Yesterday’s News
On This Day I am Adding a Poem of Remembrance
Remembering 298 souls on Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 Shot Down by a Russian Missile Over Eastern Ukraine, July 2014
Don’t forget to show hospitality to strangers, for some who have done this have entertained angels without realizing it. Hebrews 13: 1-2
Angels, dressed as passengers wearing blankets,
having overcome the broken wings,
are the ones still ascending.
While below, all the insides of earthbound lives
have exploded like fumbled melons,
open and giving back seeds of life,
ambition and troubled love
mixed with ash and bone atomized
and still settling on earth
in a measured sifting,
without urgency.
Slowly filling long earth gashes
under hushed,
cold-night stars.
And The Reviews Are In…
A fun and insightful review of my chapbook Birds Who Eat French Fries recently appeared on the Mad Hatter Reviews website and elsewhere (Facebook and Twitter). Thank you to UK book reviewer JM Squirrell for a job well done.
Check it out @JMSquirrell’s #review of @mmaul414’s #poetry collection, Birds Who Eat French Fries.
A Long Lost Poem Comes Home!
Well here is a poem that has finally found its way back after a long journey. Seeing “Baby’s Breath” again was like bumping into an old friend. Thank you to Showbear Family Circus for publishing! You can read it here: http://lanceschaubert.org/2020/05/15/babys-breath/
Cincinnati Poetry Month Project, “Postcards from the Pandemic” Includes Michael Maul Poem
My poem, “Seeing You From Six Feet Away” has been included among the works of other poets documenting life during Covid-19 times, when very little is as usual. It appears as part of a really lovely Cincinnati Poetry Month project called “Postcards from the Pandemic”. Featured are 30 poems by 30 Cincinnati poets which are being posted one per day throughout the month of April on the Poet Laureate of Cincinnati Facebook Group page at (https://www.facebook.com/groups/1767490103507841/)
I can’t tell you which day when my poem will appear, but please keep checking the Poet Laureate of Cincinnati Facebook Group page everyday to read and support these locally written fine poems and their authors. Thank you!
Reviewer Likes Birds Who Eat French Fries Chapbook
Hey, check out this review of Birds Who Eat French Fries, posted today on Twitter. Thank you to Scottish reviewer Emma Jane Mackay for your insights!
We’ve all shamelessly done it. Don’t even try to deny it. We’ve all made sure no one was about before throwing a handful of battered delight into the air for hungry bellies. Savages of the sea they…
New Poem In Spring Issue Of Speckled Trout Review
One of my very recent poems, "Fishing From A Bridge in Fog" is included in the Spring issue of Speckled Trout Review. Thank you to founder and managing editor Kevin McDaniels. You can find it at the following address:
Poem Appears In Nine Muses Poetry…
I feel honored to have my work, “Aging with Poems”, included in a 2020 issue of Nine Muses Poetry. The publication is based in North West Wales, and aims to showcase the best in contemporary poetry, though I always feel as if I have slipped in under the tent.
If you are of the mind, I would appreciate your taking a look. You may find it here https://ninemusespoetry.com/2020/03/23/one-poem-by-michael-maul/
New Chapbook
Michael Maul's chapbook Birds Who Eat French Fries is now available for distribution.
The book contains twenty-eight new poems. All were written since his 2018 collection Dancing Naked in Front of Dogs appeared and earned wide praise.
A few of the poems that debuted in Birds Who Eat French Fries have already been claimed by literary journals in the USA and Canada for individual publication.
Single copies are available for $6 or two for $10. Shipping inside the USA is free. For convenience "Birds Who Eat French Fries" is available directly through this website. To order, just click on "BOOKSTORE" at the top of the website navigation page which is where books are sold.
Please take a look. There is a lot to like among these works!
"Poetry Mini Interviews"
Here are links to Part One and Part Two of five interviews with me that Thomas Whyte in the UK is posting on his blog site "Poetry Mini Interviews". Parts Three - Five will be coming soon, so please keep checking-in!
https://poetryminiinterviews.blogspot.com/2020/02/michael-maul-part-one.html
http://poetryminiinterviews.blogspot.com/2020/02/michael-maul-part-two.html
Look For It.
Exciting news that Nightingale & Sparrow Literary Magazine has published my poem "Spinning Time" in its love-themed Valentines Issue, sold through Amazon.co.uk. Kendle price is £2.32
Interview
Felix Winternitz is the author of three books and has served as an editorial director at Cincinnati Magazine, features editor at the Cincinnati Enquirer and as a senior editor for OHIO Magazine. He frequently writes for Cincinnati CityBeat and other publications.
