Our Lady of The Busboys: Queer poets Trebor
Healey and Collin Kelley dish on religion, writing and why bus
boys are so fuckable
Trebor Healey and Collin Kelley had never met, but discovered
they shared a mutual love for travel, sex, religious iconography
and hunky restaurant staff. Suspect Thoughts Press has just released
Trebor’s poetry collection Sweet Son Of Pan, while
Collin’s new limited-edition chapbook, Slow To Burn
was published last month by MetroMania Press. Trebor, award-winning
novelist of Through It Came Bright Colors, lives and
writes in LA, while Collin, whose debut collection of poetry Better
To Travel was nominated for a Lammy and Georgia Author of
the Year Award, lives in “queer capital of the south”
Atlanta. They recently played 20 questions by phone and email
to create this conversation.
Trebor Healey |
Collin Kelley |
Collin Kelley: The poems in your new collection,
Sweet Son of Pan, are "erotic poetry." What
do you find erotic and how does that translate into your work?
Trebor Healey: Wilderness, nature, plants, boys
and men in their natural state. I’m a faerie and a jock
and a poet and a nature boy, so all these things are charged for
me and appear again and again in these poems. I think everything
is erotic. I think Eros can blow through boundaries, melt distinctions,
fences, rigidities. “Erotica” is not a sub-genre or
even a genre. If you look at it, it’s the overarching reality.
We live in a physical world ruled by desire. Pan’s state
of grace?
Kelley: Hmmm...well...some of best poems have
been written after a good fuck and sometimes that feels like grace.
And then sometimes writing a good poem is better than a good fuck.
You just never know. I'm always curious to see how it will turn
out. Some of my erotic poetry spirals into pornography. Do you
believe there’s a fine line between eroticism and porn and
do you try to straddle that line?
Healey: Oh, that age old question. I don’t
really make a distinction. Sex is energy and when you tap into
it, you know when it works and when it’s real, connected
and true. I’ m into connection. I don’t care whether
anyone deems it porn or erotica, like one is somehow more legit
than the other. I suppose you could say porn is “exploitive
and superficial,” while erotica is more literary, artful,
true, conflicted. I like sex both ways, so bring ‘em both
on. All this separation is for dweebs and the rigid. Speaking
of sex, we've spoken about our penchant for busboy poems, or what
I call Cavafy poems—those poems born of ogling a cute boy in
the food service industry. Can you talk about that a little?
Kelley: I love a cute waiter or busboy...it's
half the fun of going out to eat. Rather than try to explain,
why don't I just share the most recent poem...
Bus Boy
I’m going to call you Carlos, take creative license,
a good excuse for not knowing your name.
You look like a Carlos: toffee skin,
not quite kinky hair in a ponytail, full lips.
Michael calls you pretty, says I can have you,
he’s got someone at home, and as you refill
my water glass my mind cracks in half,
one side shows us holding hands by candlelight,
the other has you spit-lubing your cock
behind the Dipsy Dumpster, shoving inside me,
you’re on a break, and want to break me in half,
fifteen minutes only, and five for a smoke.
Watching you move about the dining room,
your studied charm for public consumption,
I see the way you walk, the way your biceps curl,
the way you’re aware of eyes scanning you
like a menu and everyone has dessert on their mind.
What attracts you to them?
Healey: Well, it’s always sexy to see
men in jobs they’re stuck in. Easy to say that, and not
to romanticize suffering—believe me, I’ve bussed a lot
of tables. But food service isn’t that bad! I know it’s
often sexiest to be miserable, caged, like a jockstrap. We are
often most attractive when we look miserable because there is
a vulnerability there. Not really a powerlessness, but a sort
of human limitedness which is sweet and true. So many of these
boys are angels, princes or kings, fallen like the rest of us.
A boy stuck in some job, having to be nice, is like a sort of
spring-loaded sexual state. They’ve got “I wanna get
wild and fuck and get the hell out of here” written all
over them. I wanna root for them! Food service is also very intimate.
They are feeding you, serving you—I want to serve them back.
Kelley: Hmmm…yes. I’ve encountered
quite a few I’d like to…ummm…serve. (Laughs)
Were you raised in a religious household and how did your sexuality
affect home and family life?
Healey: Oh yeah, very traditional Irish Catholic
family. I loved it in many ways, it enriched my existence. America
is so crass and I felt I had this channel into an ancient culture
through the church. It disappointed in time, especially as I discovered
my sexuality, but I think the wilderness and sex filled the void.
It’s a pagan religion essentially anyway, just caged. I
had a major dream that set me loose from it, which in some sense
fit in very much with the revelatory visionary aspect of Catholicism.
I am very happy that I was a little Mary-worshipping heretic.
