The Essential Doug Holder 

Big Table Publishing Company

ISBN: 978-1-945917-62-2

$15.00

As I read Doug Holder’s latest collection, The Essential Doug Holder, the Edward Hopper painting Nighthawks often comes to mind. In the well-recognized painting, we see a dapperly-dressed couple sitting closely together on the far side of the counter in the brightly-lit, sparse diner. But it’s not the couple that our eyes go to first, or linger on the most. It’s the other sharply-dressed diner in the fedora, who is sitting alone, his back against the world. 

Doug Holder, poet and storyteller, an acute observer of the minutiae – master of irony and self-deprecation, could be that lone diner in Hopper’s famous painting. 

His poetic lines are highlight-worthy. You should see my copy. Here’s a few samples of his brilliance: 

From “Dreaming on the Senior Line at Market Basket”

Vinyl, cloth and plastic

wrap the world 

but I dream of mangoes 

or a sad-eyed haddock

joyously twirled.

From “Father Knows Best-Mother Does the Rest”

The bland tyranny

of the cardigan sweater.

From “When Father Dies”

Let him fall like

a weathered pit bull

in a three-piece suit. 

From “Richard III in Hollywood”

The ghosts that haunt you 

vanished 

now that you

popped the Prozac.

…that you have deals to cut

evil to consummate

during your 

highly-rated 

winter of discontent. 

Holder has a chapter entitled Eating Grief at 3 AM. Maybe that’s what the lone diner is doing in the Nighthawks painting – eating grief.  And Holder, himself is no stranger to grief, watching his parents grow frail and sickly; his mother suffering from dementia, consumed with the whereabouts of her pocketbook. The loss of his affectionate grandmother, of good friends, and his colorful childhood in New York City, and later – legend in Somerville.  In his poem, “Eating Grief at Bickford’s – for Allen Ginsberg,” Holder is reminiscing of a more wholesome, less complicated time, whose customers are now long gone: 

The old men

who used to spout 

Marxist

rants from

the cracked porcelain of their cups

are gone.

…Stains of baked beans

on their lapels

finger a piece

of passionless cod

lulled by their 

own murmur. 

In the poem, “Carpal Tunnel Syndrome – for my late father, Lawrence J. Holder,” Holder comes to suffer the same condition of his late father:

I thought of my father

as he gripped

his left hand

prying it open with his right

a hand curling

into a callused fetus

holding on to 

something 

for dear life. 

And years after his death

as if possessed 

I feel my own hand curling 

in my right hand pocket

There’s also a feeling of singularity in a lot of Holder’s poems, the safe and equal distance that comes with practiced observation. We see this in his poem, “Unknown in a Crowd.”

And that’s when 

you felt most at peace – 

lost in the cornucopia.

Feeling 

like the multi-eyed

fly on the wall

away from the claustrophobic intimacy.

Observing 

not observed 

owner of your own dialogue…

And again in the poem, “Au Bon Pain at Dusk.”

You know the skids 

when the Spare Change hawker

won’t call you “young man” – 

when the haunts 

you slipped into

like an old shoe 

are boarded 

with angry wood crosses

when the glance of a beatific 

Harvard girl 

escapes you

with a bothered flick of her head.

It is dusk…

your knees ache clandestinely 

under the table.

The prospect of sleep

awaits you

like the promise

of a young night 

once did. 

There are ecclesiastical ponderings in the poems, “Transcendence” and “His Last Impact on the Metropolis – based on the Boston Globe account of a man who passed away on the Red Line,” where a middle-aged man dies on the train, dropping like some flimsy theatrical prop...the trains backed up / from Cambridge to Dorchester. / Bulky, twisting metal snakes -

The processional

with passengers

on either

side of the stretcher 

watching some forgotten

ineffectual man 

make his mark

freezing the rush hour

stopping them

dead in their 

tracks.

The Essential Doug Holder should be on every poetry lover’s bookshelf. These are unforgettable stories with multifaceted characters; dynamic language, and fresh perspectives. I read Doug Holder’s book, all 172 pages, in one sitting, not wanting it to end. 

