Geist.com recently caught up with the poet

who is a family physician in Seattle, and was a founding editor
of Floating Bridge Press. Peter
Pereira will be offering a workshop “Line Breaks/Line Endings: A workshop
on the poetic line” on Saturday October the 10
as well as reading at the

. Peter
offered up one of his poems that show his playfulness and attention to line
breaks, and we asked him a few questions on poetry, line breaks and his work.

Anagrammer #2

I'm interested in the space between
detonation and denotation.

I'm curious how things move
from ignored to eroding,
and from eroding to redoing.

How it is we make danger
into garden and
words into worlds.

So much depends
upon a letter lost or gained.
How we choose to parse
a phrase, spare
or spear a thought.

I want to know
how demotion leads to devotion
and poverty to poetry.

How we find the g
that makes enraged engaged.

How we know
whether to flee
or feel.

Geist.com: What
interested you about doing a cross-border reading?

Peter Pereira: I love coming to Vancouver. It's so close to
Seattle, but it really feels like coming to another country. The mix of
cultures and languages is so stimulating. And it's great to meet some of the
writers north of the border.

G: Have you
noticed any similarities or differences in teaching poetry and teaching personal
health as a family physician?

PP: Poetry and Medicine are actually very similar
pursuits: they both depend upon careful listening, careful observation, an
ability to dwell in uncertainties, to suspend one's disbelief, and to really
open yourself up to another person's story or life, another realm of
experience. One quote that I like to share with student doctors is "A
history is not obtained, it is received." Being a good writer, or a good
doctor, both start with empathy, for your patient or for your
subject.

G: Your upcoming
workshop focuses on poetry versus prose and line breaks. What interested you
about focusing specifically on line breaks?

PP: Probably one of the most essential differences
between poetry and prose is the line breaks. Especially in free verse poetry,
the pauses at the end of lines, and between stanzas, are one of the most subtle
and nuanced ways of adding moments of suspension, multiple readings, changes
of tone and pace and voice, into a poem. The exercise that is planned for the
workshop is really fun: I use a well known poem to show may possible ways
one could have broken the lines, and then participants get a chance to
experiment on another poem.

G: What are your
thoughts on the current state of poetry? Fading, dead, flourishing, ready for a
re-birth?

PP: I agree with the great poet and editor Sam
Hamill, who once said he believed that we are in a Golden Age of poetry,
similar to the Tang Dynasty poets of China. There is so much good writing
going on, not just in America, but all over the world. There is
everything from personal lyric and historical narrative and formal poetry, to
language poetry and non-conceptual poetry and flarf. There are books of
poems from doctors, Iraq war veterans, and ex-mutual fund managers. Hundreds of
years from now people are going to be looking back and saying, wow --
what an abundance of riches here.

G: What do you
consider one of the modern "must reads" for poets?

PP: I couldn't give you just one! Heather
McHugh has always been a favourite, I love her humor and wordplay. She just won
a MacArthur and has a new book coming out called "Upgraded to
Serious" that I can hardly wait to see. And then there are the three
Wrights: CD Wright, Charles Wright and Franz Wright, who have no relation and
are all quite different poets, each doing some amazing stuff. Louise
Gluck has always been a favourite of mine, and I believe Carolyn Forche has a
new book soon too. Regarding newer younger poets: there is a lot
of really fun experimental and challenging work happening: Ben Lerner,
Paul Guest, Michael and Mathew Dickman (twin brother poets), Olyna Katiak
Davis, and others.

Peter Pereira’s most recent book What’s Written on the Body (Copper Canyon 2007) was a finalist
for the Washington State Book Award. You can find out more by visiting his

website. Peter’s workshop will be held from 6-8 p.m. at Bean Around the World Coffee on 5601 Dunbar Street,
Vancouver BC. Cost will be $20.00. RSVP to
rachelrose@telus.net.