(this interview is exerpted from a Special Edition of my newsletter. "Wolfie" is my nickname in certain circles...hope you all enjoy this.)



RD "Raindog" Armstrong
By Anita L. Wynn

     I stumbled upon this man's work completely by accident, one day, long ago.  His work immediately struck me as particularly strong.  I started searching for more, but it was hard to find, here on the East Coast.  RD is a West Coast poet...specifically, he is from the busy melting-pot hive of Los Angeles. 
   
   RD Armstrong's writing, both prose and poetry, has had a profound influence on my thinking, and my own artistic endeavours.
He has, for the last ten years or so, published the quarterly Lummox Journal, and it was my distinct privilege earlier this year to have an article published in this magazine. He also operates the online e-zine DUFUS, which is a wonderful place to find new, strong, poetic works and voices.
     I began asking myself how I could expose more readers to RD's work.  I told everyone I knew about him.  Sent out copies of his poems in emails.  Then, I began this newsletter...and I thought, "Why not ask him if he will do an interview?"  So, extremely nervous, because this is one of my poetic heroes, after all, I sent him an email, inquiring whether he might be inclined to grant the readers of Pagan Poet's Review a view from his side of the fence.  To my relief, he agreed readily. 
     His voice will captivate you.  You have been warned.:)



"The Interview"
Wolfie:  RD, our readers may not be familiar with you and your work.  Would you tell us a little about how you came to be a poet?  Was there ever a "defining moment"?

RD:  Well, I started writing something that resembled free verse when I was in high school. As I remember it was pretty appalling, but I got a few poems published in the school newspaper or some such thing.  There weren’t any sort of creative writing courses back then and I sure hadn’t heard of the “small Press” though I do recall seeing some mimeo-type mags with poetry in them at the local independent book store that looked interesting. I even published an “underground” newspaper during my senior year but I don’t recall there being much poetry (if any) in them (in fact we only published two or three issues before I got suspended – so much for freedom of expression).  Some time in my senior year I started reading this column in Open City by this guy Charles Bukowski (Notes of a Dirty Old Man) and I couldn’t get enuf of the guy.  I started buying his books (same book store) and became an avid reader of his work.  I also read Ferlighetti (Coney Island of the Mind is still my favorite) and some other writers.  But BUK seemed to have it all and that was all I needed.  I still dabbled in writing but I doubt I wrote more than 20 poems over the next 20 years.  It just never sounded like it rang true.  I still hadn’t found my ‘voice’.  And I wasn’t involved with a poetry scene, either.  I liked music and I heard a lot of it over the years.  I dreamed of being “on stage” and being involved on some level, but I never imagined that it would ever really happen.  Then in 1989 (20 years after graduating from HS) I began to play in a band (I was a late-bloomer)!  It was so cool.  Three years later, I went to an open mic and heard people reading poetry as well as playing music.  I was blown away.  Around the same time I had begun to write again (I took a ten year hiatus because I had fucked up my life by abusing alcohol and felt that I had betrayed myself through writing, and couldn’t trust what I wrote as being in my best interest).  Lo and behold, I discovered that I had found a voice that I could believe.  I guess I had been picking up “work experience” and absorbing all that Buk during all those years and was finally reaping the benefits of all that seasoning.  Now it’s nearly eleven years since it started making sense and I’m still struggling to get the word out.  But that’s another essay.

Wolfie:  Have any of the classical or neo-classical poets influenced your poetry?

RD:  I’m not sure what a neo-classical poet is.  I like Sandberg, Frost and some of those obscure Chinese poets like Wei Po (but that all hangs on the translator – Kenneth Rexroth has done a good job).  But basically, I’m a literary stumblebum…completely self-taught.  I find something I like and I look to see who the author credits as influences and then I check them out.  And so on.  It’s the smorgasbord school of literary inquiry.  I’m sure if I would have had a formal education, it would be different.

Wolfie:  Do you believe it seems more difficult for a female to gain respect as a poet than it is for a male to do so?  Why or why not?

RD:  I’m not sure if that’s true, though I do know that there seems to be a lot more men involved in poetry.  I suppose that’s true of most of the arts.  It’s a man’s world, so they say; which if you think about it, is kinda silly, since most of what men do is a thinly-veiled attempt to impress some woman.  It’s that whole peacock phenomena (you spend 9 months trying to get out and the rest of your life trying to get back in – to put it crudely).  I don’t know much about the rarefied air you breathe up there in the ivory tower, there seems to be some sort of bubble that protects the vaunted halls of academe.  Women seem to do better there, but it’s still lopsided in favor of men. In my opinion, it’s a stupid obstacle that forces women to go to strange lengths to succeed: like writing like or as a man.  That’s BS.  A good writer can place her/himself in anyone’s shoes and write convincingly, regardless of age, gender, race or creed; in spite of how PC that may or may not be.

Perhaps, the problem rests on the shoulders of those who publish the work in the first place.  And, usually, these people are men.  And again, it has a lot to do with what the perceived climate of salability is…you know, the old bottom line (and the bottom line is just a reach-around from you know where). 

Forgive my over-simplication of this, but I am so far removed from this concern that it’s easy for me to make broad (no pun intended) sweeping judgments about this topic.  Most of the so-called established poets wouldn’t give me the time of day, male or female.  I may be a wag, but I hold sway over a VERY small pond in the greater waterway that is poesy. 

