. The same year he received the distinction of being named Honourary Life Member of The Canadian Poetry Association and The Ontario Poetry Society. In 2007 he was made a member of the Chancellor’s Circle of the President’s Club of McMaster University and named first recipient of the Souwesto Award for his contribution to literature in his home region of southwestern Ontario. In a separate distinction he was named winner of the inaugural Black Moss Press Souwesto Award for his contribution to the ethos of writing in Southwestern Ontario. In 2011 he was appointed Poet Laureate of Norfolk County (2011-14) and in 2015 Honourary Poet Laureate of Norfolk County for life and in 2017 he received a Canada 150 Medal from the Federal Government of Canada for “his outstanding contribution to literary development both at home and abroad.” A recipient of over eighty prestigious international awards for his writing he is winner of the $10,000 CBC Literary Award for Poetry, the only two time recipient of the People’s Poetry Award, and 2006 winner of the inaugural Souwesto Orion Award (University of Windsor). In 2007 he was named winner of the Winston Collins Award for Best Canadian Poem, an award he won again in 2012. He has well-over seventy books published to date and is the editor of seven anthologies including two best-selling works: That Sign of Perfection: poems and stories on the game of hockey; and Smaller Than God: words of spiritual longing. He co-edited a special issue of The Windsor Review—Alice Munro: A Souwesto Celebration published in the fall of 2014. His work has appeared internationally in over 500 publications, and has been translated into French, Spanish, Korean and Chinese. He has read his work in nations all over the world including South Africa, France, Korea, Cuba, Canada and the United States. He has received letters of praise from Nelson Mandela, Desmond Tutu, Australian’s beloved national poet the late Les Murray, and Senator Romeo Dallaire. Called “the greatest living poet in English” by poet George Whipple, John B. Lee lives in Port Dover, Ontario where he works as a full time author.