Review by Carolynn Kingyens, author of Before the Big Bang Makes a Sound

Rodger LeGrand

RS:
We've known each other a long time, Rodger - since Big Table published your chap, Hope & Compulsion in 2009. What's the biggest difference between your writing then and now?

RL:
We have known each other a long time, even though we've never actually met. It's funny. I thought we would meet when I moved to Boston, but at the exact same time, you moved to San Francisco!

I'm always working to improve my writing. I'm always reading and learning more and more about this art. I approached my writing back in 2009 with the same seriousness that I approach it now. I had the good fortune of studying with great poets like Thomas Lux, Stephen Dobyns, and Marie Howe. Their work made an enormous impression on me as a poet and as a teacher. 

As poets, we are always reading, listening in on conversation on the subway, observing the world around us. Our perception and sense of the world changes as time passes, and I'm older now, so I see things a little differently than I did back in 2008 when I wrote those earlier poems. So i guess the biggest difference between my writing then and now is having aged and having experienced more. I'd like to think that I have spent the last 12 years refining my craft, but I don't know that I can be the best judge of that.

RS:

Whenever I work with a poet who has a flair for narratives, like you, I always want to ask - have you ever thought about doing a novel?

RL:

I have thought about writing novels and short stories. The problem for me is that my brain works in line breaks. I see the world in quick bursts of images. That's reality to me. Narrative in my mind is a series of insights, of lines, that link to form a metaphor. It's just the way my mind works. I'm drawn to those moments of lyric insight where something just sort of turns on in the brain after reading a line of poetry. It's as though something clicks and for a moment the entire universe seems altered. 

Stephen Dobyns is a great example of a poet who is able to write stunning poems and also write stacks and stacks of great novels. I have never understood how his brain is able to switch between genres the way it does. I don't know that I have enough brain power to do that... Prose does something different for my brain. It's generally more linear, less associative. Insight for fiction writers comes from how characters find their way through a challenging situation. It's great to read, but I can't seem to get my brain to work that way from the other side of the book. I have wondered if my inability to follow through on a novel is because I'm not social enough? There seems to be something inherently social about understanding how a character might behave in a certain situation. I'm not sure. I'm definitely not the most social person. I read a lot of fiction and non-fiction, though. I actually read anything I can get my hands on. I switched to Kindle a while back so that I could carry my library with me everywhere i go. Some people carry their entire music collection, I carry books.

RS:

Kirkus praised your new book, Studies for a Self-Portrait, calling it "poignant verse that asks readers to look - and think - deeply." Do you think that is one of the main goals of poetry?

RL:

I do. That was a nice compliment. Poems should prompt us to think about the world. They should help us notice lives around us. They should motivate us to think about those things in a way that brings empathy and emotion into our lives. Poetry, all art, really, should inform our emotions on how we might live more thoughtfully. I love the Books on the T program in Boston for this reason. I love the idea of bringing poems into a public space where people who might not normally be exposed to  books of poetry can encounter them.

RS:

Favorite tip for writing poetry?

RL:

Most poets would answer "reading," I think, and I agree, but I want to add "out loud" to that response. Hear your favorite poem in  your own voice. It will let you get a feel for the cadence, for the connection between how the poem finds meaning and how the poem makes music with words. As Thomas Lux once said, fill your lungs with poems. In fact, I'd like to ask anyone who is reading this interview to stop here, pull out one of your favorite poems, and read it out loud as though it was the last poem you will ever read.

Richard Fox

RS:

No one could ever accuse you of steering clear of scary topics, and your experience  with cancer and the illness and death of your parents figures into a lot of your poems. Are there any subjects you'd like to write about, but for some reason, haven’t?

 

RF:

Scary? I think of them as human. Living with cancer, with the death of parents defines me. Writing about them is a path to understanding, to being truthful with myself. I can’t think of any subjects I avoid. I didn’t intend to address the pandemic but my subconscious had other ideas. Cancer excises inhibitions. A room full of medical students and residents probing my penis to learn how to recognize an unusual side effect? Normal. Comparing and contrasting bowel movements with women and men in the radiation waiting room? Normal. Treatment is pretty funny if one survives. The absurdity of the cancer experience makes every topic in life fair game.

 

RS:

What do you think you do well as a poet? 

