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Writing from the Scar: Brandi Bird on Poetry, Recovery, and Identity (Live at the Book Warehouse)
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Content Note: This episode discusses disordered eating. If you’re in recovery or feeling vulnerable, please prioritise your well-being.
This week on a very special episode of Friendless, host James Avramenko sits down with poet Brandi Bird for a deep dive into creativity, recovery, and self-discovery. The conversation explores the messy realities of writing and publishing poetry, the impact of external validation, and the importance of allowing time and distance between lived experience and creative transformation.
Brandi discusses their own journey through eating disorder recovery and how it shapes their work, approaches to confessional writing, and the ways truth, persona, and vulnerability intersect in poetry. The two tackle topics such as perfectionism, the pressures of literary recognition, and the liberation found in writing for oneself rather than for approval.
They also reflect on the power of oral tradition, stage presence, and shared first drafts, as well as the nuances of exploring difficult family relationships—particularly with mothers—within art. The conversation turns to broader issues including medical bigotry, Indigenous identity, community, and what it means to move beyond victimhood to agency.
From pop culture to personal struggles, this episode is an honest, witty, and intimate look at the intersections of art, healing, and being unapologetically oneself.
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Transcript
Brandy's Writing Routine and Professional vs. Personal Writing
00:00:08
Speaker
Well, we are once again back live in the book warehouse. And this week I am joined by poet Brandy Bird. How are you today? I feel great. I had a long day of writing.
00:00:23
Speaker
copy at my job. Oh no. No, I like Do you? Okay. really like it. yeah I listen to like hard techno in the morning but as soon as I wake up and then go to work at my little couch desk. Yep. And today I wrote a bunch of emails to send out to potential donors. Fabulous. And the newsletter for tomorrow. And it was, it was so fun. Is there something so cathartic about having your newsletter done early? Yeah. Like when it's like on time and you can put aside just so that the next day you can just hit send and go. like i also just, you I like the like very rote, turn your brain off writing practice that like my job gives me my professional job outside of the creative life that
Challenges and Critiques in Poetry
00:01:10
Speaker
I've built. Um,
00:01:13
Speaker
There's low stakes. And it goes through so many different people people's hands or eyes before it gets like published. And when i'm and so poetry is is supposed to be like that, but it often isn't.
00:01:27
Speaker
Big time. Big time. Yeah. yeah So sometimes you will publish or I will publish something that I'll look back on in a few months or years and be like, oh, that definitely wasn't ready.
00:01:39
Speaker
Right. And it went through some eyes, but it definitely was not ready. I really jumped the gun because I wanted that $20. Right. Right. Yeah. Okay. You have just unlocked a completely separate can of worms. I'm so grateful for you talking about because that's something that I've been really mulling over, not only in my own writing, but just in a lot of reading a lot of poetry that's coming out.
00:02:04
Speaker
How I frame this without sounding judgmental of some people? Because I don't want it to sound like I'm like, oh, you shouldn't. E-judgmental. Okay. Okay. You know what? Screw it. Let's go hard. Sometimes I'll read... stuff I've written and you know and if and i've I've published or stuff that other people have written. and i' And I'll have this feeling of like, did no one else read this?
00:02:23
Speaker
like Or did you did you not take any advice on this? And it gives me the impression of, I don't know if they just didn't get pushback on it or if it was that it felt right in the moment because sometimes you get really caught up in the sort of this the instinctual element of writing poetry and the sort of the just natural, it just feels like something.
00:02:44
Speaker
And then you look back and you're like, oh, i could have I could have maybe put a little bit more chisel work into it. you know Well, I think often for me, the problem is I don't give myself enough time. Sure. So I'm very excited well, in the last few years, I've been very, very excited when I'm writing new drafts. And I'll i'll i'll take a poem and write it and edit it over a month. But really what I needed was six months in a drawer. that it brings. Yeah. And then look back on it and be like, oh, okay, this is the key to unlock
Artistic Inspiration and Misogyny in Art
00:03:17
Speaker
this poem. Yeah. And change something.
00:03:20
Speaker
But I think there is value in like iterative practice with publishing. um Like I... I ah oftentimes, because publishing is so slow, it's like I will have said yes to publish something five months ago, and then it comes out, and it's that poem's already been ripped apart and put back together again. of course.
00:03:43
Speaker
So it really... I don't know. I think that's also valuable. It's what I really like is going on a poet's web website and looking at their like publication history and going through that and comparing the poems on there to their, the poems in their books. It's my favorite thing to do. yes And seeing how they changed. Yeah.