The Holy Mother informed my existence and gave me a sense of spirituality
that I value very much. When I realized I wasn’t the sinner,
but that the church itself, in its utter corruption of Christ’s
message was, you could say I was born again. Rediscovered the
garden. And that garden was full of cock, hallucinogenics, pine
trees, buddhas and the hearts of real live human beings. Long
story. Anyway, things with the family were tense for a spell until
one day my Mom understood that if I went hiking in the oak-studded
hills of the East Bay while she was at mass, we were communing
with god at the same time. They’ve been really good about
my being queer. They found a Jesuit who said it was alright (Laughs),
and they haven’t looked back.
I loved your poem, “The Virgin
Mary Appears in a Highway Underpass” that’s in
Slow To Burn. Tell me what inspired that and do you write
about our lady a lot?
Kelley:
I think it was a year or so ago that the Virgin Mary supposedly
appeared on a wall in a Chicago underpass. It was run-off, mildew,
etc. that made the stain, and I saw photos but never really could
see the Virgin Mary. But the faithful came running with their
flowers and candles. I've always been fascinated by VM appearances.
Here in Georgia, we had a woman who said the VM appeared over
her farm once a month and came spinning out of the sun and the
air was filled with the scent of roses. Hundreds of thousands
used to flock there. It was a spectacle. I do have a number of
poems that reference Mary and Biblical figures. I'm fascinated
by religion, but can't stomach the organized kind. And, strangely,
I do have a lot of poems that use "our lady" as a metaphor
or as an agent of change, death, transformation.
Healey: Well, I live in Los Angeles, which is
not “the city of angels,” as it’s often misinterpreted.
It’s proper name is “El Pueblo de Nuestra Senora,
Reyna de Los Angeles de Porciuncula” – The City of
Our Lady, Queen of the Angels. What does Atlanta mean anyway?
How do you like Atlanta? How is it as a place for poetry and for
queers?
Kelley: Atlanta was a railroad boom town. It
went through several names before the powers that be decided to
christen it Atlanta, since the Western & Atlantic Railroad
originally terminated here. Not very sexy, I’m afraid. The
city is a dichotomy. On one hand you have Margaret Mitchell and
Gone With the Wind and the other you have Martin Luther King Jr.—both
very polarizing figures in history. That’s still felt today
in the city, but we’re also becoming more international
by the minute. The poetry scene has really blossomed in the last
five or six years. There's always been a strong underground, but
it's really started to make bigger leaps and get more media coverage.
As for queers, baby, this is the queer capital of the south. We've
got more fags than you can shake a dick at. You moved from San
Francisco to Los Angeles, which, to me, is like moving from another
country. How did that affect your writing?
Healey: Oh gosh, it’s complicated. I love
both places. SF is like the cute unattainable satyr boy, and LA
is like the overweight Latin drag queen who has so much more love
to give. I think SF is a magical place, but in a fairy tale way,
full of machinations, and kind of withholding. There is a dark
side that is sneaky. And it’s not a totally real place to
me. The beauty and weirdness on every corner are astounding and
refreshing and wondrous. But I could never hold my center there.
I felt assaulted and oppressed by illusions in SF. In LA, I feel
assaulted and oppressed by the blunt truth, which I think, for
me, is a better angel to wrestle with as I really like to write
very close to what I experience as real. If you left Atlanta where
would you go?
Kelley: London. It's my spiritual home as a
writer. I'd wanted to go there ever since I was a little kid,
and in the mid 90s, I finally had the money and time and it exceeded
every fantasy I'd ever had. I've tried to get back at least once
a year for the last decade. I must have lived there in a past
life. I kiss the ground every time I arrive and sob like a child
every time I have to leave. Europe always gets the poetic juices
flowing for me. I love the whole process of travel, the hustle,
the bustle, the trains. London certainly inspires me, as does
Paris. Lately, I've become fascinated with Los Angeles. I hadn't
been there in years, and then in 2003 I went back for a reading
for Better To Travel and the city both repulsed and riveted me.
I love the poetry scene in Southern California in general. It
seems so much more supportive and, while there are egos everywhere,
they seem to be on a lower speed in LA. I always have a blast
when I'm out there and I can't wait to come back. If you moved
again, where would you go?
Healey: I love Mexico, it’s my favorite
place in the world. The people, the culture, the history, the
climate, all that. I’m unemployable, like most poets, so
often I think of Vietnam to teach English. I’m gonna try
to visit Southeast Asia this year if I can. Southern Europe is
always attractive. I love the desert. I’ m amazed how much
I’ve come to love the desert. Even Palm Springs, or Tucson.
It’s really seductive; I don’t know how to explain
it. The bleakness, and yet the incredible life, unseen until you
really look. Then it’s just fecund.
Kelley: Your novel, Through
It Came Bright Colors, has won several prestigious awards.
Do the awards matter? Does it affect the way you write? Do you
feel you have to "one-up" yourself with every project?
