November Feature: Tyler Mills

We are excited to introduce Tyler Mills as our November Feature of the Month!

Tyler Mills is a poet, essayist, and editor who was born in Chicago and grew up in upstate New York. She holds degrees from Bucknell University (BA), the University of Maryland (MFA), and the University of Illinois-Chicago (PhD). She is the author of Tongue Lyre, winner of the 2011 Crab Orchard Series in Poetry First Book Award (SIU Press 2013). Tongue Lyre was fourth on The Believer’s “Readers Favorite Works of Poetry in 2013” list. Her poems have appeared in numerous publications, including The New Yorker, Poetry, Boston Review, and others. Her poems have also been featured on Poetry Daily and Verse Daily and have been anthologized in A Book of Scented Things, Best New Poets,Women Write Resistance, and (forthcoming) Best American Experimental Writing. A recipient of scholarships from the Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference and the Vermont Studio Center, her past appearances also include the Bethesda Writer’s Center, the Chicago Cultural Center, the Pitchfork Music Festival, the Southern Festival of Books, and the Stadler Center for Poetry. She is editor-in-chief of The Account: A Journal of Poetry, Prose, and Thought and Assistant Professor of English at New Mexico Highlands University in Las Vegas, New Mexico.

Below, read our exclusive interview, and read samples of her work on our homepage:

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Q (Tyler Tsay): I suppose we should start at the beginning: when and why did you start to write?

A (Tyler Mills): I can't remember a time when I wasn't writing. One of my early memories is of being so young (three?) that I couldn't use language well, so I babbled fake stories out of nonsense words that had the rhythm of real words and wrote them down in scribbles. It's funny, I remember knowing I wasn't using real language, but I still felt like the nonsense meant something. When I learned how to write, I would make little books out of construction paper and staples.

I always liked visual art, music, and theatre, so in high school I did all three. Then I focused the most on music. I went through a rural public school system before there were some major funding cuts to the arts in that district. We had a photo lab, a huge art space, a really great music program... Anyway, I ended up spending a year as a violin performance major in a music school before realizing that I wanted to do the work for my Gen Ed English courses much more than spend yet another hour perfecting that week's Etude. So I transferred universities and became an English major. That’s when I began focusing on my writing in a serious way. I think I answered your "when" question. As for your "why?" I don't know. It's a way I've always translated my impression of things into something I can either understand and analyze or hold at arm's length (or both).

Q: How do you think your studies in other media (visual art, music, and theatre) affected your work? Specifically, music and lyricism seem to play a large role in your most recent book, Tongue Lyre - and in a fair amount of your poems - even the poems on our Homepage reference muse and song right in their titles. [PS. I played cello for almost eight years before I got bored with the classical stuff and moved a little into improv/composition, so I can relate!]

A: Cheers to the string section! I still turn to the violin sometimes to help me think about a problem (though I'm not as good as I used to be!). A poem's music is in the cadence and rhythms of speech, and I'm thankful for the violin for helping me to hear that when I was writing my first book and in the work I’m doing now. Tongue Lyre was also inspired by the myth of Orpheus (and his lyre), and the violin for me becomes a kind of lyre in that book--my first, where I was testing out a lot of things. I think drawing and photography have helped me work on poetic imagery when I'm revising, and theatre has helped me think about the voice and persona.

Q: What does the element of myth or mythic language add to a poem, in your opinion? How do you begin writing a poem, generally (or broadly)?

A: I think myth provides a kind of form, or container, for the poem to explore. It can also showcase something new about the contemporary world in how the mythic (prior) story or information interacts with the new element. As for the writing process? Goodness. Often a poem begins with a detail, a fact, or an image I keep thinking about. I bring my work through many, many drafts, so sometimes where my poems start and where they end are very different.

Q: Are you ever afraid that you might lose something from draft to draft?

A: Sometimes I do lose things, good things, and I have to return to an earlier version and pick them back up again. I save everything so I can do this. I suppose that's part of my revision process. Sometimes, taking a poem through many, many revisions will help me write the ending, but then I'll need to go back to draft eight or nine to nail the beginning.

Q: Absolutely. I suppose the natural question is how do you know when a poem is “finished?” Is it when you send the poem out to the world?

A: These are good questions: I wish I had good answers! Each poem is different, and I try to be as patient as possible so I don't rush sending something out that isn't ready. Finishing a poem is like putting that last jigsaw piece into a puzzle that's all sky or leaves and is difficult to figure out. It clicks, and suddenly I know it's done.

Q: Definitely. To bring it back to a more personal note, tell us about your childhood, your family, and your upbringing. Are there any distinct images or ideas you like to draw from your background when writing?

A: My parents are visual artists, and so I think art making has always informed the way I think. The smell of wet paint always reminds me of home, wherever I am. I think that I look at things as though I'm drawing them sometimes, which then influences the way I work with imagery.

Q: How has your poetry changed and/or matured over the years?

A: I think I'm becoming more adventurous with form and its potential (working with adapted materials). And lately, I've been especially interested in what can be done with the poetic image--while retaining clarity--within the choices we can make with syntax. I was always interested in this, but lately, I think that's what I've been really aspiring to do.

Q: What are some goals you hope to accomplish in regards to writing, moving forward?

A: I'm working on an essay project now, and I'd like to dive more deeply into it. I've also finished my second poetry manuscript and am finding myself both excited and unnerved by the new poems I'm working on. I don't want to rush my thinking about it all because it's so new, which is why I'm being vague.

Q: Looking forward to it. Advice for our (predominantly young) audience?

A: I know that social media can be a big distraction, and there's immense pressure to publish. But also make sure you're turning away from all of that noise and really luxuriating in the creative process--which is yours and only yours! I'd also say to read widely, be open to chance (the book that leaps into your hands in a used bookstore), and respond to what you're drawn to by thinking about how it might guide your poems.

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