00:04:05
Speaker
And... that's important too. I think I really like, I really, i personally, i think people should feel comfortable sharing first drafts with like trusted people.
00:04:16
Speaker
Um, I like i ah sometimes will post first drafts on my close friend stories on like Instagram. yeah Just be like, witness this yeah that I just created. And then i will look back on that story in like four hours and be like, oh my God, I should probably hide forever. out there yeah But like i but but like I am proud of of like the, come like not compulsion, that sounds...
00:04:44
Speaker
bad, but like, I think it is exciting and we should celebrate just creation itself. one hundred percent. I'm a big believer in the idea of instinctual art, at at the very least, as you're guiding light. You know, maybe as you you know as you say, I think once you've kind of iterated and you've really chipped away at it and you figured out what am I actually trying to say here? i come, you know, I was as a young artist, I was really influenced by David Lynch and the way that he would talk so openly about like just following the impulse and just, you know,
00:05:14
Speaker
not almost not trusting yourself with the first thought but allowing yourself to keep going deeper and just following the the pull you know and and yeah it's a lot easier to pull back than who push forward that's just it right you know and you know and then he went on to you know he was making films and and paintings and music and he also rescued five woody woodpecker dolls from a lake which I think is really exciting I think that's incredible don like he's he's you know he's he's good man, you know? He did have like five wives and none of them have have publicly scolded him, so. That's something I have thought about a lot. I've thought about the... I think he's like, oh my god, this is such a funny tangent, but like he's such a character to me because he is so on paper such a misogynist and yet everyone who's worked with him just would glow about him and all of his ex-wives would glow about him and was just like...
Personal Growth and Therapy
00:06:11
Speaker
Yeah, it's like a really interesting conversation to be had about like misogyny in his work. And I like that guy. Oh, yeah. we all I mean, i'm so I'm sure there's shit in my stuff that not to the scale because it's not yeah like maybe like 300 people read a read poetry. sure Yeah, i I think that's important too. Yeah.
00:06:30
Speaker
Yeah. Before we get any deeper, i want to circle back. I try to open my, I just love following these threads. I think this is is going to be a really fun conversation because we can kind of yes and, you know, but, but I like to try and open conversations with ah a simple question of, of Brandy, who the hell are you?
00:06:49
Speaker
How dare I? I am. i don't know i mean i am At heart, a scared little weirdo who spent their entire life thinking they were like an outcast and just like awkward and strange and too intense and obsessional.
00:07:13
Speaker
ah And just bizarre in a way that's never been seen before, but it derogatory, you know. And now I feel very much more comfortable in in like that uncertainty about who I am. um I'm doing this psychodynamic therapy right now. That's like, like it's not somatic based. I mean, it's not somatics, but it is sort of like somatics where I'm like relearning how to feel emotions in my body. And so that and includes like joy. Yes. Which I did not realize I was not experiencing.
00:07:52
Speaker
um I feel way like much happier with myself. yeah When I started my MFA at UBC like three years ago, ah people were like, oh, you're so funny. You're so funny. Wow, you're so funny. You're so charming. And i was like, no one's ever told me that before. And...
00:08:12
Speaker
and So now it's is I feel like I'm going to believe it and just be like, yeah, I am funny and I am charming. And I'm even and I'm and i'm doing something really
Stage Presence and Oral Tradition in Poetry
00:08:22
Speaker
scary. I'm challenging myself to take a stand up comedian meet comedy course with Aaron Reed.
00:08:29
Speaker
At Little Mountain. Amazing. Aaron Reed, one of the comedians the city. I love Aaron. Oh, my God. Incredible. Great guy. Yeah. Also, like, he talks about mental health in a really interesting way, like OCD.
00:08:41
Speaker
um i I'm really excited to learn and be humbled. Like, I want to be humbled by someone who's, like, so much funnier and so much wittier, quicker than me because I haven't done something that's really scared me for a long time. Like, when I...
