Ari B. Cofer
Following the publication of their second poetry collection, Black queer poet and writer, Ari B. Cofer, meets with founder and editor of Breadfruit, Olivia Simone, to discuss their writing process, publishing experiences, and the importance of community.
Let’s dive right in and begin by talking about when and why you started writing?
I began writing a long time ago. There’s a stereotype that a lot of writers start writing when we're kids, and that's no different for me. But, when I was a kid, I had no intention of being a writer. I wanted to be a doctor. And then, when I got into college, I decided it wasn't for me. I loved my writing classes far more than I liked any of my science or math classes. It was a really safe community that allowed me to feel comfortable in my writing process and feel confident to say that I could be a writer one day. In my local community at the time, there were also a lot of poetry events – like open mics and poetry slams – which I started competing and writing for. Eventually, I decided that with the community I’d built and the feeling that writing gave me – not only the validation but also its cathartic nature – that this was what I wanted to do full-time. It kind of felt like a pipe dream at first, but it doesn’t anymore, which is really special. So, I graduated with my degree in professional writing and in my nine to five I do more technical/ content writing that is less related to anything specifically creative, but it does help refine my skills. I’m also working to publish more books. Right now, I’m in my master’s programme, getting a degree in poetry, which is really fun. It’s been highly important for me to find a writing community and see that it is possible for me to do something like this. Once I got that validation, that it is something people can do, especially something that Black people or Black women or non-binary people can do, I was like okay, this is something I can pursue, and it’s been fun figuring that out.
When you talk about your community, does this include writers who are at similar stages to you or are they at different stages? And are they writers of similar identities to you?
Kind of a mix actually – I think that's part of why the writing community feels so special to me. I went to a primarily white university for undergrad, so I didn't meet a lot of Black writers, except for one professor. But when I got into the local poetry community, I started meeting more Black writers, and I felt a lot more comfortable there. I think there is a space for academic writing, especially since I'm in it right now. But I also believe that having the opportunity to see that writing doesn't always have to look like Margaret Atwood or Emily Dickinson is crucial. Sometimes it can look like Audre Lorde or something a little bit different. It was incredibly important for me to find this community, because otherwise, I don't think I would have developed into the writer that I am today. Not that I would’ve been a bad writer, I just would’ve been a different writer. In general, it’s necessary for me to preach community. As a poet it’s important to find other writers, especially Black writers, so that you can feel like what you’re doing is achievable. That it’s possible… hard, but possible.
What has your experience of studying been like? Having written for years and published two collections, you’ve come to the master’s with a lot of experience; how has the transition from writing outside of an institution to studying your craft been?
I've been lucky because my programme is inclusive in a lot of different ways, which I don't think is always the norm. I've heard from a lot of friends that it's not. Even so, I do recognise that there is a bit of a difference now that I'm in a programme compared to when I wasn't. It’s a weird difference – not necessarily friction but something of that nature – that comes from when you’re in a setting that’s entirely creative and for the community and which focuses on storytelling, compared to when you’re aiming to further your craft and you’re investigating the specificities of poetry. In the programme, we look at our poetry from a different lens. Depending on where you go for your degree, it can impact the type of education you receive. I'm lucky in my programme because we look at things from an intersectional lens, and my mentors are intentional about how and what they teach. If we want to focus on queer writers for a semester, they genuinely take the time to offer you a range of workbooks about queer writers or Black writers, for example. I've had a lot of autonomy and been able to guide my education in the way that I want to, but I recognise that's not the experience a lot of people have. Especially for Black individuals, it's hard to find a programme that doesn't feel stuffy or that doesn't feel like you're being excluded from the narrative. I've had conversations with people where they feel as though the things that they’re studying aren’t relevant to them at all. For example, my faculty mentor this semester has encouraged me to integrate my life experiences and way of speaking and writing into my critical essay, which has been really special for me. Unfortunately, I know that's not the case in a lot of places, and it does affect the way that people receive their education.
It’s great to hear that there are programmes that exist where you feel respected and encouraged to further your style of storytelling, instead of making you feel like there’s only one way that’s correct or important. Is your close community from your master’s or from before you started studying?
