James O\u2019Bannon\u2019s poems \u201cNaming\u201d and \u201cDad Keeps Saying Pray About It\u201d were published in Mid-American Review Vol. XLI. In the spring of 2023, James agreed to answer a few questions by associate editor Christopher McCormick on his poetic work. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
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Your poem “Naming,\u201d\u00a0(after a poem by Diana Khoi Nguyen)\u00a0which appeared in Volume XLI of Mid-American Review,\u00a0utilizes\u00a0non-sequiturs and surrealistic elements, as in the unforgettable line \u201cIf there is a child who is dead there is a bird alive somewhere,\u201d yet a firm wisdom seems to underpin the entire poem. Can you tell our readers a little bit about what you sought to achieve with this piece?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u201cNaming\u201d is written after the poem \u201cGrief Logic\u201d by Diana Khoi Nguyen. In her brilliant poem, she utilizes hypothetical syllogisms to explore grief as well as other ideas. For \u201cNaming\u201d, I wanted to maintain the sense of logical leaping employed in Nguyen\u2019s poem, while using the image of a bird to symbolize a child in sort of a spiritual sense.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I found myself thinking about the language used in the death or incarceration of Black children\u00a0and how that differs from the language used with white children. Considering that dehumanization, I wanted a poem where Black children could exist\/stay alive in perpetuity, hence the \u201cIf the child stays alive\u201d line\u2019s repetition. Lastly, in all of my work where a god figure is mentioned, I think of it as a means to wrestle with an aspect of faith and hopefulness in a world that consistently contradicts those beliefs and antagonizes them.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n .<\/p>\n\n\n\n In your poem \u201cDad Keeps Saying Pray About It,\u201d you write \u201cI\u2019d like to live \/ in a world where there is a god \/ who calls my name.\u201d What role does religion and spirituality play in your writing?\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n In being raised in a Black, religious household, participation in church and other aspects of Christianity were expected. I went to Sunday School, Bible study, participated in sermons, etc. As a child, you are never really allowed to interrogate your inherited belief system. As I got older, I found myself questioning many of ideas I was taught. Christianity felt too idealistic to me, and it excluded too many people I loved. <\/p>\n\n\n\n In my writing, I see god as a figure\u00a0used to interrogate those difficult questions.Much of my poetry deals in the questioning\u00a0of how one could believe in not only a god-figure,\u00a0but a god that is unquestioningly good, when\u00a0so much of our world\u00a0fails us in so many ways.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n .<\/p>\n\n\n\n Your poem\u00a0\u201cand now the doctor asks if depression is a family,” published in Waxwing issue XVIII,\u00a0speaks on subjects such as race and self-love.\u00a0Can you talk about how those subjects have been an influence on your journey as a writer?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n \u200bI wouldn\u2019t really call my relationship to these ideas an influence. Race is definitely embodied in my writing because as a Black person in America, it is tied to every part of your being. You wake up Black, you breathe Black, you sleep Black. In this particular poem, I chose for the relationship between mental health and Blackness to be overt because of the ways it is stigmatized. There are so many negatives poured onto the waywe view the mental struggles of Black folks; even medically. So, I would say my goal in marrying these concepts would be to allow people to see the struggle I\u2019ve dealt with (and still deal with) in its most open and bare form, hopefully, as a means for people to embrace the humanity in that struggle. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" James O\u2019Bannon\u2019s poems \u201cNaming\u201d and \u201cDad Keeps Saying Pray About It\u201d were published in Mid-American Review Vol. XLI. 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