Nathanael O’Reilly : part one

Nathanael O’Reilly is an Irish-Australian poet; he is Assistant Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Texas at Arlington. His books include (Un)belonging (Recent Work Press, 2020); BLUE (above/ground press, 2020); Preparations for Departure (UWAP, 2017); Cult (Ginninderra Press, 2016); Distance (Ginninderra Press, 2015); Suburban Exile (Picaro Press, 2011); & Symptoms of Homesickness (Picaro Press, 2010). More than 200 of his poems have appeared in publications from thirteen countries, including Adelaide Literary Magazine, Antipodes, Anthropocene, Apricity, Cordite Poetry Review, Headstuff, Marathon Literary Review, Mascara Literary Review, Rochford Street Review, Skylight 47, Transnational Literature, Westerly and The Newcastle Poetry Prize Anthology 2017. 

Photo credit: Gregory Beck

What are you working on?

I’m currently working on a book-length collection of poems about the street I live on, called Boulevard. I’m really interested in place and the local, and one of my favourite poetry books is Basil Bunting’s Briggflatts, a big inspiration for the project. I’ve written about seventy poems so far, spanning the four seasons. The poems won’t have titles, just numbers, and I plan to arrange them according to the season in which each is set. My previous poetry collections have almost all been transnational and have contained poems set in multiple countries on three continents. Boulevard will be my first collection in which all of the poems are set in the United States. Narrowing the focus down to a boulevard less than a mile long is quite a departure for me. Being stuck at home due to the pandemic forced me to find new subject matter just outside my door and to appreciate my immediate environment, rather than always yearning to be elsewhere.