Healey: I was surprised by the awards, very
humbled and grateful. I suppose they matter in that they can open
some doors for you. As for their affect, I seem to be only able
to write what I want to write, so it hasn’t affected me
much. The world’s response to us is often far from how we
experience our life, so I take it with a grain of salt. A fluke.
Karma. As for one-upping myself, that seems dumb. I have to honor
whatever talent I have and keep writing. I’m not competitive
much, with myself or anyone else. You’ve been nominated
and won awards…how do you feel about the poetry scene?
Kelley: I feel like I straddle the fence in
the poetry "scene." I don't have an MFA, nor did I finish
my bachelors, but through sheer stubbornness I've made inroads
into the "upper echelon." I have no interest in teaching,
getting tenure or giving myself an ulcer over whether or not I'm
nominated for such and such award. You would be amazed at how
many bitter poets who, despite the fact they've won awards and
are highly regarded, feel they deserve even more acclaim. These
bitches are in the wrong business. Poetry is a niche market and
everyone wants to be the big fish in the little pond. Many of
the academic poets are jockeying for better teaching jobs and
tenure, and sometimes it's like watching dogs fight for a scrap.
I'm happy just to be in the pond in general. I have no delusions
or illusions about my "place" in the poetry world. I'm
thrilled to have found an audience who enjoys the writing. It's
like Dashiell Hammett says to Lillian Hellman in the film Julia:
"It's just fame, Lily, it has nothing to do with the writing."
Healey: What are you working on now, or next?
Kelley: I'm shaping the next collection of poetry
and I’m sending my novel, Conquering Venus, back
out to make the rounds of a few indie publishers. The novel is
about a 20-something writer named Martin whose lover has committed
suicide and his best friend/fag hag Diane decides to take him
to London and Paris to help her chaperone a bunch of students
who have just graduated from high school. Of course, Martin falls
for one of the students, so there's plenty of drama there, and
he also meets this Jeanne Moreau-ish character named Irenne who
has agoraphobia and can't leave her house. Irenne's husband was
gay and was mysteriously killed during the 1968 riots in Paris,
so while Martin is helping Irenne track down what happened to
her husband, he's also clashing with Diane over falling in love
with her student. The novel is set in the summer of 1995 when
terrorists blew up the Saint-Michel metro station, so that figures
into the story as well.
What’s next for you? You said you’re working on a
new novel…
Healey:
Oh yeah. I’m terribly in love with this novel, which is
not as good a thing as it sounds. It’s often tragic and
full of drama and heartache. It’s about a clown; it's a
road novel; it’s about lost love, and finding a greater,
larger love; it breaks my heart, and I know it’s what I
need to write, and so I try to avoid it, dodge it. But it’s
there. I’m struggling with it right now, taking a break.
I’m launching Sweet Son of Pan in New Orleans.
Then going to NYC and SF and LA. It’s unabashedly homoerotic
so I feel like I can’t go as many places as I went with
my novel. But I’m a reading slut and will go anywhere, so
who knows, invite me anywhere, I’ll always show up to sing
my randy songs. Along those lines, I’m considering the Northwest,
Minneapolis, Tuscon. You’re going international with Slow
To Burn aren’t you?
Kelley: I'll be in Texas in April, since MetroMania
Press is based in San Antonio. I'll do a couple of readings there,
then come upstate to the Austin International Poetry Festival
for a few readings. Then it's back to Atlanta, some gigs in the
southeast, New York in September and LA in the fall. I'm also
trying to get my first gig set up in London, which would be a
treat.
Okay, we have to wrap this up. One more question… Is writing
sometimes better than sex?
Healey: Hmm, that’s a tough one. Good
art is good sex on some level, and just as satisfying and recreative.
I think the essential connection in life is erotic and that goes
for art and sex, so how can you separate them? I often get hard
when I’m really hitting my stride creatively. I know it’s
good and true when I get a woody writing. Being in the body is
special, and writing can get so mental, so I think maybe sex is
better than writing ultimately. And there is connection to another
in a real live way. I think poetry is closer to sex than fiction
is, because you can share it easier, and sing it, and all that.
It’s more physical and more direct.
One more question for you…How do you like having the initials
CK? Do you feel an affinity for our dear closeted underwear manufacturing
mogul? Or is that the most annoying and tired question you get?
Kelley: Actually, no one's ever mentioned it,
but I'm wearing CK briefs right now. :)
Read more about Sweet Son of Pan at:
www.suspectthoughts.com
Read an excerpt from Sweet Son
of Pan
Read more about Slow to Burn at:
www.metromainapress.com
Read an excerpt from Slow to Burn
For more information and to see when Trebor and Collin might
be queering up your town (or ogling the wait staff at your favorite
restaurant), visit their websites at www.treborhealey.com
or www.collinkelley.com.
