When did you first encounter poetry? How did you discover that you wanted to write poems?
As a child I first encountered poetry when I was given a Shel Silverstein book. Later in grade school I can remember an assignment of taking text from Macbeth and creating a found poem. This along with an Edgar Allen Poe seminar I took in grade school planted the seeds of a love of poetry and writing.
Do you have a writing routine? A favorite time or place to write?
I find my creativity flows best in the evenings when my mind is winding down and free from the confines of the day. I can get my thoughts out much clearer when I type. I’m often jotting thoughts down in the notes on my phone as it is always when I am walking, driving, or in the shower that the best ideas come to me.
Where do your poems most often “come from”—an image, a sound, a phrase, an idea?
Often something small, something finite I observe. As poets I think we are first and foremost observers. A phrase overheard, a plant, warm sheets fresh from the dryer, a slashed tire.
Which writers (living or dead) have influenced you the most?
Louise Gluck, Marie Howe, Anne Sexton all rock my poetry world. They have given me some of the most profound examples of how poetry captures ideas that are both universal to humanity and also deeply personal.
What excites you most about your new collection?
I am most excited about taking characters well known to many and giving them a new voice, new perspective and placing them in modern settings. One of the central ideas when I started this was how our thoughts work against us, not our environment. It is called Alone With Our Weapons because when alone with our thoughts, we become our own enemy. It started with one poem from Guinevere which I brought to the Salem Writer’s Group and was encouraged to keep going and write more. I am grateful for this encouragement which pushed me to explore further and dig deeper.
Guinevere Makes a Vision Board
I spent hours cutting at first
Watching the way the scissors caught the light
I see my life through the sharp mouth’s reflection
I tape the scissors to my hands
walk around the house like that for awhile
I spin my arms around in a circle –
knock all the contents of the dresser down
without a care for who will
put everything back in its place
The scissors remind me of Excalibur
become another phallic symbol
so I take them off
When I finally start gluing
It’s just shadows -a place to settle our thick
headed contempt for the truth
The dark suggestions of life take form
grow whiskers and a face
thick manes start to spill off the paper
There’s a mare and
a foal curled next to her
two stallions stare in the distance
Only I could tell they are stallions
the way they banded together
them against the world
Hannah Siciliano resides in Wilmington Massachusetts. She is a wife and mother to her beautiful daughter. She is a writer, actor, harry potter enthusiast, and yogi. Her work has been featured in The American Journal of Poetry, Mass Poetry’s Poem of the Moment, Soundings East, Twyckenham Notes, Ghost City Press, Incessant Pipe, Sweet A Literary Confection and others.