 

RF:

I let go. I don’t plan the path of the poem, especially its ending. I match content with form and vary style with approach. A poem is a puzzle. The pieces fit in unexpected ways and the result may look odd but makes sense.

 

RS:

What is a challenge for you?

 

RF:

I am compelled to write. It’s not a choice. I go through euphoric periods when poems come easily. There are longer times during which I unhappily fight every word. Cancer teaches me to never back down, to bring it on.

 

RS:

Have any of your poems ever hit you with an insight about yourself that surprised you?

 

RF:

Yes. Often when I write, it’s to understand what I’m thinking. I let go, allow images and language to arrive from my subconscious. Ride the stream until the poem announces it’s done. I expected to write more but the poem is wiser. Reveals its truths and then we both rest. 

 

RS:

Favorite tip for writing poetry?

 

RF:

If I’m having trouble with a poem, I design a form, say: 12 syllables to a line, six lines to a stanza, four stanzas. If I’m in a bind, add a rhyme scheme or meter. While my conscious mind thinks I must cut two syllables from a line, my subconscious feeds me unintentional words to fit the numbers. I reach a point when I have what I want and abandon the form.

 

Inspiration is a romantic notion. Ditch it. If I was paid to produce poems and my boss told me to have one about Granny Smith apples completed by noon, I couldn’t wait for inspiration. It’s my job to write, so I write no matter how I feel. Work is rewarding, sometimes fun.

 

If a piece makes me uncomfortable or afraid, then it’s a poem.

Mark Saba

RS:

I just went to your website and saw that you have written novels and poetry, in addition to the collection of short stories you did with Big Table Publishing. It's unusual to be able to do all three! Which genre do you favor? What are the challenges of each?

MS:

I began writing fiction in Annie Dillard's class when I was at Wesleyan. I wrote my first novel as a senior thesis there, ending up at around 250 pages. Annie encouraged me to learn poetry because it would benefit my fiction writing. The first poems I wrote were awful. Then, as a grad student at Hollins College, my poetry writing skills improved, and I realized that I was at heart a poet. But I can't sit down and force a poem if it isn't tugging at me, the way I can when fleshing out long works of fiction.  So I continued writing novels for something to do in between writing poems. I now consider all my work (novels, novellas, stories, poems, even paintings) poetry. I say that because, like poetry, each of my works is based on a vision and a feeling, and I consider them successful if I've been able to translate that vision and feeling into something others can appreciate. 

RS:

What are some of your favorite themes? What past experiences have found their way into your writing?

MS:

I've noticed over the years that the theme of duality often arises. I'm so comfortable seeing opposing points of view in anything, and so I often create situations in my writings where two conflicting perspective hash it out. There is also the theme of loss that comes up, and I attribute this to having lost my father as a toddler, and all the mystery and uncertainty that that entails.

RS:

You said you might soon be moving to Boston, where I left behind a vibrant writing community when I moved to San Francisco (I miss it!) How important is a writing community in terms of motivating yourself to write? Do you belong to any writing groups?

MS:

This is a strange question for me, because I've always felt isolated as a writer, maybe because there is absolutely no one else in my family who writes, or even takes much more than a passing interest in what I do. I've always had a demanding day job (for the past 31 years as a medical illustrator at Yale University) so if there was any time or energy left at the end of the day, I chose to spend it writing, not engaging in writing groups. Having said that, I have in the past been involved in a poetry group at Yale and another poetry group at Stamford. I guess I am pretty much focused and self-motivated in my work, thought I'm not sure I'd recommend that to anyone. 

RS:

Favorite tip for writing a novel?

MS:

Dig down to the deepest part of you and write what demands to be written from there. 

Michael C. Keith

RS:

I’m a huge fan of your short fiction, as you know, because you have one of the most vivid imaginations I’ve ever witnessed. So, what is it like to live in your head?

