Excursions – by Ceridwen Hall

Just released by Trainwreck Press

Ceridwen Hall breaks new ground in Excursions, her second collection of poetry. This book has the lingering gaze that we met in Automotive only here it focuses on the scene, the observer, and the complications of definition. These poems seem to relish the freedom afforded by white space. They flow into each other and their fluid sonics massage your jangled mind. You come away with a soft grin. No, you are not alone. New discoveries await.

Hall likes to put disparate entities next to each other; like reading and rivers or fog and the future.

In “Current,” she reminds us that, “An island begins when a / fallen tree catches on a rock, stray matter in its lee.” Then “Sights” points out that “all tourists are children.” And vacations can be disorienting: “Because it’s Monday, I keep assuming I’m dreaming.”

“Navigation” explains why it always takes longer to hike out than to return as “an unwalked route is always longer.” It offers good advice to any writer, “Refrain from attempts to chart or transpose purpose.” Then there’s a delightful trick in store: “how neat and convenient the arc / of problem to solution isn’t. These lines set us up to celebrate the tidiness of life and our efficacious problem-solving. But that’s just hubris. With a sly grin, “isn’t” pulls the rug out. The party continues with a nod to “the dog’s unstoried joy of impulse/routine.”

“Holiday” turns us into underground “windowghosts” and advises that “the trick is to cross wrists with your future and spin / until a past diverges or coheres.”

This book is full of splendid moves like these, which we can revisit with pleasure over and again.

You can buy this book at The King’s English Bookstore.

Author Interview

Ceridwen and I met by phone to talk about the story of Excursions, her writing practice, and projects she’s working on now. Our conversation is edited to make us sound smarter.

A: What is the relationship between Excursions and your first book of poetry, Automotive? [Reviewed on this blog January 21, 2021].

C: This one’s different. It’s mostly a matter of form. I was in yoga class and my teacher encouraged us to use the entire mat in extra wide postures and forward and back movements, circles that got bigger and bigger. So in this book, I asked What happens if I use the entire page? So these are bigger across the page poems.

A: I see what you mean. The moves in these poems reflect a greater expansivity.

C: Yes. They’re also about exploring the world; exploring the page.

A: I love it when form and content converge like that. And this sets up my next question really well. Would you tell me the story of this book? Did it grow out of your interest in expansive forms?

C: I think so; also from asking myself questions about how narrative and travel work – how a trip of any kind: going to the grocery store or in a pilgrimage has its own narrative. There’s a beginning, change occurs, and then the ending. This came out of my interest in exploring the relationship between stories and travel.

A: You know, I think this is a favorite move of yours. You juxtapose disparate concepts and the result is magical.

C: Yeah. That’s how my brain makes sense of the world. I find two things that are alike and unlike and explore where they meet and where they fall apart.

A: I see this especially clearly in “Departure,” the poem where you juxtapose language and a car.

C: It’s a poem about language and a car; how both move through time and space.

A: I love the last line, “Mirrors tilt.”

C: That was a very late revision. For a couple of years this poem had a different ending but it never felt finished. Then I reached back for an image and that’s where mirrors tilt came from.

A: Did it just click?

C: That was the last change and I knew it was finished.

A: When did this book start to be a book?

C: This is in some ways older than Automotive. I started writing these poems towards the end of my MFA at U of Illinois. Afterwards I taught there for a year and I brought my poems to my professors there, Brigit Kelly and Mike Madonick. The poems were much longer and I wondered whether they were poems or wannabe chapters of a story. They had me read each poem out loud and said “Keep experimenting see what you get.” Back and forth this way.

Then I had some time over the summer before grad school in Utah. I had this stack of poems and I thought, “Oh, let me shuffle this stack around.” But then I got busy and didn’t feel like this would be my thesis. I stopped working on these and for a while there was this stack of poems sitting around virtually on my desktop.

I felt like I learned from Automotive that it’s really helpful to write a chapbook alongside a full length manuscript because you can put the poems next to each other and compare them. I had this stack of poems and I thought, “Let me see what happens when I hone these poems as a unit and then I can have two manuscripts to play off each other at the same time.

A: Some writers like to juggle and others work on one thing only until it’s done. Were you juggling these two manuscripts?

C: I didn’t have both of them open in the computer at once. It was more like, “Today I’m going to work on this manuscript and not think about the other.” And then I would be going about life and thinking about those manuscripts and “Oh! This poem belongs in the other manuscript.” Or, the problem is XYZ. I could compare them.

A: So ideas didn’t intrude?

C: I designated writing time for each one.

A: Within Excursions the poems seem to speak to each other.

