IAN MARTIN : part five

How do you know when a poem is finished?

I don’t. My approach to writing is very iterative. Everything just sits on my computer and I come back to it frequently to make little changes. In theory a poem is done when it’s been published, but I’ll still probably revise it after the fact for when I do readings, or if I’m republishing it in some form. Poetry is an imperfect form of communication (like everything) so I see revision as a normal part of the process. I will always keep trying to get every poem to be perfect, to perfectly communicate what I’m trying to say. When I say it perfectly, I will be done. I will win poetry forever.

IAN MARTIN : part four

Has your consideration of poetry changed since you began?

I think I used to see poetry as a solitary pursuit, as romantic, as depressing, as all-encompassing. Now I just think of it as something nice that I like to do and share. It’s a way to connect with people and that’s the most important thing to me now. I used to be a lot more standoffish. I didn’t want people to understand me. I wanted to be special and important. Poetry is cool but it’s not the only thing. You can do other stuff and just hang out.

I think also my view on what poetry can be has changed a lot. I think I used to have a really narrow view of what was “good” or “correct” in poetry but now I care a lot less. There’s lots of ways to write a poem and when I think too much about what a poem “should” be and try to make my poems look or behave a certain way, it invariably turns to crap. It’s too rigid for me.

IAN MARTIN : part three

How important is music to your poetry?

Almost not at all, which is odd. I’m deeply invested in music, and I do songwriting from time to time. And I spend a lot of my time writing poetry. But I’ve never really done anything that combines them and I tend to think of them very separately. I don’t know why. I’ve been listening to a lot of Marie Davidson lately and she does electronic club music mixed with spoken word. I’m really into that lately. I think mixing different things is cool and worth doing but there’s so much to do and so little time.

IAN MARTIN : part two

What do you feel poetry can accomplish that other forms can’t?

In general I don’t think any art form is uniquely capable of something that other forms aren’t. In the words of Kanye West: “Everything in the world is exactly the same.”

IAN MARTIN : part one

Known primarily for leaving dishes in the sink “to soak”, IAN MARTIN is a multidisciplinary artist living in Ottawa. IAN’s work has appeared recently in paintbucket.page, small poems 🍓, the DUSIE blog, G U E S T, BAD DOG,  ➰➰➰, talking about strawberries all of the time, chaudiere books, and Half a Grapefruit Magazine. IAN has published four chapbooks, most recently YOU’RE GOING TO HAVE TO KEEP THIS UP FOREVER (AngelHousePress, 2018) and PLACES TO HIDE (Coven Editions, 2018). When not writing, IAN makes small video games and complains online. [ www.ian-martin.net ]

What are you working on?

I have a couple manuscripts on the go right now. Not sure in what format they’ll eventually appear. One is about futurity and one is about games. Both are about alienation and identity. I’m excited about these manuscripts because I’m trying out lots of new forms and ideas and getting messy and just having fun with it.

This is the first time I’ve started a manuscript with the concept first and started developing new poems specifically for it. Usually I just take a bunch of existing work and try to make it fit together. I think it’s neat. I think I’m a bit nervous because sometimes when I intentionally set out to say a specific thing, I think too hard and the poetry comes out bad. But I think it’ll all work out.