Lauren Camp has been the New Mexico Poet Laureate for the past three years and the author of eight books of poetry. In 2022, she was chosen as the fourth Astronomer-in-Residence at Grand Canyon National Park, which inspired her latest book of poetry, “In Old Sky”. Friday night at 7:30, she will be reading her poetry as part of NMSU’s Nelson-Boswell Reading Series in the CMI Theatre inside Milton Hall. Scott Brocato spoke with Lauren Camp about her work.
Scott Brocato:
Let's start with your origin story. As a poet, you came to poetry when you were a visual artist, correct?
Lauren Camp:
That is pretty much correct, yeah, I was making visual art, and primarily what I was making was portraits of jazz musicians and miscellaneous other abstract, more abstract art. When the series of jazz musician portraits started traveling, one of the venues that it traveled to, somebody came up at a solo exhibit and said, “I know you made the art. Who wrote the poems?” And I looked around the room and didn't see any poems and told the person that. And the visitor to the show said, “No, these are poems,” and took me around and pointed out the wall text that was beside the artwork which I had written. And so then I had to start figuring out, well, what is a poem? I thought I knew, and I guess I didn't.
Scott Brocato:
So you didn't have any affinity for poetry before you became an artist, like when you were even younger?
Lauren Camp:
Oh, I did, sort of. I mean, my mother and grandmother would task me with writing very rhymey poems for people's occasions like birthdays, anniversaries. They were very metered, they were in very much like a 4/4 rhythm, almost. And that's what I thought poetry was. I thought it was Shel Silverstein and Dr. Seuss and James Whitcomb Riley, and not much else.
Scott Brocato:
You mentioned your portraits of jazz musicians. How does music inform your poetry?
Lauren Camp:
Well, I spent a long time in the grip, really, of jazz music in general. And learning about it, part of that research or learning was being on the radio and hosting and producing a show for Santa Fe Public Radio. And that was a way to both share the music, but also to learn more about. And so I had my ears very full of jazz music, and the ways that I could blend from one particular era of jazz into another or into some world music. And also in that same show, I was voicing contemporary poems, and so really just listening to sound and the mesh or friction of words and chords. It informs my poetry in so many ways because when I started writing poetry, I transferred all of that sort of intuitive knowledge into what I wanted from my poems, and even from an individual line of one of my poems.
Scott Brocato:
You're originally from New York?
Lauren Camp:
That's right.
Scott Brocato:
You mentioned working at Santa Fe Public Radio. How and when did you end up in New Mexico?
Lauren Camp:
I got here in 1994 on a whim, entirely. I was living in Northern California, and had decided I was done there for various reasons and quit my job. And I was engaged and I drove through the southwest, really, on a two-month camping trip with my soon-to-be husband, and we were just looking for a place to live. I’d never been in the southwest before, anywhere. And I drove into New Mexico, drove up from I-25 from Albuquerque--which I had decided wasn't quite right--into the outskirts of Santa Fe and said, “OK, here. I'm going to be here.” And it just felt like both otherworldly and like, a good place that would be home.
Scott Brocato:
You’ve been the New Mexico Poet Laureate since 2022. Tell me what the process is like that you went through to become a Poet Laureate.
Lauren Camp:
Well, there's an application process, which involved letters of recommendation and a writing sample and a project description and an interview. I think there was maybe another part or two. It was a whole elaborate application, at the end of which I got very good news in summer of 2022 that I had been selected for this incredible role to represent New Mexico and bring poetry and people, New Mexico residents together.
Scott Brocato:
Your latest book of poetry is called “In Old Sky”. It grew out of your experience as an astronomer-in-residence at Grand Canyon National Park. How did you become an astronomer-in-residence, first of all?
Lauren Camp:
I applied for that too. (Laughs) That's how these things go. I'm not an astonomer. So it was a very interesting call that I would not have applied to if it didn't also say writers, or maybe specifically poets, could apply. So I ended up being the fourth astronomer-in-residence at the Grand Canyon, which was an unbelievable experience of being at the Canyon for a month, right at the rim, at the south rim, looking over and into the Canyon and having the possibility of studying the night skies, basically, early morning and night, over and over. And it's very rare that anybody traveling gets to really settle into a place in that way. But it was so inspiring to me and such a challenge to figure out how to describe, not just the Canyon--which is in itself an extraordinary wonder--but also the history of the cosmos, which I could see across and over the Canyon, or feel in some ways.
So how was I going to do that? I wrote all month. I wrote a lot, and at the end a couple months later, Grand Canyon Conservancy, the nonprofit arm of Grand Canyon National Park, offered to publish a book of those poems.
Scott Brocato:
I assume you'll be reading from "In Old Sky” Friday night when you will be here at NMSU for the Nelson-Boswell Reading Series. What else can we expect Friday night?
Lauren Camp:
I'm going to read from my four most recent books. Why not? I thought I would offer a little taste of what I've been doing over the course of the last, probably five years or so. So starting with "Took House”, which came out during the pandemic, and then the three more recent books which came out all in about an 11-month period.
Scott Brocato:
Could you read one of your poems for us and set it up?
Lauren Camp:
Sure, I'd be glad to. I think I'll read you the very first poem in “In Old Sky”, which is the book about Grand Canyon and the night skies:
I've Been Learning The Best Nights
Growing up, I was interested in the gravity
of our small backyard slide,
climb and drop into Earth.
Ladder. Orbital cycle. Around me an algorithm
of trees and the small stipple of suburbs.
I gathered my matter in the
slipping terrain. At the Grand Canyon that first night,
the atmosphere boiled in its handiwork.
Shallow wavelengths altered umbra and silver.
The bees strew about
in their soft bulk,
and I went with them, went
everywhere, looping petals, tying
every flickering, every fact, the whole galaxy to another.
Scott Brocato:
That's beautiful.
A final question: can you talk about the New Mexico Epic Poem Project?
Lauren Camp:
Oh, I would love to! I’m glad you asked that.
So that is the project for my Poet Laureate term. It's a major undertaking on my part and the part of my partner organization, New Mexico Art. And we are traveling to as many counties in New Mexico as we can possibly get to during my term. There are 33 counties in the state, and it's a big state geographically, the fifth biggest in the country. Hopefully by the time my term ends, we will have made it to 29 of them. We've already been to Las Cruces; we had a wonderful turnout there.
It involves talking about poetry, a chance for communities to have a bit of an open mic, and for residents of each community to get to be up in front of each other and us and share some of their work. But also the chance for these communities to begin to respond to prompts I give them that will move towards building a community poem for each community. I've already created the Las Cruces community poem from responses we got from the turnout we had, and those poems that we are making from across the state will be printed as beautiful letterpress broadsides by the historic Palace Press at the Palace of the Governors, and then one of those broadsides will be gifted back to each community.
The poems are just the words of the community members. They are not my words. So it makes it really easy for me to say, those poems, each one, is unique and feels very appropriate to those communities. And really, I mean I can enthuse wholeheartedly about the poems. They are gorgeous and really showcase each community. And then hopefully the poems will be gathered into a book. We’re talking about doing that at the end of the term. It'll come probably after my term is over. But it's a very exciting project that has involved thousands of miles on the road, meeting lots of extraordinary people, getting to immerse in different communities around the state for at least little bits over the course of the past couple of years.
Scott Brocato:
Well, we're looking forward to you returning to Las Cruces Friday night to read your poetry at NMSU, Milton Hall, 7:30 PM, part of the Nelson-Boswell Reading Series, Lauren Camp, New Mexico Poet Laureate, thanks for talking with KRWG Public Media.
Lauren Camp:
Thank you so much. It’s been a pleasure.