Finding His Voice in Poetry - A Q&A with Author Michael Maul
By Felix Winternitz
When Michael Maul first set pen to paper nearly six decades ago, he could little imagine becoming an internationally published poet.
Now he's the author of a widely acclaimed book of collected poems, Dancing Naked in Front of Dogs (Amazon Books). In less than a year following its release, he is now unveiling a chapbook, Birds Who Eat French Fries, available November, 2019.
In an interview, Maul stresses there's an inherent honesty required by his craft. As one reviewer has noted, Maul "finds inspiration, beauty and resonance in the cloth of everyday American living. Many of his poems share the stories of people living bravely within very challenging situations. These circumstance include Down Syndrome, generational poverty and child abduction, PTSD, autism and the impact of a mass-fatality tragedy on one community."
Maul observes that his themes often involve the emotional toll that life can sometimes take, emerging as stories that document "the journeys through the ups and downs of lives." He embraces a powerful voice as he details the moments that make life memorable. He grasps thoughtful, stark language to best jolt the reader out of any complacency.
Even so, as the poet notes, "My poetry is very accessible stuff." Maul says his work doesn't require a whole lot of soul-searching or detective work on the part of the reader.
Sitting down with him last summer, Maul reflected on his writing career, and offered a number of engaging observations while covering an array of potentially sensitive topics: including the process of writing poetry, where ideas come from, how Maul’s work has so quickly found such a broad audience, and new projects he has underway.
Here is that interview.
FW Thanks for taking time to sit down with me. I’d like to begin by asking a question I think I already know the answer to. And that is, my assumption that writing poetry is not a pastime you have taken up very recently. Am I correct?
MM Yes. I’ve been writing poetry for the past fifty-five years. I began at seventeen.
FW Is there any particular catalyst that got you started so young?
MM Just happenstance. My parents moved from Ohio to Florida just before my junior year of high school. I left behind all my friends and whoever I thought I was at the time. Writing poems became a solace from loneliness. A coping mechanism or something of the sort. And it taught me a lesson about where poetry can take you.
FW Which was…?
MM Well for me, it took me to a place that gave space, distance and perspective.
FW It sounds as if your writing began almost as therapy. Did you ever try to publish any of those early poems?
MM First, I still find poetry to be healing. And second, I didn’t try to publish the very early stuff. For the first couple of years I just tried to become more familiar with the medium; words and rhythms and forms.
FW So when did you first begin publishing your poems?
MM I think when I was nineteen. I know it was during my freshman year in college. By then I was publishing both poetry and fiction.
FW So that’s when you began hitting your stride?
MM Not really. In those days, for underclassmen most of the courses you took were required, not elective. So I was suffocating in geology and French and math in which I had zero aptitude and interest. I spent my time writing and sculpting instead.
FW That sounds like a risky solution. Did it work?
MM [Laughing] Of course it didn’t work! But I found an English professor who took an interest in me and became a mentor. I confided in him that I was thinking about dropping out of school. He said “You can’t do that; you’re an artist.” It was the first time anyone ever put a name to what I was. It made all the difference in the world. Really.
FW What was his name?
MM Harrison Butterworth. He helped get me into an experimental program at Ohio University that let me bypass many of the most problematic required courses, matched me with a faculty advisor and introduced me to a community of established, successful writers, and students like me. It was a lifeline.
FW Another question, and it’s one that both readers and writers are frequently are interested in. How do you write?
MM Big question. First, on a granular level, the answer is I write on a laptop, send myself text messages from my phone, leave myself voicemails or scribble notes…really in an emergency I’ll grab anything at hand. If you have lines or titles or ideas trying to get into your head, it’s a big responsibility. The right words are everything. When poet Toni Morrison received the Nobel Prize in Literature in Stockholm, she talked about words and their capacity to liberate, embolden, empower and heal. That’s a lot of currency.
So if you’re a writer and words, insights, ideas come knocking on your door, you better answer. If you wait to respond, there’s no guarantee they’ll be there later.
FW Voicemails?
MM I’m afraid so. In his poem “How to Be a Poet” Wendell Berry wrote “Accept what comes from silence. Make the best you can of it. Of the little words that come like prayers prayed back to the one who prays.”
So when the bell rings, you have to come out of your corner. Right then. Simple as that. If you don’t, the words will move on to someone else and you’ll have missed your chance. Before I learned this I lost the handle on so many potentially good ideas for poems. You think you’ll remember what triggered the inspiration, but later you often don’t.
Another answer to your question is that I frequently write in the first-person. It has advantages and drawbacks. I think the first-person voice makes things happen easier for the reader, it funnels content more directly to them rather than through someone else.
