New York Poet Tsaurah Litzky Cleans the Duck and Makes It Shine
GALO: What were you thinking about when you wrote your first poem at seven-years-old? Was there a theme? If so, did it ever appear again?
TL: I went to art school at the Brooklyn Museum starting when I was five. The first poem I wrote was about a kachina doll, a representation of the Navajo God of the Sun. The class that day took place in the Southwestern Native American section. We were asked to choose an exhibit and draw it. I drew the Sun God, and when I got home, I wrote a poem about him. That was my first and last poem about a kachina doll.
GALO: Longfellow had his first poems in print when he was 13-years-old. Was this something you intended to emulate?
TL: I didn’t [know] this about Longfellow when I was a child. Indeed, this is the first time I have heard this information. I wasn’t trying to emulate anyone when I started to write. I just did it. I couldn’t, and didn’t, want to stop myself.
GALO: What do you think makes a great writer?
TL: Respect for the power of the word, love of language, and perseverance. You have to keep writing!
GALO: You write in your “Come Poem” in CTD, “I come because coming is still a revolutionary act.” Does this refer back to the sexual revolution of the 60s? How do you see the connection between sex and politics today – does it even exist?
TL: My point of view is that coming has always been a revolutionary act and still is. Every orgasm changes your life for good or ill. As for the connection between sex and politics, I could write books about it. In fact I already have. See my erotic novella, The Motion of the Ocean, published in 2004 as part of Three The Hard Way, a series of erotic novellas edited by Susie Bright. I have to say, I find the question as to whether the connection between sex and politics still exists rather naïve, particularly in the face of the Occupy Wall Street Movements, which were inspired by how the 99 percent has been thoroughly screwed by big business and corporate interests. Also what about the relationship, the similar power dynamics that exist, as part of both political and sexual situations? I’m going to stop here before I do write a book.
GALO: I see the term ‘sex magic’ on your website. What does it mean?
TL: It means that sex has magical, transformative powers, once again for either good or ill.
GALO: How did the handle ‘Miss Dirty Stories’ become attached to you?
TL: In 2001, I was invited by the late, great, [and] once famous ex-music columnist, Al Aronowitz, to contribute a monthly erotic story to his website, The Blacklisted Journalist. I did so for five years until Al passed on. He was the one who christened me Miss Dirty Stories. You can still access the Blacklisted Journalist online and read those stories.
GALO: I notice often in CTD you are able to take a run of the mill moment and turn it into something memorable or beautiful. This seems to be an important part of your style. Is this a natural gift or something which requires extra work?
TL: Thank you very much. I take that as a high compliment. This is part of transforming a negative into a positive, or seeing the silver lining as I said earlier. I hope I don’t come across as a Pollyanna. It’s just that I can see no sense, or get any pleasure, from wallowing in the mud. Yet I see myself as a realist. There are some poems in CTD, more than a few that are not very cheerful i.e. “Tanalus,” “Hot Water,” and the poems about my father’s last days. I hope for clarity at least and exhilaration at best.
GALO: There is often a very lyrical quality to your work. In the poem “I Love You Isaac Bashevis Singer,” there’s a section talking about the dead, not knowing they are dead, and the living, not knowing they are alive. This reminds me of, “He not busy being born is busy dying,” from Bob Dylan’s “It’s Alright Ma (I’m Only Bleeding).” Are there particular types of music that influence your writing?
TL: I love all music and agree with one of my favorite reggae artists, Jimmy Cliff, when he poses and answers the following question: “What is the universe and knowledge? It is music, just music.”
GALO: How do you feel about the new technologies which allow writers to instantly make their work accessible to the public and receive feedback?
TL: It’s fine, if that’s what the writer wants to do. I’m still enough of a Luddite to want to see my work in print form, in books and magazines, as well as online.
GALO: What are your feelings about the times we live in? What kind of fertile ground, if any, do you see for a writer like yourself?
TL: I feel we live in fascinating as well as very dangerous times. Environmental threats grow and multiply as does fear and our potential to destroy each other. Technology can be a white knight or a monster. I feel it is my obligation as a writer and an artist, and the obligation of all artists, since it is such a privilege to be an artist, to speak up and be heard; to do your work in whatever form it takes and get it out there as part of the increasingly important consideration of how life can exist and flourish on the planet.
GALO: In the poem “Low Life,”’ the line begins, “Whole weeks when all I could afford to eat was a daily pint of take out roast pork fried rice…” Sounds like the starving artist was more than a cliché with you – how hungry were the difficult times?
TL: Sometimes pretty grim and hungry, but I never sold my body or ate from a garbage can, or preyed on those weaker than myself.
GALO: Regardless of the state of your stomach you write in “Deliverance” that upon your return to the Big Apple from a family Seder, you were looking forward to the freedom in your white room and your writing table. Are these the foods that really set the table and fill your belly?
TL: Yes, of course. My writing is the center of my life and I believe my best work is still ahead of me.
GALO: You dedicate CTD to your mother, Ruth Levin Litzky, and your father, Lenny Litzky. They both have passed but what might they say about your latest selections and success?
TL: They would be so happy for me!
GALO: What’s coming up next?
TL: I’m working on a chapbook of poems about my father. When that is completed there are a couple of erotic stories I want to write. I want to find a publisher for my memoir, Flasher.
GALO: Are there any other ‘hidden’ aspects of your artistic life you would like to share?
TL: Actually, I had a career as a sculptor and maker of assemblages when I was in my late 20s and early 30s. I started to make collages as such two years ago when a friend gave me the 100 Martha Stuart Living magazines he had found on the street. A couple of my collages were part of an art show and received rave reviews.
For more information on the author or her work, visit her site at www.tsaurahlitzky.com.
