{"id":251,"date":"2020-05-20T08:49:32","date_gmt":"2020-05-20T00:49:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/welter\/?p=251"},"modified":"2021-06-17T17:51:44","modified_gmt":"2021-06-17T21:51:44","slug":"conversations-with-the-contributors-shirley-brewer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/welter\/2020\/05\/20\/conversations-with-the-contributors-shirley-brewer\/","title":{"rendered":"Conversations with the Contributors: Shirley Brewer"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Poet Shirley Brewer<\/p><\/div>\n

Shirley Brewer is a Baltimore poet and the author of three collections of poetry. Here, she discusses her path to poetry and finding inspiration in the pandemic era.<\/p>\n

Why did you decide to submit to Welter<\/em>? <\/strong>
\n<\/span>I’m in a poetry group with Kendra Kopelke, the [University of Baltimore] professor of creative writing who retired a year ago. She always reminds us in the group when Welter is accepting submissions. I\u2019ve been in it before, and I thought, well, time to submit again. <\/span><\/p>\n

You\u2019re a graduate of the University of Baltimore\u2019s creative writing MFA, right? <\/strong>
\n<\/span>I had graduated from UB in 2005. [Welter<\/em>] has really evolved since I was at UB. It\u2019s definitely come a long way. It\u2019s really a very nice publication. When you think of journals that come and go, the longevity of it is very good. It\u2019s a great experience if you\u2019re there as a student, too, to work on a literary journal. <\/span><\/p>\n

Were you studying and writing poetry before you came to UB?<\/strong>
\n<\/span>I didn’t really study poetry, but I’ve always loved reading it, so I was just writing it on my own.  I’ve always had poets in my family, so I’ve been exposed to poetry since I was young. When I was a speech therapist, I used poems a lot with my students–Shel Silverstein and that kind of thing. But before I retired from the school system, I went back to take some workshops in creative writing at Maryland Hall for the Creative Arts and Anne Arundel Community College. I decided that I wanted to study this further, and I moved into Baltimore, and I haven\u2019t stopped since. I\u2019ve just immersed myself in it completely. Poetry has brought me a great deal of satisfaction, and I plan to keep writing it forever. <\/span><\/p>\n

Can you talk a little bit about the poem that you decided to submit, \u201cGift Shop on the Arctic Circle?\u201d <\/strong>
\n<\/span>I have a friend, Don, and we used to teach together years ago when we were in our twenties. He has traveled more than any other person that I know, and I always kid him when he travels–you know, \u201cMake sure you\u2019re near a gift shop so you can buy me presents.\u201d He\u2019s been everywhere you could possibly imagine. So he said he had this trip planned and was going to the Arctic Circle, and I said \u201cWell, wait a minute. I don\u2019t think they have any gift shops on the Arctic Circle.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

As soon as I said that, a bell went off in my head. I thought that would be a cool title for a poem. I was thinking about everything that was going on in the news before the pandemic with politics and all of that, and I thought it would be kind of nice to just get away from all that. <\/span><\/p>\n

You said that was before the pandemic. Have you been doing much writing in isolation? <\/strong>
\n<\/span>No, I’m not. I’ve written three pandemic poems, none of which would be anything I would ever submit anywhere. But I’ve been working a lot on poetry–reading a lot, reading journals. I have two manuscripts that I\u2019ve already written that I\u2019ve been working on, and I\u2019ve been working on poems over the phone with other poets. So I\u2019ve been doing poetry things, but I haven\u2019t been writing new work. <\/span><\/p>\n

Ada Lim\u00f3n<\/span> is one of my favorite poets, and when she’s not writing,  she calls it the gathering time.  I love that and have adopted it, because I think that’s what I’m doing. I know some things will come out of [the pandemic], but as far as writing, I’m not putting pressure on myself. <\/span><\/p>\n

That\u2019s wonderful. Stay well, and thank you for submitting. <\/strong>
\n<\/span>I\u2019m looking forward to getting the journal! <\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Shirley Brewer is a Baltimore poet and the author of three collections of poetry. Here, she discusses her path to poetry and finding inspiration in the pandemic era. Why did Continue Reading →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3561,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/welter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/welter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/welter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/welter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3561"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/welter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=251"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/welter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1433,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/welter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/251\/revisions\/1433"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/welter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=251"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/welter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=251"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubalt.edu\/welter\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=251"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}