In terms of drawbacks, people think I’m always writing literally about myself. Which is very often not the case.
Also, and this may or may not be unusual, I’m always working on multiple poems at the same time. So I have several different horses on the track at once, all racing toward a finish line.
FW Do you find some subject matter to be more conducive to good poetry than others?
MM Not now, but I once did. I used to think I had to write about something big. But as it turns out, writing about everyday things often resonates the most. So, I do both. I wrote a poem about my mother’s death, and I wrote a poem about having breakfast alone on the shore. In the end they had equal power.
FW Does an example come to mind of one the least traditional poems you wrote?
MM Well, I can share this with you. My mother wrote poetry and was a huge influence on me wanting to be writer, too. Years after her death, I found a typed copy of a poem she composed called “Deserted Farmhouse”. I liked it.
It contained stunning imagery but seemed a little dated in terms of style. Though she had passed away long before, I decided to collaborate with her on it by helping the poem become more contemporary, while remaining true to her soul.
It now bears both of our names and two author headshots. I’m forty years older in my picture than she is in hers. I plan to submit the poem to a few publications in the near future. And if I ever see her in another lifetime, I hope she's not pissed about the edits I made to her work.
FW On the topic of publishing, this year you have had the successful release of your first full-length collection of poetry, Dancing Naked in Front of Dogs. I have to ask, where did that title come from?
MM Thanks for giving me a chance to set the record straight. We’re not having naked dance parties at the Maul house every weekend. Look, I’ve been a dog person my whole life. I’ve seen people put on airs around other humans, but no one feels pressure to impress their dogs.
I took the title of my book from one of the poems in the collection. The poem is about being willing to honestly reveal your humanness. When it was time to name the collection I thought it could also work as a title for the entire book, saying to the reader this is what we look like, and this is who we are.
FW You referred to inspiration earlier. Do you believe in inspiration?
MM Of course I do! I believe in everything when it comes to successful writing. Hard work, deep concentration, yes inspiration, disembodied voices, magic and mysticism, truth, beauty, honesty, and even luck. I remember Hemingway was quoted as saying "For a long time now I have tried simply to write the best I can. Sometimes I have good luck and write better than I can.”
That’s inspiration.
On the other hand, you can’t wait to be inspired to write. Plenty of credible poems have been written without it. Billy Collins, who is one of the most gifted Poet Laureates America has ever produced, says it’s also about mastering the craft. He points out that good poems have two subjects, the starting subject and then the discovered subject. At some point the poem’s content leaves the initial object and pivots beyond it to something greater. I believe that too, and just knowing it can help aspiring poets a lot.
FW Why do you think the audience for poetry is so small in the U.S.?
MM You know, though I’m prepared to see the market for poetry here as small, by contrast the interest in poetry is surprisingly high. In just the past several months my poetry website has received hits from half of the states in America, along with many countries in Europe, plus cities in Australia, India and Azerbaijan, part of the former Soviet Union which mentioned Dancing Naked in Front of Dogs as recommended reading for students at the college level.
Now that being said, a lot of very smart people in the USA feel uncomfortable around poetry. They have had previous bad experiences, where the end of the poem is like the end of a joke whose punchline they didn’t get. Which makes them feel like they are lacking. And regardless of who you are, that is not a good feeling and you don’t want more of it.
Some other countries (I’d offer Ireland and Scotland as examples) allow poetry to play a larger part in their culture where it has more immediate relevance and far fewer barriers than on our side of the Atlantic.
So I work hard to make my poetry accessible to everyone. I’m writing about places we all know and people we've all seen. When you sit down with it, you won’t need a thesaurus or a minor in Greek mythology to know what’s going on. It’s straightforward, so if I do my job right we all have the same experience and we all end up in about the same place.
FW How do you know when a poem is done? Or for that matter, whether or not what your have written is any good?
MM That is a legit and difficult question. When involved in the writing process, I’m experiencing the poem as it comes to life. Kind of like seeing fireworks burst while you’re also feeling them in your chest. If it moves me like that, then it’s a good bet it will also have impact for those who read it.
And poems that last never seem to lose their juice. When I’m giving a live reading and I can see the impact of my words in people's eyes and on their faces, it means the poem is still evoking. The spirits of readers and listeners are still being nudged.
I’m also a big believer in being a member of writing communities. For years I’ve met monthly with a group of writers in Florida. Still do. We call ourselves The Ringling Museum Coffee House Poets. Everybody brings their work and everybody joins in the critiques. They have saved me from single handedly raising many of my poems through their awkward teenage years.