Wolfie:  Your poems are very "visual", and have great visceral concrete imagery. Yet, you use very plain language, not flowery or overtly "poetic" language. Would you tell us how you came to make this choice?

RD:  That’s easy.  I “cut my teeth” on BUK.  He is decidedly, or at least was for the most part, a user of plain language.  He, as Gerald Locklin once wrote, celebrated the art of the ordinary.  Sure, he’s noted for being crude, but some of the most beautiful poems I have ever read were written by him as well.  I think you have to read a great deal of his writing to see through the Bukowski-hype (I’ve got about forty of his books, so I think I have done my research).  BTW, people seem to make the mistake that I was a friend of his, that we hung out and got drunk and chased all the skirt in town…but this is simply not true.  I could have tried to be a friend of his, but preferred to observe from the cheap seats.  Buk wasn’t a nice guy.  I’m sure he had his moments, but I know I would have been picked off as a poser in a matter of minutes.  No, I was a fan of the writer, not the person.

Wolfie:  Do you write anything besides poetry?  If so, what?

RD:  Oh, I write a lot more than poetry (in fact, these days, it seems like I’m writing everything but poetry). When one becomes known as a Small Press wag, it becomes important to be as articulate as possible, since others put so much stock in what you write.  For instance, I wrote an essay a month for eight years for my, now defunct, magazine The Lummox Journal.  Then I wrote one every other month for three more years for the same mag.  I also wrote reviews and articles.  I’ve written some fiction (in fact I have a collection of micro-fiction called The Manx Tales, that I published a few years ago), and some nasty stories (some call it erotica, but I think it leans in the direction of psychotica) that will most likely never see the light of day (with my luck somebody will find them after I’m dead and publish them or desecrate my grave for being such a colossal chauvinist pig – thus elevating himself in the eyes of his girlfriend).

Wolfie:  How do you feel about literary critics, in general?  Do you feel that they should determine the direction of poetry?

RD:  If there’s a buck to be made off poetry, it’s bound to be in the critiquing / teaching of the stuff.  There’s a sucker born every minute and most people want to be shown what to think, buy, appreciate, vote for.  They want a warm place to shit, loose shoes and sex that’s at least tolerable, but mostly what they want is to find the path of least resistance.  And because of this desire for ease, they gratefully look to others to tell them what’s hot and what’s not.  Can you blame them?  And as to critics…opinions are like assholes, you know?  Everyone is entitled to their opinion – it’s part of our heritage as Americans, right?  Who is to say that one critic knows more than the next – if you believe in your work, that’s really what counts.  The rest of that noise is just some literary circle jerk…or as Shakespere wrote: it’s a tempest in a teapot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

Wolfie:  What advice would you give a writer who is just at the beginning of their career?

RD:  I don’t know if my advice is worth much since I feel I’m still lost in the woods, myself.  My best advice is to stand by your words.  It may not help you get published, but in the end, you’ll have your respect.

Your peers…well that’s another matter. 

Writing is an act that is personal; between you and your muse/god.  What you do with it after that is another matter.  But if the work is not solid, if you are not at one with your work (that is to say, believe in yourself – because there are plenty who will try to tear you down), you might as well piss into the wind for all it will matter.  Or join a band.  Or get an MFA and teach your dreck to some gaa-gaa eyed kids who will dote on your every word. 

Wolfie:  Thank you very much, RD.  We appreciate it a great deal.




Link to RD Armstrong's website and available works:

www.lummoxpress.com

Enjoyed this immensely!

For my money RD stands shoulder to shoulder with Locklin and Lifshin.  it was a great honor for me to have him write the introduction to my latest book. 
The line of books he publishes in his Little Red Book series (49 titles to date, with the most recent being by Glenn Cooper) is a must-have for any serious readers.
Thanks, Anita, for spreading the word on a writer who deserves more attention.
john

you're very welcome.  It was a great honor for me to have him do this interview.  He's so humble...and such a great poet.  He, as they said of Michelangelo, has a strong fist.  some of his stuff will tear your heart out.

It has been very pleasant to read this interview. I am grateful to you, Anita, for sharing it.
Vasile

Anita,

I want to add my two cents to the petals of thanks for this interview. I suspect Jay will be tap dancing when he gets back from where ever he is. He has been proding others to step out and interview some of the poets shaping the landscape these days and you've done a terrific job. I have to admit that I am not as familiar with RD as I would like to be and have found various online publishing's of his work, thanks to you.

But what I really wanted to tell you was that your questions seemed to open up RD to get at the stuff that shapes his poetry. It's that stuff I think is extraordinarily helpful to other poets still clearing the throat. It's the kind of stuff that well written criticism can do to the thinking cap.

Well done.

Isn't reading exciting!

larry

LOL--yes it certainly is.  Now, if I could only disabuse him of this notion that I'm somehow tied to academia...don't know where he got that idea.
   I've been reading his poetry for about 9 years now.  I tried to get inside his head, a little, when I was planning out the questions.  It took me days to figure out not only what to ask, but HOW to ask it.  I've never worked so hard on written work in my life!!!  LOL.  He's right up there with my other heroes...my Poetic Pantheon, as it were.  I"m not starry-eyed about him, but I do my level best to look at what he writes, how he writes it, how he presents it, and I tried to honor that while I was interviewing him.  I'm happy that you enjoyed the read, and happy, too, that you're getting acquainted with his writing.  I really think he needs more recognition.  Deserves it.  Thanks for the compliments.

Hope you can convince RD to join us here, Anita. Nice interview.