C: Yes. As I assembled the book I was thinking about recurring images, how far apart some poems should be, different patterns with sounds or visually what’s happening on the page.

A: How did you find your publisher, Trainwreck Press?

C: I read a poem on Poem-a-Day that I really liked. It was not totally dissimilar to my work. Then I saw the author had published with Trainwreck. So I Googled Trainwreck and submitted to them. I expected to wait a long time but heard back within a week. I was sure it was rejection. But it wasn’t.

A: Exciting! And how was it working with them?

C: Really nice. They allowed me to make final changes, gave me a couple of options for font, dealt with my unique formatting needs. They gave me a couple of choices because the poems take up take up so much space. The issue was how much to let the letters breathe while still keeping the book compact and visually sharp. To me this signaled … freedom. I made a couple of changes at the proofing stage.

The day pre-orders started they said, “Here’s your cover!” It’s the kind of cover I would have chosen. I had envisioned something with a map or compass but didn’t have a specific image. Somehow I telegraphed enough that it got picked for me.

A: Neat. And how was the launch? I hated to miss it.

C: It was fine. I kept it small and just read some poems, a couple of new ones. In retrospect I probably would not schedule on a Super Bowl weekend.

A: One of my favorite poems is “Current.” Here’s a line: “our early stories were sounds, so is the river.” Then it ends with the beginning of an island. I think this is a move we saw in Automotive, ending with a beginning.

C: I’m not sure where that poem comes from. I love The Wind and the Willows, It was one of the first books read aloud to me and the first one I read myself. So that set me up to see a permanent connection between the watery outdoors and reading.

A: There’s no island in The Wind and the Willows.

C: No, but my family took a lot of vacations on or beside rivers and I just love how a tiny rock becomes an island in the middle of the creek. My siblings and I used to go out in a river and find our own special island. The three of us could share a big one but we were obsessed with the baby islands you could claim for yourself.

A: I think you said you fought over them?

C: You can only fit one person on a baby island.

A: Who usually won?

C: It wasn’t fighting-fighting. It was more like arguing. We’d each find our own island and claim it, defend it.

A: I bet your parents enjoyed watching you. Then there’s the poem, “Sights” – so complex and layered. “The water below is both audience and cast.” And the bridges. And I love the observation, “Because it’s Monday I keep assuming I’m dreaming,” So often this happens when we travel. And you bring out the absurdity of this experience! “It must be San Francisco.

C: Yes. My mom, sister and I took long weekend there.

A: Did you write it there?

C: I took notes in my journal and wrote it shortly after getting back.

A: Your journal?

C: I go everywhere with a journal.

A: What does it look like?

C: It’s just a journal. At home I’m devoted to large moleskin. When I’m travelling, I’ll take anything with me, whatever fits in my bag.

A: Have you ever lost a journal?

C: Not while travelling. I’ve temporarily misplaced them at home and have always found them eventually.

A: Do you panic?

C: No because I know they haven’t left the building.

A: Does each trip have its own journal?

C: Sometimes. It depends on how long the trip is and whether I have temporarily misplaced the journal I used last time.

A: Do you save them?

C: Yes in a box in a closet.

A: In “Holidays” one line caught my attention,” The trick is to cross wrists with your future and spin until a past diverges or coheres.” Gorgeous. Have you ever done this?

C: Yes. I have crossed wrists and spun with another person but not with the actual future.

A: Why cross wrists?

C: We used to do this in middle school, wanting to get dizzy. I wrote this about a trip I took with some college friends. It was New Year’s and none of us could see the future.

A: Wonderful. What else are you up to these days?

C: I’m doing a bit of editing and I’m now a certified book coach. I went through a great –certification program through Author Accelerator and am now helping people plan and revise novels in ways that really invite them to dig deep and take creative risks while at the same time thinking in a clear eyed way about how they will market the book and who is the audience. We address pragmatic aspects as well as creative cheerleading and inspiration. It’s a little like having a writing group.

I went through a PhD program and still found the practical aspects challenging. This certificate program really forced me to consolidate those skills.

A: Do you have a website?

C: Yes, it’s www.ceridwenhall.com

A: What’s next?

C: I’m still figuring that out. I’m sending my [PhD] thesis out and it’s been a finalist a number of times not yet picked up… And I’m working on a manuscript called School for Danger after a 1945 movie produced by British Royal Airforce about spies in occupied France. It explores how being a student is like being a spy in the sense that you’re seeking info and you kind of have a persona. Students become a different version of themselves than they are at home. That’s like being a spy.

A: And for fun?

C: I’m taking a pottery class. I needed something to get me out into the world interacting with people, somewhat creative but not with words.