 

MCK:

Well, thank you for that. Coming from you, it means a lot. Despite my often darkish subject matter, humor mostly informs my thoughts, so being in my head wouldn’t be such a scary place. My radar for things to write about is always pulsing and mostly on alert. During this pandemic, I’ve been having trouble finding the switch to kick on the scope (bad metaphor?). That is to say, the current hasn’t been flowing like I would like. Distracted too much by all the bizarre things happening in the world—and then there’s the plague in the White House. These two things have robbed me of my usual creative lift-off. However, I have been producing a tiny bit, although I’m not confident that it possesses the spark and verve of my pre-pandemic/pre-Trump work. I’m thankful that my mind always seems to generate some scriptable observations, albeit in more modest amounts right now.

 

RS:

You tend to write a lot of macabre. What do you think is the challenge of that genre, what makes a macabre piece succeed, and what mistakes make it fail?

 

MCK:

I’ve been fascinated by the creepy and surreal since I was a kid. Watched too many Twilight Zones, maybe. That fascination has never left me, so it necessarily insinuates itself in my writing. Anything that has a dominant place in your thoughts does that. The challenge of writing horror or science-fi is to come up with something fresh, because there’s so much out there, and much of it doesn’t achieve launch. Tone and atmosphere are very key to a piece succeeding, too. I tend to write in a lean, minimalistic fashion—nothing gothic or abstract. Direct and accessible coupled with the right story line can be the most compelling for the reader, I believe. At least at this point in time, when people tend to shy away from lavish or idiosyncratic prose—blame the screen for that. People can’t sit too long in front of the printed page. The short-attention span universe.

 

RS:

What themes crop up a lot for you?

 

MCK:

In the last couple of years, I’ve shifted my writing efforts to prose/poetry (micro fiction) with topics nested in realism (with obvious exceptions.) Perhaps because of my age, in terms of themes, I’ve been more concerned with the consequences of physical (mental, too) deterioration and death in recent years. That was the clear thrust of Let Us Now Speak of Extinction (MadHat Press, 2018) and is essentially the focus of Insomnia 11 (same press, 2020.) As I said earlier, although the subject matter is dark, the pieces are not without humor. That’s just how I deal with it. Laugh while crying.

 

RS:

We always tease you about how many collections of short fiction you’ve written. How much time is spent writing and how much time is spent revising? Do you ever work a story and then realize you no longer like it?

 

MCK:

I don’t spend quite as much time as I used to in the first draft stage, given the micro nature of what I’m doing versus the longer short story. What I do now hits the page pretty quickly and takes more time to revise than to originate. What I engage often descends on me in a flash (flash fiction?). And then the challenge is to capture the nucleus wholly/fully for later refinement, if that makes sense. I typically hear the quintessential line while I’m doing something else (not at my desk) and then race to write it down. From there I build. It doesn’t always result in something I like and more often than not, I give up on it. That said, I may leave it on my desktop and return to it the next day, rather than just delete it. That time away can breathe new life into what I felt was moribund. I guess the lesson there is not to be too quick to abandon something.

 

RS:

Favorite tip for writing short fiction?

 

MCK:

Be clear about what you’re attempting to convey. Is your message vivid? Is it original, or cliché? Does it have what I call “ping”—immediacy and meaning? Sculpt it down to its quintessence. Stand back from it a day or two and see if you’ve said what you intended, and ask yourself if what you intended is worth the saying.

Tony Press

RS:

We’ve talked a few times about you writing your novel, and I know the process is stalled. What do you think keeps you from doing it? What do you think it is about short stories that you prefer or feel more comfortable with?

 

TP:

I keep telling people I’d love to have had finished my novel—excellent use of the past perfect tense, mind you, but I don’t seem to want to do what I need to do to actually finish it. I work in spurts (I always have, whether short stories, “the novel,” or poetry), but for this project, the spurts are not very close together. A writing mentor, Amber Dermont, once told me, when I’d described my vision, “The good news is, you have two novels here, maybe three.” She acknowledged my groaning reaction with yes, it could also be seen as “not so good” news!

 

Re: the novel…mostly I work on one of them, the key strand of the whole thing. Sometimes, I work on the second, and sometimes, actually, I mull the possibility of blending both into a single story. We shall see. It’ll probably end of being Strand #1—sounds fascinating, I bet. Ultimately, I need to decide (whichever route I take) whether I might have something to say, something will be of value—even if “mere entertainment”—for another person to read, and, indeed, for me to write.

