Robert Auld is a 21-year-old queer poet from Beverly, MA. He will be reading his poems this Saturday during a Benefit Show by Wanderlost Documentaries, ‘Voices From The Future’ at Club Cafe Boston from 1-4 pm. The Show— organized in spite of the recent political climate— seeks to bring about diverse and LGBTQ artists from around the Boston area. Bands Mint Green, The Sunset Kings, dance groups Paradise Lost and Lumanarium, and many other poets and artists are set to perform. The show is 18+, and the price is “suggested donation”. All proceeds go to BAGLY.
I interviewed Robbi over the phone during a storm on a gloomy Tuesday. We talked about poems, parents, politics and what it means to be queer today in Boston. His poems are stories of growth not only as a queer poet but also an emotionally driven voyeur. Auld is hell-bent to break out of his shell as he gracefully yet efficiently moves out into the world. Through romance, past friendships and new ones he is fervent in his approach to creativity, newness and craft.
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Chris Hughes:
Why and when did you start writing poetry?
Robert Auld:
It was right in the beginning of high school when I started writing poems. But I first got into poems… It was pretty morbid actually. I’m not sure if you remember there use to be a horrible sad bookstore at the liberty tree mall right by the food court and marshals, I think? It was super shitty ‘Walden books’ maybe. — Every time my family and I would go to the mall I would take off and go there.
The first book of I got was Sylvia Plath’s collected poems because it was cheapest and cos she killed herself in such a grisly way and then there was Anne sexton too. These were two influences when I was in middle school. I was always drawn to poetry but I didn’t find out until much later– if that makes sense. I was a weird kid— I had a fascination with Anne sexton putting on her mother’s fur coat and killing herself in her garage or Sylvia Plath because she put her head in the oven.
CH:
What does being a poet in Boston/ MA mean to you? Do any aspects of our environment enter your work more than others?
RA:
I felt very spoiled— there were always readings to go to — book signings at poetry stores. I think there is a history so there is a thriving scene here. It wasn’t hard to expose myself to music, literature and art, it all felt very available
As far as the environment goes — I love the ocean — I couldn’t live without the ocean, not staring into its abyss.
CH:
What does being a member of the LGBTQ community here mean to you and your art?
RA:
Connected to the last question: growing up and going to readings and concerts— exploring the scene in the city and surrounding area— I saw a lot of diversity the places I was going. It was very validating, encouraging and gave me a community where I could come out and be an individual.
I’d say I would identify myself as a queer poet. I am a queer person; everything I make has the same identity I do too. I don’t know— I think Boston is a great place to be an artist because there is an audience, I hope.
CH:
Tell me your thoughts on the election— the future, where we are going.
RA:
I was in the city on Saturday (the day of the Women’s March) I was in Harvard actually— I went to Lesley for a workshop and saw the marchers as they were leaving on the train. It was amazing to be on the train and be so sandwiched I couldn’t reach the overhead rails— I was just totally stuck among the protestors. It was really beautiful, to me, to see the amount of people that showed up. But people still must show up cos that is the most important thing; that artists still continue to work to bring together diverse communities that stand up to intolerance and corruption.
CH:
In the Poem Adhesion— you write ‘…to make a flag/ of myself, fag with guilty conscience,/ future of termination either/ way. Binary. Beaten out.’— Can you explain this a little more.
RA:
That poem was just published from sibling rivalry press— ‘If You Can Hear This’ its a whole anthology of protest poetry. I wrote this poem the week of the election. It was one of those poems I wrote I was very absent as I was writing it out.
As for the part you asked— I wanted to use the word ‘fag’ because its not a word that I’ve ever used in a poem before— or before at all in my daily language.
When I wrote this poem I just had a conversation with my family about Mike Pence— that part of our new administration wanted to own the word ‘fag’ — both of my parents voted for trump and they voted for someone who would call me a fag and wants to shock me or put me in conversion therapy me. I wanted to possess that word and have it, hold it and make it provocative.
CH:
Tell me about a few of your poems you’ve had published and where we can find them.
RA:
Yes, I have a poem coming out in the next issue of 30 North about my neighbor’s really annoying dog but she’s moving away so I guess the poems publication… I wrote it a few years ago… is a nice form of closure.
That poem Adhesion I am pretty proud of. It came out both in the new issue Assaracus one of the lit journals of sibling rivalry press and as an anthology. I submitted on a whim and it was accepted pretty fast. I feel as if it is one of those poems I feel proud of it but am reluctant to say that (laughing…). I did post it on Instagram though. Sometimes I like posting poems on Instagram— I think they are the true selfies in a way.
Here is Adhesion, which Auld may, or may not read this Saturday at Wanderlost’s ‘Voices From the Future’ benefit show for BAGLY.
ADHESION
I don’t get out of bed the day
before the election in America,
but dream of walking down a street
toward my old elementary school
where the curtain of the polling booth
draws itself behind me. I draw
a future for myself with a sleight
of hand, fingernails painted blue
for the occasion, to make a flag
of myself, fag with guilty conscience,
future of termination either
way. Binary. Beaten out.
The beating of eggs cracked
on the side of the counter,
making breakfast with my lover
the morning of November 8th 2016.
I often forget the eggs were
once alive, fork the yolk
to blur the image. I vote
from a similar blind side.
The blue nail polish briefly catches
the fluorescent light in the gymnasium.
The shimmer is delicious.
In its glare, I fill the box.
Adhesion was published by Sibling Rivalry Press in ‘If You Can Hear This: The Poems in Protest of an American Inauguration’ published simultaneously as Assaracus Issue 25, out now.