Jennifer Metsker

The Interview

The word “must” appears frequently in “Excerpts from The Exile.” Do you see this poem as a set of instructions for the reader? For yourself? Is art’s role to be reflective, prescriptive, or both? 

The must in this poem is definitely to be questioned. The speaker is meant to be some kind of omniscient figure who is telling the you (who is me or the reader) what life must be like, but the trick is, the omniscient figure is also only what I imagine omniscence to be like. So the musts represent the inevitabilities the you feels the omniscient figure has thrust upon them. It’s meant to be like a set of commandments, only ones that have been reverse-engineered. Because what can life be other than what it is?

I’m not sure this poem is taking a stand on art’s role at all, but I definitely think that art should be reflective, not prescriptive. It would be difficult to prescribe anything to anyone. If anything, this poem is meant to show how ridiculous it might be to prescribe how things must be. 

“You” and “I” both exist in the poem. “God” also exists in this text. What role does that god play? Is it more than “you” and “I” combined?

The manuscript this poem comes from explores the idea of what God is based on my experience with that heightened religiosity that is a symptom of mania and psychosis. So this God is an imagined one, for sure, definitely just a figment created by the I, who imagines God’s directives, but the I imagining this God feels oppressed by this presence nonetheless.  

“Excerpts” start with a reference to meaning-making and proceeds to demonstrate the many challenges in that pursuit, from our own ironic tendencies to the world’s resistance to scrutiny.  Is attempting to make meaning a responsibility, an opportunity, or a curse?

I think meaning making is all of those things! We can’t help doing it, which is what the poem is suggesting at the outset–it’s just how our brain’s evolved. So we need to do it–it’s our responsibility to understand what’s going on around us because we do participate in a world of humans and a culture, and it’s definitely an opportunity to understand ourselves and the world in more complex and accurate ways (as accurate as human intellect can achieve, anyway). But the curse comes in when meaning making become so overwhelming that it is difficult to just be in the world. As a person with a mental illness, hypersalience, or the need to make meaning out of everything, which causes one to see signs that are not there, factors into my experience when I am ill, but also when I am well. When I am well, though, it’s more like hypervigilance because I’m trying to understand sanity to a much more intense degree than someone who simply takes it for granted.

You explore spirituality and belief in so many unique ways, though you always sounds curious, never coming off as remotely didactic. How do you walk that delicate tightrope of discussing such passionate, divisive topics in ways that can resonate with anyone regardless of their background or faith (or lack thereof)?

I think because I really am just curious and also believe that spirituality is such a personal thing it would be impossible to try to force your own view on anyone else. The curiosity I have is really only about my own relationship with whatever God is to me. So my poetry is reflecting this search more than an idea of what spirituality is. I don’t know if I know what God is, honestly, and I don’t know what faith is, for sure. But it’s interesting that we have these things and it’s been a very intense part of my life in manic or psychotic episodes–God is a very complicated figure when you believe you might actually be God, or the converse, are being persecuted by God–and sometimes simultaneously in these episodes, which is strange. This changes your relationship to spirituality pretty much permanently, or at least it did for me.

You employ a multi-section structure for many of your poems. How do you feel that affects your work? Does it allow you to explore themes more thoroughly, perhaps from different angles and perspectives?

I would love to be able to write more single section shorter poems! But it’s just not that easy because once I get into an idea or start to explore a certain voice, I feel deeply compelled to keep expanding it. The title of my book includes the word hypergraphia because I actually do experience this state when I can’t stop writing. I was once told by a psychiatrist that I should never write because it would exacerbate my condition and induce a manic state. That didn’t stop me from writing, but I have to say he did have a point. It just felt imperative for me to write, so I tried to better manage my illness and try to control the effects writing can have on my brain–it doesn’t always work, but I’ve mostly got this managed. 

Finally, what are you working on now? Any projects on the horizon?

I’m working on revising a novel right now. It was inspired by the Florence syndrome, or Stendahl syndrome, which is a weird condition documented in Florence during which one  becomes manic or even psychotic from viewing too much art, particularly religious art. It’s actually a novel about suicide, though–that is the main topic. I’m also working on a textbook about my job, which might sound boring, but I love my job. I oversee the writing program at a research-based art school and have found really interesting ways to help creative people write about their practice. It’s a very different kind of writing, but to be honest, it’s also very grounding writing–I rarely have to worry about it carrying me away into the strange places that fiction and poetry do.