 

Short stories do remain more accessible for me, and I’m still creating some, though not as frequently as I once did. That, too, could change. The challenge for me has always been to work “without the fever.” I sure do love a good story, though, whether short or long, whether I’ve written it or someone else has, or even whether it’s fiction or not—though I prefer fiction. I continue to quote Kesey’s Chief Broom (if the story is done well): “But it’s the truth, even if it didn’t happen.”

 

RS:

What themes do you find yourself writing about?

 

TP:

The themes I seek (or that seek me) relate to people changing, how it happens, and how the change affects them, as well as the people around them. I want to see characters learns, or realize, even if they themselves might not be able to put it into words. If I do my job, they shouldn’t need to do it for me.

 

RS:

Is there anything you would not be comfortable writing about?

 

TP:

No, I don’t think there is, topic-wise, but I do often realize, after the fact, that many/most of my stories are set in pre-internet times. It’s not that they are “mystery tales,” any of them, but I know that sometimes I’m thinking (as I write or read), “Well, couldn’t/wouldn’t this character just go online, or text, or do something like that, to answer that question?” And for my characters, most of the time I don’t want them to have that option—it feels “too easy” to me. Like writing/reading about a character’s dream—never! Never, never, never! I know, it’s simply my preference, but there it is. If I ever submit something that includes a character’s dream, then you’ll know I’ve been captured by ghostwriting killer hornets.

 

RS:

Best tip for short story writers?

 

TP:

This works for poets, too, and I do also write poetry…not as often, and probably not as well. I often claim, “I write stories when I have questions, and poems when I think I have answers. Thus, mostly fiction.”

 

I never leave the house without two pens in my pocket, and almost never, without a small notebook. You just never know what you might see, or hear, or think about, as you are walking. I’m a walker, too—“Keep walking” is a mantra for me, and I’ve come back into the house more than once, more than twice, almost rushing up the stairs, because I’ve overheard something, or seen something in a new way, and it (whatever the “it” is) demanding to be put on paper.

 

Also, whether it is a flash piece or a 25-page story, I do think the hardest thing is to know when to stop editing. Almost always, I think, a story can lose a few words…sometimes many more than just a few. When is it done, when is it done? I think Tobias Wolff wrote something like, “Well, it’s never done,” which is why a number of his stories, as they’ve been republished, are slightly different from the previous version. Speaking of him, he is a short story writer I greatly admire.  

 

Jim Gustafson

RS:

What are some of your favorite themes?

JG:

Confusion, in one way or another, seems always to be present. I write about aging, death, God, and weeds. Weeds keep creeping in. Sometimes they need to be pulled. Other times, they are allowed to stay, even if they clash with the other things growing on the page.

I am conscious, too, of the times in which we live. I remember a college professor saying to me, "Jim, the world is too much with you." I didn't realize that he was quoting Wordsworth. Now I do. It was the late sixties - civil rights and Vietnam were bring chaos to the street, as now.

I have long thought death brings meaning to what proceeds it. I have swung on the pendulum of belief my entire life. When I read my work, these themes seem to emerge, for better and, most often, for worse.

RS:

Do you ever write short stories?

JG:

Short stories are a challenge for me. I have written and published a few. I lack the patience it takes, or perhaps the better word is "discipline," to continually be in process. I have characters in my head. I even dream about them and write down what I recall. I have one story I have been working on for two years. I find some of the pieces show up in my poems.  

RS:

Is there anything you feel you do particularly well?

JG:

On occasion, I surprise myself with sound. John Logan said poetry is "ballet for the ear." I find great pleasure when my words connect in a dance to music.

RS:

What are some things you find difficult or uncomfortable to write about?

JG:

My challenge is digging deep. I have subjects within that refuse to come out. I know they are there, but they resist the page. I suspect shame, embarrassment, and guilt - real or false - keep me from finding the words. On the rare moments I pull such "weeds," I write my most satisfying pieces.

Another challenge for me is recurring patterns. Certain words, especially "in" keep sprinkling my poems. Revision, for me, always includes a search for unintended patterns. 

RS:

Favorite tip for writing poetry?

JG:

"Put your ass in the chair."