José Hernández Díaz is a California prose poet who encapsulates the rhythms and movements of the West Coast while simultaneously channeling the legends of the form. Writers like Tate, Simic, Edson. Richard Garcia, Brian Barker.
Hernández Díaz spins modernity (Marlboros, skateboards, Pink Floyd shirts) with surrealism and folklore (skeletons, wolves, dragons) into paragraphs packed with a signature style both meditative and magical. There’s a hole to Hell. There’s an astronaut party. There’s a bush that turns you to ash or water, depending on the color of the rose.
With his debut chapbook, The Fire Eater, now out in the world through Texas Review Press, I felt it necessary to chat with a writer I’ve been admiring for a couple of years, who impresses me with each and every tiny fable.
Let's begin with an icebreaker. If you could visit any decade in any country, where and when and why?
Maybe the 60s in the U.S.A. When Charles Simic, Russell Edson, and James Tate were all writing. I wouldn’t want to go back to those times in terms of the social-political context, but just in the sense of writing poems and having readings w/ those three whom I consider to be my biggest idols in prose poetry. It would’ve also been nice to live in México pre-Cortés times.
Congrats on your debut chapbook! How has it been since its release earlier this year?
It started off really strong! It sold out of its first printing in the first week. I was stoked, for sure. The first reading for the book was a hit. Sold out of copies. Then AWP-San Antonio, my first, was the time of my life. Sold out of copies, too. I loved it. Can I release a book every year?
Understandably, once we all started going on lockdown, it has slowed down considerably, but there are more important things right now, like not dying. All of my readings for the book launch got canceled (I believe 6 readings), so that has been the hardest part. I have been selling copies online, though.
How old is the oldest poem in the chapbook and how recent is the most recent poem?
The newest prose poems in the book were written last spring 2019. The book was accepted summer 2019. The oldest prose poems are from 2016, I believe, maybe one or two from 2015. The majority of the collection was written from 2017-19.
Despite the chapbook's release and the time spent sending copies and focusing on promotion, have you still been able to write new work?
Yes. I went through a year and a half where I only wrote about seven new poems/prose poems. I just tried not to think about it and went about my business. Then I suddenly started writing early in the mornings. Making it part of my routine. I pretty much write every day right now. If I need to take a day or two or a couple weeks off, I’ll do that. I used to wait for the muse, though, when I started writing. Now, I look for her every morning before dawn, with a coffee and some breakfast.
Your prose poems seem to be full of your own experiences and your own identity yet contain many magical and surreal elements. Do you find yourself writing from your life and distorting it? Or do you often begin with a fiction and later include the 'you'?
Yes, both! Sometimes I start off with an everyday moment, like walking along the shore, and then something bizarre will happen. I think Richard Garcia said something like “Start at Oz (Wizard of Oz) and bring it home... or start at home and bring it to Oz.” I don’t consciously think about these things, I just follow each line. Improvising. I have a lot of respect for jazz musicians, guitarists, and rappers, for this reason. I do also have poems that are only about real life. Poems or odes to my family members or teachers or my neighborhood(s), childhood, etc. Those are included in the full-length and subsequent manuscripts. I wanted my first collection to be entirely prose poems.
Can you speak a bit on the rhythm and the repetition of including similar elements throughout your poetry (skeletons, Pink Floyd shirts, guitars, skateboards, cigarettes)?
I think it can be explained by thinking of Picasso’s various periods/moods. Rose Period. Blue Period. Etc. I’m not Pablo, but artists often work in moods or themes. Sometimes I write about skeletons in everyday settings. The man in a Pink Floyd shirt is another recurring character in my prose poems. He is a bit of a daydreamer and anything can happen in his poems. I also have a man in a Chicano Batman shirt prose poem series, where he’s a daydreamer, too, but also grounded in his neighborhood.
Guitars, skateboards, cigarettes, palm trees, are also imagery from growing up in Southern California, which I feel is often seen as a phony place. I try to bring grit, magical realism, humor, and nuance to writing about the area. Overall, I love working on a series of prose poems, but I just follow whatever mood or anxiety I might have that morning. It can be a word from a random book, like “sailor” or “moaned” and I’ll just improvise from there. You’d think I’d be good at free-style rapping, for this reason, but, sadly, I am not.
Are all of the pieces in The Fire Eater included in your full-length manuscript? Can you talk about that collection?
I would say that 50-70% of The Fire Eater is included in the full-length. I also have a lot of new prose poems that I’ve written since last summer that are included. I have first person prose poems from the past five years that are included in the full-length and omitted from The Fire Eater. The first half of this full-length manuscript is all poems (not prose poems) and odes to family, and growing up Chicano/ Mex-American in Northern Orange County and Southeast LA. So, it is more of a mixed bag than The Fire Eater, which is exclusively surreal prose poetry.
