Simone Kearney Interviewed as Brooklyn Poets' 'Poet of the Week'

Brooklyn Poets' "Poet of the Week" is Simone Kearney, which means we are lucky enough to get an interview with the poet and artist (and quilter)! Kearney is co-teaching a workshop with Emily Skillings called Nest, Hut, Cellar: Practicing the Poetics of Space, beginning October 26, if you're in the NYC area. For now, rest your eyes on some o' this Q&A:

Tell us about the last book(s) and/or poem(s) that stood out to you and why.

I would say Fanny Howe’s new book. It blew my mind. Just read the book and you’ll see.

What are some books or poems you’ve been meaning to read for years and still haven’t gotten to?

I still have not read War and Peace. I’ve been meaning to read War and Peace ever since working in a bookstore in Cambridge, MA years ago, when this Irish guy studying at Harvard came into the store and told me about having been held at gunpoint in a bathtub at the back of a Venezuelan bank (I don’t know why there was a bathtub at the back of the bank), and, believing he was about to be shot, thinking to himself in desperation, “But I still haven’t read War and Peace!” Luckily he survived, and I don’t know if he went and redressed the problem subsequently by reading the book, but ever since hearing that story, I thought to myself, I must get to War and Peace (I love Anna Karenina as a book), but I still haven’t read it.

Describe your reading process. Do you read one book at a time, cover to cover, or dip in and out of multiple books? Do you plan out your reading in advance or discover your next read at random? Do you prefer physical books or digital texts? Are you a note-taker?

I’m always reading multiple, too many books. I love dipping into books, but also love getting deeply involved in a book cover to cover. I sometimes plan what I’ll read, sometimes let fate decide. I love recommendations, but I’m often led by subjects that I’m interested in in terms of what I choose to read. I can’t read digital texts, hardly, I am a fanatic for physical books and fetishize the smell of must in an old yellow book. Having moved around a lot, I always groan at the thought of all the heavy lifting I’ll have to do only because of my books, whenever I move. My books have led to so much excessive lugging, but still I love them, like needy pets. And I love defacing my books—I love to feel all sorts of emotions in the margins.

What’s one thing you’d like to try in a poem or sequence of poems that you haven’t tried before?

S&M.

Where are some places you like to read and write (besides home, assuming you like to be there)?

I love libraries. Teaching at Parsons, I have access to the New School libraries, Cooper Union library and NYU libraries and it’s a dream

You can listen to Kearney read her poem, "Rear Window," and find the rest of this feature, at Brooklyn Poets.