In The Field: Conversations With Our Contributors—Bryan Price

Where did the first spark of inspiration for ”Unidentified flying object” come from?

It’s hard to say now, but I think it has a lot to do with politics and history. I think it has to do with being disappointed with this country’s present and the future of this specific historical moment. Or maybe putting it into context with the rest of American history.

There’s a lot of level changes, with references of angels, helicopters and storms between trees and bushes and planetariums. What was the impetus for this yo-yo effect between the heavens and earth?

It’s a really perceptive question, but unfortunately I can’t account for those levels. I guess, things just happen in poems, levels, distances, directions. Sometimes out of incoherence, coherence.

Can you talk about how you chose the various images in your poem?

Yes, this goes back to the thing about history mentioned above. I haven’t workshopped very many poems, but I did workshop this one at a conference and the faculty member was very baffled by the allusions or references. And I think put off by their abstract or confusing nature. For context’s sake, I’ll mention here that I have a PhD in American history and teach it at the community college level, so these things are always kind of at the forefront of my mind. The bit about angels comes from James Madison (if men were angels, Fed. 51); Columbus, noted in his 1493 letter to the Spanish Monarchs, how he high-handedly took possession of islands by renaming them; the mention of parchment is in reference to the constitution; there is a history of minstrelsy in Stephen Foster’s music; the part about Wagner’s “Flight of the Valkyries” is an allusion to Apocalypse Now. I guess it’s all about this long legacy of conquest and brutality that seems, at this point, to be unstinting or never ending.

Without punctuation, this poem can be read in multiple ways, depending on where a reader pauses or places their own imaginary punctuation/breaths. What draws you to this phrasing? 

The punctuation question is a difficult one. In a way it’s just a habit I picked up, maybe like a rebellious tick, and I got very stubborn about it and kept at it. I think originally it had some theoretical purpose having to do with creating slippages, different interpretive frames, etc. But I’m not sure if putting a separate onus on the reader is necessarily a good idea.

What themes do you often write about?

I’m often drawn to the idea of dreams or dreamlike scenarios. Death comes up often, as does history and memory and nostalgia taken seriously (I wrote my dissertation on nostalgia). Shame as well, for some reason I like writing things that plumb the depths of my shame and humiliation.  

What books and authors are your favorites? What are you reading now?

My favorite writer is probably Roberto Bolaño. His book of poems The Unknown University is a little over-stuffed, but well worth it. There’s a line from his novel Amulet that I think about a lot: “Poetry shall not disappear. Its nonpower shall manifest itself in a different form.” Other poets I often turn to are James Tate, David Berman (and his band, the Silver Jews), C.D. Wright, John Ashbery (I’m reading The Tennis Court Oath now, very strange), and Diane Seuss, to name a few. In addition to the Ashbery, I’m also reading Lucy Sante’s book May the People be the Times right now and Austerlitz by W.G. Sebald, which I think can be read almost like an epic poem. It’s the kind of thing only a wizard or genius could write, very daunting.  

What are you working on currently?

There’s a lot of irons in the fire now. “Unidentified Flying Object” is from a manuscript of poems called More Poems about Birds, which is making the rounds currently (unsuccessfully so far, but who knows). I have a manuscript of prose poems called The Idiot. There’s a collection of stories, a novella, a chapbook of collage poems called The History of Letting Fragments Disappear. I’m always working on something.

Bryan D. Price is the author of A Plea for Secular Gods: Elegies (What Books, 2023). His stories and poems have appeared or are forthcoming in NOON Annual, Chicago Quarterly Review, EPOCH, DIALOGIST, and elsewhere. He lives in San Diego, California.