Ask the Author: Leslie McGrath

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Leslie McGrath’s nuanced poem, Parallax, appears in the February issue. The poet talks with us about pocket Museums, poems as love stories, commonality or rarity, and more.

1. What is in your pocket Louvre?

I went to a reading at my local village library recently (a library roughly the size of a supermarket meat locker) and came upon a “pocket Louvre” in the stacks. I was so intrigued by the idea of holding the Louvre’s splendors in my palm that I built the poem around it.  I think my pocket Louvre would include memories of every delicious food I ever ate, saw, or thought of. A sort of Borgesian Aleph of food.

2. What is a seedcake? Why should we have one?

I imagine a seedcake is a sweet concoction made of seeds and something sticky, like honey, compressed and wrapped in colored cellophane. Maybe the human version of the suet cakes we hang in little cages for the winter birds. I modeled “Parallax” loosely after episode eight in Joyce’s Ulysses, in which Bloom is hungry and there’s mention of lots of kinds of food, including seedcakes. Why should we have one? Because as every mother learns, it’s important to keep something yummy with you at all times for cranky children.

3. Is “Parallax” a love story? If not, what is it?

I think “Parallax” is a love story, yes, and also an exploration of self– the veracity of our self-image and how it may our may not mesh with another person’s self-image. For example, blue lobsters are rare and red auroras are quite common, but what matters more is each person’s sense of rarity and commonness. There’s so much at play in every relationship. Starting with the relationship with the self.

4. How many voices do you wish you had?

I once had eighteen voices. Now I have one. And I’m happy with that.

5. Are you common or rare or something entirely different?

Like most people, I’m probably a lot more common than I think I am. I wonder how much of this kind of ordinary hubris is simply a means to cope with the stress of living.

6. How have you been moved lately?

As I’ve been responding to these questions, I’ve been listening to news about the horrific earthquake and tsunami in Japan, awaiting news of its hitting the islands of Hawaii and the Pacific coast of the US. I’m moved by this reminder of how exquisitely everyone on earth is connected.