Poet of page, stage, and connection
A conversation with D.C. poet Alexa Patrick
by Gregory Luce
Alexa Patrick is a bright star in the firmament of D.C. area poetry. Originally from Connecticut, Alexa moved to Washington to attend American University, and remained here afterward, in the process becoming a noted poet, instructor, workshop leader—even a professional singer. Her first book, Remedies for Diappearing, was recently published by Haymarket Books. She will be giving the O.B. Hardison Reading at the Folger Shakespeare Library on October 21. We were very interested in learning more about this up-and-coming poet, and with the invaluable help of Colleen Kennedy, the Folger's Senior Communications Manager, I was able to catch up with her for a fascinating and illuminating conversation. Alexa had just returned from a writer’s retreat at Rosemary's House in Greece, facilitated by writers Safia Elhillo and Fatimah Asghar.
As we began speaking over Zoom, I was immediately engaged and charmed by Alexa’s forthright and warm manner, and the planned interview quickly became a conversation between poets.
WU: Alexa, thank you so much for agreeing to speak with us. Congratulations for being chosen to open this season’s Poetry Series. Can you tell us a little bit about what you’re planning for the reading?
AP: I'm planning on reading some work that I wrote as a young person coming up in D.C.'s poetry scene, as well as work from my debut poetry collection, Remedies for Disappearing, which was published by Haymarket Books, as well as some new things I've been working on. I think in general, my work tends toward creating an ode to D.C., an ode to the Black community specifically in D.C—to the kind of family that you can find in unexpected places, as well as ways that you can feel less lonely in the world. I speak a lot about what it was like for me to grow up in Connecticut, where I was oftentimes the only Black girl in my classrooms, and I often felt the only. And I think that a lot of people, regardless of what kind of demographic boxes they check, have felt like the only before. I think my work speaks to the only in ways that can help us all feel like a community together.
WU: That's wonderful to hear. I do feel that poetry is one of the best mediums for making that kind of connection, because we may have different versions of the language, but we all have language in common, and it's a way you can build some of those bridges. So this is kind of an obvious question, but I think a lot of people are interested in this, as I am. How did you actually get started in poetry? What prompted that?
AP: I've always been interested in poetry, though, you know, I started off mainly as a singer, as a musician. I come from a long line of musicians and performers, really. But I remember being in middle school, when YouTube was really popping off, and I would see these clips of Def Poetry Jam, which was a popular spoken word show on HBO. And my mind just exploded. I was like, wow, poetry can look like this, poetry can sound like this? This doesn't seem to align with the kind of poetry that I'm being taught is good, in school. It allowed me to see that poetry is really creating a language for yourself and you can figure out what that voice looks like and feels like, so that's really what opened me up. I didn't actually take it seriously until I was in college. I kind of sat on it, but I think I needed, first, to be independent in order to really step into it. I needed to be in a city, too, that allowed me access to different poetry communities. Not a lot of poetry slams and open mics in Madison, Connecticut. But D.C. has access not only to all these great colleges and poetry clubs, but also places like Busboys and Poets and events like Spit Dat, just a great poetry community. So first I would join as an audience member, then I started deciding, okay, maybe I'll step up and share more, and then from there I joined a slam team, started coaching the slam team, started volunteering at Split This Rock, started being a teaching artist at Split This Rock, started performing around D.C. more.
And then after that, it just kind of exploded.
WU: That's really interesting. It’s interesting, because I come from a very different generation, and I've been in D.C. for much longer than you, of course, but I think the progression you talked about is very typical. I was very glad you mentioned specifically the opportunities that the D.C. poetry community has given you. Having been a member of this community for such a long time, I am always emphasizing—perhaps I should say, preaching—to people there's no place like it anywhere else in the country, as far as I know. But to go back to how you got started, one of the things I also found really fascinating was the fact that you came to poetry more through the performance side rather than the written/page side. And I think that may not be very unusual for a lot of younger poets today. Who were some of your influences? Who really affected you and made you think you could have your own voice?
AP: Going through the school system, one often can feel a little bit alienated because poets look a certain way, poets sound a certain way, and I think that performance poets, because oftentimes they're not allowed in those institutions, tend to move towards performance spaces.
And so that actually makes their work more accessible, which is fantastic. I also think what that means is that the folks who inspire you are oftentimes your peers. It's not like someone who died 200 years ago, it's someone who you can walk by on the street. I wouldn't be a poet if it weren't for Pages Matam, who was a D.C. poet legend who I think is now in LA. They were the ones who reached out to me and said you should join this slam team, and I know they have done that same thing for a lot of different young poets in the area.
