A Literary Friendship: A July Writers' Event

Now literary correspondance happens over the ether. No more onion skin envelopes and aerograms.
Kelli Russell Agodon and I were asked by Jordan Hartt of Centrum to write on any subject we wanted. Here is what we chose.

" Friendship": A Literary Correspondence Between Two Poets

A few months ago we asked two of the most popular writing teachers at the Port Townsend Writers' Conference--Kelli Russell Agodon and Susan Rich--to let us "eavesdrop" on their musings of their friendship, their poetic passions, and their lives as writers in the Pacific Northwest. What follows is a conversation held over email on the nature of their friendship and what it has come to mean to them--and to their work--over the past ten years.

Dear Kelli,

Here is the secret nobody knows: poets need friends. OK. You know it, I know it, and so did Elizabeth Bishop. From Brooklyn over the Brooklyn Bridge this fine morning please come flying. In “Invitation to Miss Marianne Moore,” Elizabeth Bishop celebrates her deep friendship with another woman poet: her mentor and lifelong friend, Marianne Moore.

I know that Bishop and Moore shared poems, went on outings to the zoo together, and when Bishop moved to Brazil in 1951, wrote long letters. Our friendship, now almost a decade old, impacts my writing life in important and magical ways. Do you remember when we first met? We both had poems for the Poetry on the Busses anthology and were reading at the Seattle Art Museum. Your daughter, an infant at the time, let out an enormous cry when you took the podium. “That’s my daughter,” you said without missing a beat.

You can read the full article here. As always, thanks for reading.