Besides that, I have another full-length collection that is about half-way or more finished. Finally, I have a chapbook manuscript of flash fiction/microficiton that I have to organize and submit.
Your prose poems are often narrative in style and feel like vignettes, like surreal snapshots. Poetic postcards. Or even, very very short stories. How do you view the classification of prose poem vs. microficiton vs. flash fiction?
I try not to focus on distinctions or labels. It is all writing to me or poetry, because that’s where I started to gain my voice as a writer. However, when I finish writing a particular piece, I tend to base it on word count to determine if it is a prose poem, flash or microficiton piece. I like the term hybrid literature. I’m not too strict, though, in terms of labels. It is more important about the quality or aesthetic. The rest is more of a technical matter.
Outside of your own work, who/what have you been reading recently? And what's the song/album/musician you've listened to the most during this lockdown?
I’ve been enjoying Felicia Zamora’s “Body of Render;” Diana Marie Delgado’s “Tracing the Horse;” always enjoy reading Tate, Edson, Di Giorgio, Gonzalez, Garcia, and all the surreal prose poets of the past and present. I can always read that work. Lately, though, I have been focusing on writing every day, instead of reading, which I don’t recommend for starters. Reading every day is the first step and more important, but I’ve read plenty, so right now I’ve been writing mostly and reading only about a book or two a month. For context, I used to read like 4-8 books a month [laughs] I don’t get out much.
As far as music, I have been listening to Odd Future: Tyler the Creator, Earl Sweatshirt, mostly, and Vince Staples. Those dudes are the main three rappers from SoCal that I listen to, along with of course, Kendrick Lamar and Nipsey Hussle. Sometimes, I’ll even just YouTube the beats from Odd Future, for example, and write to that. I like that spacey, trippy stuff for getting in the mood to write.
However, I like to mix it up. I was raised in SoCal with various influences, subcultures: also like every single Pink Floyd album, Chicano Batman, Lorde, Celso Piña, Ramon Ayala, Too Short, E40, Willie Nelson, Jessica Hernandez & the New Deltas, Roddy Rich, Southern Gospel (old school music I grew up with), John Prine, Johnny Cash, Rage Against the Machine (I grew up with), I could go on for a while but I’ll stop here.
If you can, provide a photo of your workspace (or describe with words). What are some essentials while you create?
For this ongoing author interview series, I'm asking for everyone to present a writing prompt. It can be as abstract or as concrete as you choose.
Write about a superpower that you have acquired by some strange or unknown circumstance. What is the superpower? It is actually something mundane like the ability to beat anyone at checkers? How do you use it or not? How does the superpower relate to the weather and season if at all?
Second, bonus prompt: write an ode, or thank you letter, to a favorite teacher or parent or activist or pastor, etc…
In closing, do you have any advice for writers trying to grow in their craft and/or get published? Or rather, what's something you would have like to have known when you first started taking your writing seriously?
First off, read what you like. Don’t feel obligated to like anything just because everyone else likes it or because it wins fancy awards. With that said, when I read James Tate and I loved it immediately, it didn’t hurt that he’d won a Pulitzer and National Book Award and plenty of other awards. So, this knowledge that I could write any type of poem or prose poem, like Tate, even subversive/absurdist work, gave me permission to write and explore whatever I wanted to write about.
On a more every day practical type of advice: submit more, read more, write in the morning (if possible) or whenever, but try to make it routine. Spread love and positivity. Don’t be a hater or comparing your success to others. It’s natural at times, but it can be depressing. I’ve been there before and it is lonely and gets you nowhere but misery. Write some reviews of books you love. Write some reviews of books you love. Write some reviews of books you love. Go to readings. Virtual or in the physical realm, if possible.
Lastly, if applicable, say thank you to your high school teachers, professors, parents, coaches, etc.
Any final thoughts / words of wisdom / shout-outs?
Don’t be the person that gives shitty scores on Goodreads out of spite. Don’t hate on people who publish more than you. When your time comes to publish/share your work, it will be lonely when no one cheers for you. Also, preaching, as you can see from my previous comments, gets annoying. No one is perfect. Instead, donate to your local food banks. Organize a reading online that will benefit people in need.
Shout outs: Steve Castro, Rodney Gomez, Kimberly Ann-Southwick, Alan Chazaro, Richard Garcia, Carol Potter, Buena Park, La Palma folks, Norwalk, South Whittier, Mrs. Weir, Mrs. Howe, all the high school English teachers, my family, including brother in laws, and my parents.
Lastly, thank you to you, Ben! I know this is a labor of love and I myself have projects that are labors of love and it takes a lot of time and dedication. You put a high quality, sincere interview series out there and we’re all grateful for it. Thank you!