I've definitely met a lot through my programme, but I would say most of the writers that still feel close to me are writers that I met in the local community when I was doing poetry slams and open mics, or through online writing communities. Otherwise it’s difficult to meet other writers who actually want to be career writers. That’s no shade to people who write poetry just for fun, because it’s needed and special and treasured in the community. But, for those of us wanting this to be our whole lives, there’s a different edge to it and it’s been really important for me to find other writers like that. It's also been very different talking to my white friends versus my Black friends about the craft; I love them all, but it is a different experience. So I’ve have to be intentional about finding my community and being in specifically Black spaces. I grew up in a majority white state and I didn’t have a ton of Black friends or a writing community, and I was nervous that I would find myself out-casted, and I’ve done a lot of work to ensure that hasn’t happened. It’s made a big difference in the way that I think, and the fact that I’m still writing is a testament to the success that I’ve found within community.
Your published writing tends to discuss quite personal topics, concerning your mental health and your advocacy work, and I wondered how it’s been having such vulnerable work accessible to the public?
It's been hard. It’s definitely gotten easier with time; getting older has impacted my experience with it a lot. I started writing my first collection when I was around nineteen and it wasn’t accepted for publication until I was around twenty-four or twenty-five. I find that when I was younger I was a lot more explicit, a lot more gritty. I wrote the things that I wanted to say to people that I just couldn’t. Don’t get me wrong, I still value my early work, but now that I’m older and I’ve been able to reflect more, I definitely don’t express my feelings of sadness or trauma in the same way. I’ve felt a change in myself over time and, with that change, I feel a little less insecure and a little more confident in my ability to talk about these things. Before, I would just feel a certain way and need to get it out by writing, but now I’m aware of what I’m feeling and my work is me articulating it or showing it as a transformative experience that’s defined by what it took to get here versus defining myself. Knowing that people read it… that’s always a trip, but you get used to it.
Do you ever find yourself reading your published work back and think that you would do it differently or continue editing it in your head?
All the time. I loved my first collection when it was published – and I still love it – but if I read it back now I kind of cringe a little bit, which I think is a typical writer experience. You read something that you wrote five years ago and you're like, oh, that's not it. But I think about it in the same way that I think about my tattoos, which is maybe a weird example, but I have a lot of them. This is my 20-year-old self, and they had something to say, and this is what they had to say. From that perspective, I can respect it and say, okay, I honour 20-year-old me who said this in a very strange or forward way that I wouldn’t do now, but that's what they needed to do at the time. When I take a step back and look at it from that perspective, it's a lot easier for me to wrap my head around. But there are a lot of times when I look at my early work, especially when it's related to my mental health, and I think I would not say that now if I had the chance, but oh well, it is what it is.
Could you speak about what led you to publication? When you were writing your poems, did you think about them being published, or did you just write them and then realise that they could work well in a collection?
It was more the latter. I had a lot of work, and it all happened to be on the same theme because I was processing the trauma I’d experienced. I didn't know what else to do but put them into a collection. At first, the goal wasn’t necessarily to be published and to be a, capital p, Poet. I had a lot of friends back when I was in the slam poetry scene who were publishing chapbooks or self-publishing and selling their books at events. So I did that at first, but then I realised that I could actually be a traditionally published writer if I wanted to. It started to feel possible. Again, meeting people that had done it made it easier to understand. It wasn't a quick process by any means. I think I finished the first draft of my first collection in 2018 and I submitted it to a lot of places but nowhere was biting. Then I had to rewrite it and resubmit it, and that's when it started working for me. But it took a lot of time and perseverance. I remember thinking this is never going to end. I'm never going to get published. But in hindsight it's one of those things where timing really is everything. I have a really great publisher at the moment who believed in my work, who still believes in my work, and they published my second collection as well. So while it wasn't the original goal, I’m glad it became the goal. Even after having published collections it’s still isn’t easy. It gets easier once you're in, but the actual craft of it, I don't think that ever does.
I'm interested to know, what do you feel you did differently between your first and second round of submitting?
That's a good question. My transparent answer is that during those early stages, I was really big in the Instagram poetry community. I have various friends who found their success on Instagram, and now TikTok too, which I think is inspirational. But, I found myself trying to emulate my friends and colleagues who were successful on Instagram. That was the book I was trying to write; it was made up of shorter truisms and really short poems. At the end of the day, it wasn't entirely my voice. The difference the second time round was that I incorporated a lot of the poems that I was writing for poetry slam and then other things that I was writing as well, in addition to some of the work that I was posting on Instagram, and it made it a completely different collection. I allowed myself to sit back and recognise that this was how my friends were finding success, but it didn’t mean that I was going to find success that same way. I didn't realise that until I got a bunch of rejections, and some of them were really nice, but most of them said that they needed to hear me more. I had to take a step back and add what I wanted to make my collections me.
