Poet Interview: Rachel Jeffcoat
Rachel Jeffcoat is a poet, writer and editor. She has had work published in Dear Damsels, Fourth Trimester Magazine and Huff Post. She lives in an old house in the South-East of England, with her family and approximately ten thousand books.
When did you become a poet? How did you know it was the right medium for your stories?
I’ve been scribbling forever, but I wrote my first ‘proper’ poem in early 2019. I’d been writing creatively for a decade: parenting blogs, opinion pieces. None of it quite fit after a while - I was so tired of watching trending topics like a hawk and trying to gin up an argument. The internet is a cacophony of persuasion, and some essayists are truly gifted and doing important work - but I needed something that would be fulfilling while also fitting into nap time. I could put my toddler to bed, sneak off to write a poem, and have it mostly hammered out by the school pick-up. That’s how it started. Then I became hooked.
What inspires you to write?
I love poetry because it’s the purest distillation of a small truth. I think a poem flies when it’s full of meaningful details: as a reader, each one strikes a note in you like a bell, and you feel seen, like some part of your convoluted life as a person in the world has been validated. Fundamentally you feel like you’re OK, that even your difficult patches are part of this beautiful, necessary, communal experience on earth. I love that feeling as a reader, and the process of creating it as a writer…whew. What a head-rush. I never get over it.
Who are some of your literary or artistic crushes or influences?
I discovered Wendy Cope at school, and that was the first time I realized poetry could be profoundly moving while also being funny and down-to-earth. Carol Ann Duffy was the next one: there’s no floweriness about her at all, and yet her poems are so powerful. These days I spend a lot of time with Maggie Smith, Ada Limón, Kate Baer, Lucille Clifton, Saeed Jones…and Mary Oliver is the godmother, of course. Poets who say devastating things in deceptively simple ways, and you only realize how much power there is when you find yourself flat on the floor.
What are you currently reading and is it a good read or not, why?
You know what, I’ve just gone back to Circe by Madeline Miller. Every time I’m in a bit of a stressful period, I think ‘hmm, it’s probably time to reread Circe’. The writing is dazzling – just technical brilliance all the way down, insightful characterization and satisfying plotting - and Miller’s created such a perfectly odd, spiky, resourceful, tender heroine. I’m always glad to meet her again, and spend some time in her company.
What are you working on next/what was your last project, and can you tell us a little about it?
I’m just coming to the end of ten years of being with children at home, and I’m really grappling with it: the things I’ll leave behind, the things I gave up, where I go next. I woke up one morning with a vivid image of myself as a curator, standing witness to my children’s childhoods, and logging away all the versions of themselves that they forget. It seemed to me that that was one of the most vital things I’ve done in the last decade. That turned into a poem called ‘Behind the Scenes at the Museum’ (with thanks to Kate Atkinson for the title). It felt like it resonated with lots of people – it’s always lovely to feel like you’re not alone.
What are some common themes you see in your own work?
I write a lot about parenthood, and all the issues and inner currents that go along with it – and I’m adamant that I’ll never apologize for it. I hate the way that this earth-shattering experience of birthing and raising another human is seen as a frivolous or amateurish subject for art. Why is romantic love ‘serious’ and parental love not? I don’t want to elevate motherhood into sainthood, or deal in hoary old clichés – I want to write about how it really is: transformative, expansive, shattering.
I also find myself preoccupied with memory at the moment. I keep going back to that image in Mrs Dalloway where Clarissa imagines herself lingering as part of places she’s lived and spent time, laid out like mist on a tree. I love writing poems where we telescope suddenly into the past and back out again, which is how we live our lives, of course, without realizing it.
Finally, I get a great deal of inspiration from living in the countryside. I find the slow rhythms of the turning seasons very comforting and hope those rhythms find their way into my poetry as often as possible.
Do you believe in writer’s block and how would you deal with it?
Every time I finish a poem, I worry I’ll never write another one. ‘Wherp, that was it, hope you enjoyed it while it lasted!’ I know some people advocate sitting down and forcing something out every day, but I’m not in a phase where I can do that right now – and, you know, I think there’s a lot of grace in the waiting. Sit quiet, read, be present in your life, really experience things…and when it’s ready, it comes.
Do you feel that sharing your poetry is a vulnerable process, and why do you feel that way?
It can be. I mean, in one sense, it always is. In order for the reader to feel something, what you’ve written about has to begin with you feeling something. There has to be a kernel of truthful emotion in there or the whole thing falls apart. But I think you can do that without being forced to be more confessional or exposing than you’re comfortable with. You can use an experience or an emotion and transfer it into a different scenario, and it will still ring right, because the truth is there. Connecting with an audience shouldn’t mean unpacking your privacies or traumas for their gratification.
What is the first book that made you cry, and why?
Goodnight Mister Tom. You know the bit. Are you kidding?! I sobbed into my ten-year-old pillow.
Do family and "real life" friends read your work, and how does that make you feel?
They do. It always makes me feel a bit of a fool! We have this image of poets as elevated figures, shut away in a study or striding away over the moors. And they know full well that I’m stood here supervising homework, scrolling Twitter and eating Nutella out of the jar. That’s a comparison I’m making, though, not them - thankfully they’ve never made me feel like an amateur, and they’ve always been incredibly supportive.
What is your writing process like?
I wish I had a more impressive answer for this, but maybe it’s better as it is: I have three small children, right, and I’m a freelance editor. I get three nursery sessions ‘off’ a week, and I try to spend one of them working, one of them writing, and one of them doing life admin. Almost always I get an idea for a poem at a time when I’m not scheduled to be writing. So I do a lot of first drafts in the Notes app on my phone – waiting in the school car park, even in the middle of the night. Then I rewrite and rewrite on my laptop, either at the kitchen table or sat up in bed. Sorry to any osteopaths reading this.
What is your revision process like?
My husband laughs at how long I think about line breaks. Was it Coleridge who spent a whole day dithering over a comma? I’m not that bad. But I like playing with half-rhymes, with alliteration, and I think a really good line break can knock the wind out of you. So once I’ve got my first draft, I transfer it into a Google Doc and start playing. It’s actually my favourite part. I have to force myself to let it go and post it because otherwise, I’d be tinkering forever.
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