As weather on campus finally made it out of the negatives, The Gund’s Community Foundation Theater housed a dynamic reading and conversation on Monday to highlight the work of Robert P. Hubbard Assistant Professor of Poetry Michael Leong. After having workshopped my own poetry with Leong last semester, I was excited to see what both his older and newer poems focused on stylistically.
Audience members filed into their seats and, at precisely 4:15 p.m., William P. Rice Associate Professor of Literature Orchid Tierney stood and introduced her fellow creative writing colleague. “This reading isn’t sponsored by anyone except, you know, the love of poetry,” she began.
After introducing him, Tierney handed it off to Leong, who turned to the screen behind him, which displayed the vibrant cover of his 2012 poetry collection, Cutting Time with a Knife. Leong explained how he’d started writing the collection while he was supposed to be working on his dissertation and ended up spending nine months on the project before its publication. Before reading any of the poems, Leong admitted, “I like my first book, but there’s some cringe aspect to [it]. But nothing in [Cutting Time with a Knife] makes me cringe, which is nice.” He then explained that the newer works he would present had been written last semester, and enraptured students (myself included) and community members alike leaned forward to hear from the prolific professor.
As soon as his introduction had concluded, Leong began with the collection’s first page, which includes a line from T.S. Eliot’s “Tradition and the Individual Talent:” “The mind of the poet is the shred of platinum.” Cutting Time with a Knife is composed of poems that share a similar structure to Eliot’s phrase, with each poem including a symbol for one element on the periodic table along with a poetic line: “The heart of the poet is the honeycomb of Hydrogen,” the first selection read. “I wanted to kind of mess with Eliot,” Leong said as he explained the mimicry of the essay line. “[With] what I’m doing, my variations are just kind of absurd.”
Next, Leong turned to some newer work. The following seven pieces he read were abecedarians, meaning that each line of the poem started with the next letter of the alphabet. Leong titled this collection “The Notebooks of Aurora Bassoon Chrysanthemum,” a reference to the “alter ego” he created to serve as the mouthpiece of the poems. “I firmly believe in not asking my students to do stuff that I wouldn’t also do,” he noted after mentioning the fact that he’d practiced this form alongside his students in his Introduction to Poetry class last semester (of which I was a member!). While the abecedarians themselves never varied in length — all contained 26 lines for 26 letters — Leong’s expert use of diction, alliteration and imagery made each piece unique and engaging (I certainly learned a ton of new words). Leong read each piece carefully, and the room burst out in boisterous applause after the seventh poem was finished.
To end the reading, Leong opened the floor to questions from audience members, who asked about his writing process, his inspirations and the meaning behind his work. “I like the abecedarian form because the mnemonic function built into the structure was enough [so] that I could do one in my head at night. … I can also hold a little bit in my mind when I’m commuting,” Leong reflected on his formal choices. To a student wondering how he managed not to feel limited by such a strict form, Leong agreed, “I find myself stumbling at ‘K’ — so now that I’ve detected this, I started to compile ‘K’ words in my journal. … I just keep an inventory of words.”
Professor Leong’s experience in the writing world serves as a touchstone for the many developing poets on campus. As we try (and sometimes fail) to experiment with new forms, Leong’s dedication can inspire us to devote time to poetry, for both the love of the craft and for our own benefits as writers.