In a Tension of Leaves and Binding (Guernica 2024) is Renée M. Sgroi’s second collection of poetry. Her previous collection, life print, in points was published by erbacce-press in 2020. A member of The Writers’ Union of Canada and The Ontario Poetry Society, Renée is also a contributing editor for Arc Poetry Magazine. She discusses her new collection in this interview for Accenti.
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Many of the poems in your latest collection, In a Tension of Leaves and Binding, draw on Latin classification systems of plants and animals, ecological processes, and manufacturing procedures, such as paper making. What inspired you to draw on these elements? Did you do a lot of research?
Yes, I absolutely had to research all of these areas. It’s interesting because numerous people have commented on the scientific nature of some of the poems, and have assumed that I have a science background (I don’t). That’s what research is for! The inspiration to draw on these elements came from the observations I was making – there’s so much to notice once you begin to pay attention, and I needed a vocabulary and proper terminology to be able to write about them. In my poetic practice, research emerges out of curiosity or a need to be accurate. For instance, I wanted to ensure that I had the correct Latin names for the plants and animals. But then research also leads me to ask more questions, so it’s like a constant feedback loop between curiosity and imagination, and research. I’m happy to follow the trail of my curiosity and see where it will lead!
You wrote these poems during COVID. How did the different stages of the COVID-19 pandemic affect your writing?
My experience of the first wave of the pandemic wasn’t like other people’s, or at least, wasn’t the experience so many people were talking about – baking bread, watching Netflix, being bored, etc. Because I’m a post-secondary educator, I found myself swamped by unexpectedly and quickly having to transition to online teaching, which wasn’t something I had done much of before. And there was such uncertainty and anxiety about what was happening in the world. I’m still not sure I’ve entirely processed the experience of living through the pandemic. So by the time July rolled around, I was ready to just sit and observe. But I think that’s partly my nature, too, so that the first wave just enabled my innate propensities. At the same time, the ability to participate in online workshops, readings, and so on that continued throughout the pandemic (and beyond) provided me with opportunities I wouldn’t otherwise have had, which I think contributed to my growth as a poet, and hence this collection. For instance, I was able to be in an online Sage Hill workshop with Jordan Abel, and that definitely had a positive and lasting effect on how I wanted to work with these poems. It’s an interesting paradox, because the pandemic provided a space for me to contemplate and to write these poems, and yet, as a character or symbol or image, the pandemic itself is barely mentioned, except, as I wrote in the essay at the back of the book, “as a kind of scene setting.”
You write from the perspective of the onion, the carrot, the carpenter ants, the grasshopper – how did your approach to each “nature-voiced” poem differ?
I really wanted to imagine as much as possible what the world might look, sound, and feel like from those various perspectives (I’m not sure I tackled smell or taste). To manage that, I observed – a lot. And I engaged in a kind of thought-experiment, if you will, an imagined embodiment of the onion, the carrot, etc. It’s a kind of play – like when children imagine they’re lions or birds or whatever, and where will that play take you? When I did that, engage in the play and sense of embodiment rooted in observations, then the character of each “nature-voiced” poem revealed itself, and all I had to do was listen.
The concept of language plays a big role in this collection. How did the sound of certain words in different languages affect your word choices?
Language is so important for me, on many levels, and while I think that fact is apparent to many readers, what’s often left out of the discussion is any consideration of the different languages I’ve incorporated, so I really appreciate this question. Definitely the sound of Latin is just music to my ears. How can words like sciuris carolinensis not roll off the tongue? The Anishnabemowin words pichi and miimii also stood out in my ear for their music. Though, I don’t know that sound was the most important quality in my word choices. Calabrese, for instance, is a heart language – I probably hear it in my gut before I hear it in my ears. So when I incorporate it, it’s definitely a political choice, as a way for me to publicly claim (or maybe proclaim) something about who I am, and where I come from. And then there’s the question of whether or not to italicize. When it was originally published in The Windsor Review, the Italian words in “your town” might have been in italics, but I definitely didn’t want that in this book. I think it might be the case too, that the way I understand certain words or concepts might depend on the language I first learned them in, or what’s more familiar. “Ants (formiche)” is a good example. In my head, if I saw a congregation of ants, formiche would probably come to my mind first – maybe I should have reversed their order in the title of that poem! But yes, pompe funebri or osso definitely have a different sound, a different flow which lends them a connotation in Italian that isn’t present in their English translations – at least for me.
Can you describe the embodied experience of writing this collection? How did writing about bodies and the body affect your relationship to your own body as a poet?
I think that the imagined embodiment of plants and animals led to wonder, and maybe awe. Think about it: how does a cucumber tendril know how to reach towards a fence? When you start thinking along those lines, you start to see your body and your self in a more holistic relationship with the world around you. I realized that I’m just another body in the garden, just another random voice amongst the many voices attending to their business growing or buzzing, or crawling, or whatever. So it’s a humbling experience, both as a person, and as a poet. I’ve noticed as well, and this is something that has remained beyond the writing of this book, that I’ve developed a way to be so still when I’m in the garden (even if I’m writing or reading there), that the animals either don’t notice me, or trust me enough that they’re confident enough to come quite close. There’s quite an intrepid rabbit, for instance, that runs under my swing, even though I’m sitting there. So what is my body to this rabbit? What are my words? All I can do is describe the moment when the rabbit will pause one foot away from me, and we’ll watch each other, maybe for thirty seconds, maybe a minute or more, and then the rabbit will run off to its burrow. Is that a kind of communion? I don’t know.
Liana Cusmano is a writer, filmmaker, spoken word artist, and Accenti editor-at-large.