What’s a piece of advice you would give other emerging or unpublished poets and writers?
I feel I have some hot takes on this. First, I think that people should have a group of friends, whether they're writers or people who understand them and their craft. If I write a poem or something that I worked really hard on and I want to share it, I sit with it and I ask myself, am I wanting to share this for validation? Am I wanting to share this for feedback? Or am I wanting to share this because it was something that was deep inside of me and I just need to get it out into the void? From there, I decide what I want to do with it. At the beginning of my writing career, I think because I was on Instagram, I was just putting out content. The goal was to put out as much content as I could. As a result, I would write something and post it the same day or the next day, which isn’t the move. I’ve realised that I was just getting instant gratification, but that’s not what I needed. Now, if there's a poem that I really want somebody to see, I'll send it to my friend who's also a writer; I’ll say, hey I wrote this, can you tell me what you think, or can you not tell me what you think but just see that this is something that came from me. Aside from that, I’d say talking to people is great. I know a writer’s worst nightmare is to have to network and talk etc., but a lot of my success has come from talking to people and reaching out to those in the industry. Getting to know what’s going on, how people are published, and how collections are formed helped me massively. I don't necessarily believe that people need to get a master's degree to be successful as a writer. I know plenty of people who have no degrees and they’re successful writers. It’s the path I chose because I wanted to be mentored by poets that I really respected. But, in reality, I think it's more about how involved you can get yourself. That doesn't mean that you have to stretch yourself thin and go to every reading or talk to a million people. Just knowing a couple of people who can advocate for you, or give you feedback on something that you're working on – whether it's one poem or a whole project – is really important. As much as capitalism and the Internet makes you believe that you can do it by yourself, which is possible, it's going to be so much harder. You don't need to go through that and you don't have to go through that. So, remember and make yourself aware that there are resources out there for you. In the least cliché of ways, there are people who will want to help and who will answer your emails and who will blurb your books or support you in any way that they can.
Like so many creative industries, publishing can feel really gate-kept. How have you found the process of publication and your experiences with the industry?
After my first round of submitting when I realised things weren’t working, I changed my strategy a little bit, which involved doing more research. Before, I was submitting to anywhere and everywhere that would accept a manuscript that was within the parameters of what they were asking for. But then I started looking into the specifics of the presses that I was submitting to. How many queer authors has this press published? How many Black authors has this press published? I've even seen some presses that will not promote their Black authors as much as their other authors. I was looking to make sure that I went somewhere that would respect me. I think the reason I’ve had such a good experience is that a lot of work I did on the back end made sure I wouldn’t end up at a press that was going to treat me badly, and luckily I found a great press, which I’m thankful for. Unfortunately, it does take a lot of research, and a lot of writers don't even know where to start looking. It takes a lot of accepting the disappointment that not every press is going to be for you and seeing hundreds of places that are open for submissions and knowing that maybe only half of them want the things that you're working on. But that's okay, because I would rather my work be valued at a place that actually wants it versus somewhere that accepts my work because it’s good, but doesn’t fit in with the rest of their catalogue.
How did you start your research for this?
Some online; I also looked at the acknowledgments section of the poetry books I like reading and saw which presses they’d been published in, checking if they were accepting full length manuscripts from unagented writers. There are also magazines that sometimes have roundups on their sites that explain that they’re not accepting submissions, but three of their friends are. Knowing your interests and your niche is really important to understanding where you might fit in most; that really helped me get a list and narrow it down.
Post-publication, how do you continue to engage with your community? And has this changed at all since you’ve been published?
