Contributor Spotlight: Diane K. Martin
Diane K. Martin’s poem “Shocking the Well” is featured in Issue 75 of the Bellingham Review.
What would you like to share with our readers about the work you contributed to the Bellingham Review?
I lived in San Francisco for thirty-six years, and for twenty-four of those years my living room bay window looked out on the Pacific Ocean. In November 2012, we moved to western Sonoma County, which I love for many reasons, but our view is wholly blocked by a large ornamental plum tree that blooms pink in early spring. And we have our own well, which requires maintenance. When my friend emailed to ask me how I was adjusting to my new surroundings, these factors were very much on my mind.
Tell us about your writing life.
I’ve always written, even as far back as grade school, although of course there have been periods when what I produced was scant, but even then, I was always thinking writing. Like many, I was occupied by being a mother for years, and just surviving financially has been a concern. And I’ve had some serious health issues. But I think I’ve always been obsessed just by words, reading, and writing, and by the other arts and by women’s struggles to be acknowledged as serious artists.
Which non-writing aspect(s) of your life most influences your writing?
My husband is a photographer and has taught me to really see the world around me. I’ve learned that by framing what you see, choosing how and what you impart to the viewer or reader, you make the work of art.
What writing advice has stayed with you?
I like what Neil Gaiman says, “The main rule of writing is that if you do it with enough assurance and confidence, you’re allowed to do whatever you like.”
What is your favorite book (or essay, poem, short story)? Favorite writer(s)?
I can’t do one favorite, but I’ll list some of the writers who have influenced me: TS Eliot, Virginia Woolf, Jorge Borges, Sylvia Plath, Elizabeth Bishop, Wallace Stevens, William Matthews, Yusef Komunyakaa, Brigit Kelly, Lucia Perillo, Dean Young, Michael Ondaatje, and Robert Hass.
What are you reading right now?
Hah! I started this past summer intent on reading Swann’s Way (Proust), but I confess I got only halfway through it. I read Rebecca Solnit, Peg Pursell’s Show Her A Flower, A Bird, A Shadow, Lowell’s sonnets, two mystery novels, multiple New Yorker magazines. I also read poems by Dean Young, John Ashbery, Gregory Orr, Megan O’Rourke, Lisel Mueller, W.S. Merwin, D. Nurkse, and Harryette Mullen. And I loved Lillian Howan’s The Charm Buyers.
What project(s) are you working on now, or next?
I need to publish my second collection, Hue & Cry, but I am currently assembling and working on my third collection, Tongue & Groove.
Anything else our readers might want to know about you?
Where can our readers connect with you online?
I used to have a website and blog, but don’t currently. You can find me on Facebook: Diane Kirsten Martin.
DIANE K. MARTIN’S poems have appeared in American Poetry Review, Kenyon Review, Field, Harvard Review, New England Review, Zyzzyva, and many other journals and anthologies. Her work was included in Best New Poets and received a Pushcart Special Mention. Her first collection, Conjugated Visits, a National Poetry Series finalist, was published in 2010 by Dream Horse Press. She lives in western Sonoma County with her photographer husband and her dog.
Featured Image: “Well” by synx508