I am also super inspired by Morgan Parker, who is just a fantastic, beautiful poet, who also speaks to Black girl onlyhood. I see much of myself in her.
I'll also say Toi Dericotte. She's one of the co-founders of Cave Canem, and she's incredible. Though we're not part of the same generation, I hope that I am in her lineage, you know.
WU: I've read Morgan Parker. I have that book, Magical Negro, which I think is fabulous.
AP: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah!
WU: I remember there's a poem where she mentions Charlie Parker, who I don't think she's actually related to, but since I write a lot about music, especially jazz, that one really resonated for me.
But moving on, in addition to your many other accomplishments, you are an educator. Could you tell us more about that part of your career?
AP: For sure. I think that one of the important parts of being an artist is also to be an educator and a student at the same time. It allows you to make a living as an artist. Many people say they don't want to be a starving artist, but you can perform AND you can teach…, there's so many different ways that you can work within the arts. Also, embedded in the nature of spoken word poetry and slam is a kind of mentorship. You always have a coach and as you grow in the slam space, you become a coach, In the slam space, I realized that not only do I think I do a good job at working with and teaching younger people, but I think that there's a kind of obligation to it. How do you make sure that you are setting younger generations up for success, so that they have an easier time than you did when you were coming up? My first experience being a teacher was being a slam coach, and then, a teaching artist with Split This Rock. I was also an instructor at this arts program at Wesleyan University called Center for Creative Youth. I am a product of that program as well. I came up through the music area, but returned as a writer.
Since then I have been invited into some really exciting spaces. I was an adjunct professor at the University at the District of Columbia, as well as being invited to do one-off workshops for various organizations, like Meta (Facebook), and Microsoft. I think that at its core, poetry—I described it as a portal before—it truly is a portal into all of these unexpected places where you can work with people and use poetry as a means to help them connect with themselves and with the people around them.
Right now, I am the Programs Director for an organization called Shout Mouse Press. We work with young people from marginalized communities, specifically, to help them write and publish books.I always want to make sure that I have a mentorship, educator, or youth worker element to the work that I do.
WU: Poetry predates actual written literacy. It was a way for cultures to transmit their history and that sort of thing, so the fact that there are a lot of performers who are also poets, or poets who perform … I mean, it's almost like there's not a clear distinction.
AP: For a while, there was that debate of page versus stage, and it doesn't really exist. As a poet, I think that you should do a good job of reading your work, you can read your work to be felt. And if you are doing that successfully, it can come off as, oh, well, this is spoken word poetry, But it's just reading your work in a way that relays the feeling of it. And then music is the same thing.
I also may be biased, but I truly believe that poets can do anything. So often you see people who started off in poetry becoming popular musicians, actors, screenwriters. It's a malleable art that can allow you to fit in a lot of really dope things.
WU: That's very true, and I really appreciate that. I myself have moved from—not moved from, I'm still a poet first—but in my case, what poetry has opened up for me is the possibility of writing what's called creative nonfiction, memoir. It's opened up all these prose possibilities for me, because I think a poet obviously has to be really good with language, and it translates very well into prose. Probably better than the other way around. Not to … not to get into a fight, but ...
AP: Let's start it, Gregory. Let's do it!
WU: Yeah, yeah! I looked at your website, and I was really impressed by all the things that I saw you were doing. Have you written much prose?
AP: It's actually interesting. The first time I was published was a personal essay. It was published in CRWN Magazine, which was really unexpected, because I never described myself as that kind of writer. That said, I had a story I wanted to share and that genre was the best vehicle for it. Right now, I'm actually working on a novel-in-verse. I’m trying to merge my poetry with narrative, and it's been really fun. I just got back from this writing residency in Greece, which was amazing, where I got to work with Fatimah Asghar and Safia Elhillo, and alongside some other really dope writers, to get some feedback on the first few pages, and I'm really hoping to finish that this year.
WU: I too have been a teaching artist, working not just with poets, but with young people who are trying to write stories, or create some forms of self-expression, and one thing you didn't mention—but it's obvious from your manner, as you were talking about it—is the sheer joy of working with younger people. I'm sure you've had that experience countless times.
AP: Of course, of course, and I'm actually going to say that I think one of the benefits of writing a novel-in-verse is that it is more accessible to younger people. I think young people eat it up, and so the novel that I'm working on right now is a young adult novel, so I'm excited to do that, and I think that that's also why The Poet X blew up so much, and Brown Girl Dreaming, and Jason Reynolds and his books as well. Working with young people, there is such a joy to it. A lot of times, people will talk about young people being our future, but I often say that they're not the future, they are the present. They are what's happening right now, they are truly on the front lines of all these movements for social justice. They are innovators of language, of music, of art, and so I think it is important and so I think it is important to have young people in your life, not just to make sure that you are making the world a better place for them to live in, but also so that you can continue to stay connected to the world, so that you don't feel like … I'm an adult, I know more than this person. It allows you, again, to be a student of them and see what it is that they're seeing.