It's definitely changed. Like I said, I was really active on Instagram, and I think a little bit to a fault. I was very accessible to a lot of people, which led to a very quick and hard burnout. The nature of social media and the way the algorithm can change at the drop of a hat can really leave you scrambling to figure out what to do next. It just wasn’t healthy for me and I had to reevaluate how I could continue to show up for the community but not feel like I was giving 115% of myself for a hundred or a thousand likes. Now, it’s a little bit different, especially after the pandemic. I have a friend/colleague, Caitlin Conlon, who I host writing retreats with twice a year. We open submissions, typically aimed at 18 to 35-year-old writers, and we write with them for a weekend and the point is to build community. During the retreat, we talk about our favourite poems and about the craft, we answer questions about how you can publish a collection and things that future authors may not know. We try to make it community oriented and create a family feel. Everyone has their own beds in a big house and we share meals together. There are two long workshops a day that Caitlin and I teach, and then we play games at the end of the night. It’s really fun and the setting has a bigger impact than if we were in a classroom, which has its time and place, but for people looking to make friends in the writing community it’s easier to do that in a space like the ones we create, versus when you’re in a room with fifteen other writers that you’re intimidated to talk to. In addition to that I’ve found a lot of events that I didn’t realise were happening. The local library and small bookshops host events with their book clubs and stuff like that. It’s terrifying to attend; it’s weird and small and awkward but I’ve been trying to force myself to go more because you meet some awesome people and some people that you wouldn’t expect and some people that are able to advocate for you if you ever need that. I still try to make myself available to people – because I know people have questions they want to ask – but less so on social media. I aim to have a more passive Internet presence and an active in person presence. Another thing that I do is keep a standing meeting in my calendar with a small group of friends. It’s a space we consistently show up to; we workshop poems or share things or work on submitting because maybe we haven’t submitted anything in two months and so we just use the hour to look at each other submit our work. Having a few people that hold you accountable can be really helpful as writers. It doesn’t have to be the whole Internet or people that you’re going out networking with. Even if you have a few friends in the community that have the same goals as you, they can help.
Ari B. Cofer (she/they) is a Black and queer poet, writer, and author of two poetry collections: Paper Girl and The Knives That Made Her and Unfold: Poetry + Prose under Central Avenue Publishing. Educated with a degree in Professional Writing from Baylor University, and currently in the middle of the Randolph MFA program to receive a master’s degree in Poetry, Ari’s work has curated an engaged audience of over 90K followers across social media platforms and has been featured on sites such as Buzzfeed and The Mighty. Her works highlight her mental health advocacy by writing on topics like depression, trauma, and recovery. She currently resides in the Pacific Northwest.
About the Books:
Paper Girl and The Knives That Made Her: published through Central Avenue Publishing on Jan. 4, 2022. “Fragile by nature but tough by circumstance, paper girls are shaped by their love and loss. This collection of poetry and prose describes the journey of learning to live fully through the messiness of life and tenuousness of mental health.” Major themes from this book include mental health (depression, trauma, suicide, self-harm, and more), sexual assault, love, relationships, and recovery.
Unfold: Poetry + Prose: published through Central Avenue Publishing On Feb. 7, 2023. “From the author of Paper Girl and The Knives That Made Her comes Unfold, a poetic, aching, and hopeful retelling of realizations made while on the journey to healing from both loss of love and loss of self. Through poetry and short essays, Unfold shows that true growth comes from being unafraid to face what’s hidden inside, to be vulnerable, and to be unashamed of what we find when we finally open up.” Major themes from this book include mental health (depression, trauma, suicide, self-harm, and more), familial relationships, recovery, friendship, and love. See ‘sunday phone call, reimagined’, a poem from Untold, below.
sunday phone call, reimagined
hey mom, do you ever get random aches in your knees? how long does it
last? only when it’s cold? arthritis? hereditary? mom, i was
kinda dizzy when i woke up this morning, and gerald says that happens
sometimes when people have anemia. do we have low iron? should i get
checked? what do i ask? mom, this is my fourth uti this
year and i don't know what i'm doing wrong. mom, i think
i'm doing everything wrong. mom, have i ever done anything
right? mom, if my only accomplishment is healing the body
you made for me, that’s not a life worth celebrating.
mom, i’m sorry. mom, I need you. mom, when
you were still my home, did you feel full or just swollen? mom, you
know i'm a poet. i'm just trying to ask if you wanted me.
mom, did you want me? mom, when i was sixteen, you
admitted you used to wish you daughter would be your best friend.
mom, if i can remember how to be a daughter, is it too late to
be your friend? mom, my head hurts.
mom, everything hurts and you’re the only person i ever want to tell.
mom, what happened to me? mom, something
happened and now i don’t want you around but i still need you close.
mom, why does it hurt to want you? mom, are you
listening, what happened?
why can i only remember the good times when the home videos are on?
why can’t i let you in when i don’t even remember pushing you out?
mom, what happened? mom, why am i like this?
did you pass this down to me?
did your mother pass it to you? mom, do you know
when it ends? mom, has it ever ended?
hey mom, do you remember that picture of me after i cut off all my hair?
when you said you’re starting to look less like your father and more like me.
mom, i am trying to look for myself and keep finding you.
do you have any time to talk?