FW We’re almost out of time, but before I let you go I wanted to ask if there are any new projects you are involved in that you’d like to share?
MM Well I’m winding up work a new chapbook that will be available through my michaelmaul.net website this fall. It will consist of about thirty poems or so. My wife, who is a book artist, is handling its design and production. It will be a small print run, handmade.
I've also been enjoying meeting other poets and readers on a new Facebook page we’ve created. Its name is Michael Maul Poetry. Plus, I’ve started posting more on twitter, at @mmaul414. I’m appreciating more than ever that these are great tools for staying in touch with readers and writers from all over the world.
And I’ve been doing more live readings, three so far this year. Two in Florida and one in Ohio.
Meanwhile I’m continuing to publish individual poems in literary journals, reviews, anthologies and online. Most are based in the USA, but not all of them.
FW That’s an incredibly full plate! Don’t forget to breathe, and thanks for making time for this interview.
MM You’re welcome. I’ve enjoyed the conversation.
Scarlet Leaf Review
Scarlet Leaf Review has posted five of my recent poems on their website. You may Find them online here:
https://www.scarletleafreview.com/poe…/category/michael-maul
Nine Muses Poetry
Excited to have had my "Aging with Poetry" poem selected for publication by Nine Muses Poetry, in North West Wales, UK. Scheduled to appear March 23, 2020. Thank you, thank you to editor Annest Gwilym!
2019 Good Works Review
2019 Good Works Review is now available for purchase from Amazon online, in either paperback or Kindle formats. The annual collection of excellent poetry and fiction includes my poem "Loving Memory" for which I sincerely thank the editors.
Honors & Distinctions
Michael Maul’s “Anniversary Poem” was named as a 2019 nominee in the worldwide Best of the Net writing awards competition. His name and poem were placed into nomination by editors of the Dublin, Ireland-based poetry journal Dodging The Rain.
The jurored Best of the Net competition leads to the publication of an anthology comprised of Best of the Net finalists and winners in three categories: fiction, nonfiction, and poetry. The 2019 poetry submissions are being judged by Eloisa Amezcua, whose own poems and translations have appeared in New York Times Magazine, Poetry Magazine, Kenyon Review, Gulf Coast, and others. She lives in Columbus, OH
The 2019 Best of the Net anthology is published annually by Sundress Publications, a nonprofit literary press collective whose mission is to champion great work published online.
One of the poems included in Michael Maul’s Dancing Naked in Front of Dogs collection, was listed in a year-end recap of twelve favorite poems of 2018, as compiled by widely followed poetry blogger, Charlotte Hamrick (Zouxzoux) .
Thank you to The Cincinnati Association for the Blind and Visually Impaired for hosting me at their offices and recording an hour of me reading poetry from Dancing Naked in Front of Dogs. The program will air soon as part of their Radio Reading Service programming.
Writing Wisdom
Who Said It Best?
A tip of the hat today to Maria Popova and her Brainpickings newsletter. And for reminding us of the words of American poet and cultural treasure Adrienne Rich, who said:
“A poem can come out of something seen, something overheard, listening to music, an article in a newspaper, a book, a combination of all these…”
and
“One of the great functions of art is to help us imagine what it is like to be not ourselves, what it is like to be someone or something else, what it is like to live in another skin, what it is like to live in another body, and in that sense to surpass ourselves, to go out beyond ourselves.”
More from Michael…
Thoughts on Hate Speech
[After El Paso Shootings]
Lately I have been forgetting little things.
Not milestone birthday or when I was wed.
But how to take the measure of words.
where both rocks and puzzles can be hard,
but only one is difficult,
or between trash collectors and garbage men
one being what you do,
the other describing
of what you’re made.
Unlike Amnesia Majora
where you may not recall
even who is president
or the year of our Lord,
Micro-nesia is the place
where I am now
to relearn
lost measures
of everyday words;
where smaller things matter more,
to thoughtfully choose
what I’m trying to say
and passing on words
especially hard.
Not ones challenging
to pronounce or spell
but those to never say…
Atomic words
that, as David Foster Wallace said,
do not just express, but invoke;
Fighting words of high mean weights.
That when spoken,
power is unleashed
turning people into other things
transforming lovers
into lovers with wings
who can set aloft and never return.
Or, if they do,
may come back one day
but only in name
looking, perhaps, the same
but having lost forever
all familiar ways.
Back To School
Just like that,
my son killed the crosswalk kiss.
I knew it loomed, but not so soon.
He just ran away and waved his hand,
passed in front of crossing guards
and then went in.
Among parents still hugging their kids
I pretended to wave goodbye
to a boy
not only out of sight,
but already gone.