“Kessler Syndrome,” “Light Job,” “Patternicities,” and “The Schiaparelli Stage” by Jacob Strautmann appeared in Issue 31 and can be read here.
We’d love to hear more about this set of poetry.
My friend of nearly 40 years, Dallas Campbell, is an electronic music composer. I was really taken with his 2018 album The Seven Sisters and the Serpent. It includes three ambient pieces I wanted to respond to: “Terra View E2112”, “Lunar View J2857”, and “Interstellar View X3444.” I put each song on repeat as I worked on the poems and occasionally recited them over the music, though I never made a formal choreography between song and poem. Dallas’s synth cracked open the door for me to do some world-building, and I hope to work with his music again soon.
What was the most difficult part of writing this set?
I hadn’t attempted anything sci-fi before, and I found myself with the concerns of people much more experienced in this genre – how to keep the pieces grounded in human experience, how to deliver a sense of awe while remaining relevant, and, most of all, how not to sound derivative of the great successes in this genre.
Recommend a book for us which was published within the last decade.
Kim Stanley Robinson’s Aurora. I’m a sucker for anything with a compelling AI.
If you could have a drink with any living author, who would it be? Why?
Alice Oswald. I would be too star-struck to speak. It would be a quiet drink.
What are you working on now? What’s next?
These poems are part of a manuscript called New Vrindaban forthcoming in 2024. I’ve lost three of my four bandmates from two bands I performed in during my emo youth, and the project marks their loss. Compared to my first book which is centered on WV and the legacy of the extractive industries, this one is more personal – regret and guilt recur throughout. I’ve challenged myself to take formal and thematic risks to honor these fallen musicians and dear friends.
Our thanks to Jacob for taking the time to answer a few questions and share these poems. Read “”Kessler Syndrome,” “Light Job,” “Patternicities,” and “The Schiaparelli Stage” here: https://www.sequestrum.org/four-poems-by-jacob-strautmann.
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