WU: That's one of the things that I have been absolutely amazed by.
AP: You know, we don't know everything just because we're older. There are so many young people whose voices are completely overlooked.
WU: I've had the great fortune to be able to go into classrooms, especially middle school, where they're really at that pivotal developmental stage, and everyone has something to say. And they just need somebody to listen and encourage them.
AP: Yeah!
WU: I'm talking about my work with 826DC. We don't worry about—of course grammar and good spelling and all those things are important—but that comes at the end. So, it's interesting what you say. It's such a joy. Some of my reasons for doing it are very selfish. I just love doing it. And you're right, I think it does keep us connected.
But moving along, you did allude to this briefly, but how did you actually come to D.C.? I know you were looking for different kinds of communities, but what was the move that actually got you here?
AP: College. I went to American University, and I knew I wanted to go to college in a city, so it was between D.C. and New York, and here we are. Now that I think about it, like you were saying before, there is no other literary city like D.C., and I agree. I've been here for 13 years now, and, you know, I'm not sick of it. I feel like I'm still learning so much. There’s so much diversity and you have access to so many different things. A lot of people think, oh, well, D.C., it's just politics, but there's a really vibrant, full cultural underbelly that a lot of people actually don't see. So, I've been really, really enjoying my time here.
WU: That's great. As, you know, our host for this conversation represents one of those institutions you talk about. The Folger is an absolute treasure. It's the sort of place that, in most countries, would be in the leading cultural city, like Paris or London. Washington is very underrated in that regard.
AP: Yeah, and it's funny, because, think about all of the famous writers that live in D.C. right now. We have all these National Book Award winners, all these New York Times bestsellers who are just walking around the streets, and there is a reason for that, because it's a good place for us to exist. I'll also say that I think with D.C. in particular, because of where we are situated on a map, we have a kind of East Coast energy and hunger, but we do have a Southern warmth as well that makes it feel more communal. So it's like, okay, well, we can actually collaborate, rather than compete with each other, and that is such a joy.
WU: It's really interesting that you mentioned specifically the Southernness of D.C., because I'm from Texas, and have roots that go into Louisiana and Tennessee, and I feel very comfortable here. I think maybe sometimes people from outside the South are surprised that D.C. thrives the way it does.
AP: It's so funny because coming from Connecticut, this is the South to me. First time coming here and hearing Washingtonians speak I was like, Y'all have accents?
WU: I think people are really surprised when they get here, and it's not some kind of cultural backwater, it's not just a bunch of statues. Maybe people know about the famous museums, but there's something to do almost every night, or every day, every weekend, no matter what time of year it is. And those of us who have been here for a long time consider ourselves like natives.
You've been here long enough. You can start calling yourself a Washingtonian.
AP: Well, I wouldn't dare, I get scared to do that, but yes.
WU: So, are you working on anything else, even maybe outside of poetry, like recording music or performing music? What other kinds of events might you have coming up?
AP: It's actually pretty wild. As my debut book was coming out, I was actually playing the lead in an opera that was directed by Bill T. Jones. I sing non-operatically, but they needed someone who could sing non-operatically and then also do a kind of spoken word performance. I was performing in the Pittsburgh Opera for about a month. Then, two weeks after that, my book came out. There's always a kind of braided nature to my art, but because I spent a year touring and pushing this book, my music has since taken a bit of a backseat. I'm now just coming out of that. I have started singing, with a jazz band, and will do little spots here and there. I find that, if I practice doing what I love and if it feels mission-aligned, then the positive opportunities always come, so we'll see what's next.
Alexa will appear at the Folger Shakespeare Library's O.B. Hardison Reading on October 21. Visit her website at https://www.alexapatrick.com/ to learn more about her and all her activities. And buy her debut poetry collection, Remedies for Diappearing, from Bookshop.
Alexa Patrick is a singer, poet, and educator from Madison, Connecticut. Now living in Washington, D.C., she holds fellowships from Cave Canem, Obsidian, The Watering Hole, and the DC Commission on the Arts and Humanities. Alexa has held teaching positions through Split This Rock, The University of the District of Columbia, and the Center for Creative Youth at Wesleyan University. https://www.alexapatrick.com/
Gregory Luce is the co-founder and poetry editor of Washington Unbound. He has published six chapbooks. He lives in Arlington and serves as Poetry Editor of The Mid-Atlantic Review and writes a monthly column for the online arts journal Scene4.
