Interview with Caroline Johnson - Editor
1. What inspires you to write? From my youth, I spent a lot of time with myself and everybody in my small family read constantly. I think I get my inspirations by assimilating different thoughts in my head.
2. When did you first start writing poetry? I remember writing poetry at the age of ten, but more during my turbulent college years. Very long bus rides to college was helpful. I can assure you that they were quite bad. I had to give up poetry for more than twenty-five years after I came to the U. S. I have been writing consistently for the past eight years.
3. Which poets are among your favorites? I believe we love poems that we grow up with. My mother tongue is Bengali, although most of my education was in English. I had the great opportunity to appreciate poems in both languages. The Bengali poet, Jibanananda Das (1899 – 1954) is my most favorite poet. His inimitable style, both in terms of language and thought process, touches my core. Poems of Rabindranath Tagore, another famed Bengali poet, T. S. Elliot, and Keats are comfort poems for me. Among modern American poets, I like Kate Ryan and Billy Collins.
4. Have you published any of your poetry? If so, where? Small magazines, including Prairie Light Review, Rivulet, Moon Journal, ISPS web, and other Bengali/English magazines, published my poems. In 2010, I released a collection of my previously published poems as a chapbook, titled “Synchronicity: Poems.” I have no idea how 90% of them are sold already.
5. What is your advice to aspiring poets? I spend time with my thoughts placing them in a space of solitude, even when I am in the middle of chaotic work and family life. Accumulating new
knowledge is also important to me. Other aspiring poets may find practicing what I do useful.
6. Do you have any advice about how to get published? Submit as often as you can to magazines you respect.
7. Do you belong to any other writing group? Currently, I am the co-chair of the Naperville Writers Group. I also belong to a long-running Chicago area Bengali literary club called Unmeesh (Awakening). This group allows me to read and publishes my English writings. I also belong to a couple of informal groups. Writing groups are invaluable to me.
8. What are you working on now? I am working on a larger volume of poems, titled “Bathymetry: Poems”. I also write short stories and travel essays in between. Like many other writers, I have a novel simmering on the back burner.
9. Do you ever get 'writer's block'? How do you overcome this? Yes, I do get „writer‟s block‟, but not often. Sometimes, I switch to writing stories and essays. I do not journal, but often write cryptic notes. Old notes are great for curing „writer‟s block‟.
10. Do you write every day? How many hours a week? No, I do not write every day, but I do create poems in my head every day. I write whenever I can. As a loyalty to my writing groups, I often set deadlines to myself based on their meeting schedules.
THE ANT
“Smell the morning sunshine” says the ant,
“Spring is here. Let‟s go exploring.”
In cool breeze, I lay on my bed watching
her steady crawl up the leg of my pant.
Last night, I spied her on the banana plant
but refrained from fetching the killing spray.
Now, it has invaded my sacred territory,
defiant like me, a stubborn immigrant.
HELIOPAUSE
Released from a clever slingshot
Voyager I hurtles through space
fathoming the unfathomable,
measuring the immeasurable,
to its indeterminate destination
perhaps beyond the Heliopause—
the fierce boundary of stability
as solar wind and inter-stellar medium
build up their stubborn walls,
and die like a dot of dust,
just as I hurtle through this life
toward an incomprehensible
destination of death.
Is there a beyond?
--Bakul Banerjee
--Bakul Banerjee