00:08:57
Speaker
got the email that I could take the course. I didn't tell anyone. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And it was like, I'm not going to tell anyone because then I'll have to do it. Right. Of course. And because like, it's it's like, I'm only not going to do it because I'm a coward. Right. right But it turns out I'm not a coward. You're not. I'm taking it. Maybe I'll die. you know there' there's there's um I was reading, i think my partner sent this to me, but, but at the start of the year know everybody always does their news resolutions and i always talk about how i i never do resolutions i if i do anything i do like uh this is something i'm gonna get worse at this year kind of thing but um but uh they sent me this thing that was basically talking about how um when we tell someone our plan to do something we get the exact same sort of like dopamine rush we would get if we actually did the thing so that's often why we don't follow through on our resolutions because we're like well i said i would eat healthier so i feel good enough and so
00:09:51
Speaker
There is something to be said. Like, you set a resolution for yourself and you just do it and you just do it because you want to, right? You know? I mean, my... have sabotage yourself by doing this. Well, yeah. I told my partner. My partner made me like, don't... This is something that could be useful to you. Yes. Even in poetry. Big time. The construction and the... Yeah, and like connections.
00:10:13
Speaker
and And also like stage presence. I really, really value stage presence. Mm-hmm. like as a poet because it is like an oral practice like you like when i'm writing poetry i'm constantly talking out loud which is very annoying for other people around me um but i'm like constantly recording myself reading it and then i i can hear where because my work is like very sonic sonic forward it feels good to say even though it might be ugly on the page um
00:10:50
Speaker
And so I think that's just another way that form is important yeah in poetry. It's like you you have like a villanelle or whatever on the page. It looks a certain way, but then you read it and it sounds a certain way too. It comes to life. Yeah. Literally, Will and I were having this conversation just the other day, was trying to explain that you don't necessarily have to understand the poet's intention.
00:11:13
Speaker
Because I always see poetry as essentially it's like pop music. It's like you hear a song and, you know, you don't have to like and understand every song, but you hear a song and you like it for whatever reason, whatever it is that resonates to you. And I think something that we forget is that poetry comes from an oral told spoken audio tradition. You know, we were telling each other poems before we had ever written them, you know, and, and, and so, um,
00:11:40
Speaker
your book of poetry is only kind of half of the process. It's sort of like you're being given the key, but you have to still walk through the door and the door is like, hear it and listen. So it's, you know, it's it's very much that process of of of bringing it back to life to to hear the other side, right? Yeah. and Yeah. Like I think a lot of where reading suffer is when i think there are some people who don't practice their...
00:12:10
Speaker
cadence or their control of sound. And sometimes it's just not possible. Sure. Um, because, i don't know, something feels so like anxiety can take over. Sometimes you just go blank on a stage, which has happened to me, certainly, many times before. I've had panic attacks before readings.
00:12:28
Speaker
and and Especially like i you know and like, you know, and when I used to do slams and stuff like that, and what you'd be kind of like judged if you had your poetry in front of you, you know, like, who it is, you know? And so it's like you get up on stage and then suddenly you're like, it's gone. Right. You know, and and yeah those are always fun. Oh, my guy never did slam. I went to. i wish I hadn't. They're awful. dead. I went to one slam poetry thing when i was ah cafe de sole
00:13:01
Speaker
and it really intimidated me and i never went back It's nothing. ah I think there's certain, there's like some former slam poets who like have become like page poets, like Dennis Smith, yeah who just have incredible stage presence yeah or like Tommy Pico has incredible stage presence.
00:13:23
Speaker
Mm-hmm. And my friend Selena. And her stage presence inspires me so much. It's like she can... It's like she warms the air in the room. And it's like there's a light on her. yeah um And I really aspire to have that of energy when I'm on stage. Okay, so I have you know i have these like kind of like planned questions. i you know I read through this a couple times, and I have to admit, i I struggled to find an angle, not because I was like, oh, you know, but because I was like, it triggered a lot of different thoughts in me that I wasn't sure where to go with it. So, you know, we obviously won't have time for all the questions, but, you know, we'll we'll see what we can kind of scratch out here. um
00:14:05
Speaker
One of them was actually,
Brandy's Poetry Collections: Themes and Processes
00:14:06
Speaker
you know, this is the second collection that you've that you've published after. do you pronounce it the All Plus Flesh or All End Flesh? I let people do what they want. It is supposed to be the all plus flesh because it's the etymology of the word pancreas.
00:14:25
Speaker
Pan and creas. yeah I love it. oh That's fantastic. you know And that won you know the Indigenous Voices Award. was nominated for the Governor General's. that... did that kind of bring extra weight as you were sort of walking into writing this second book? You know, did it feel like that land on you as you were planning on writing this one? Or were you just not thinking about that at all? I, The All Plus Flesh felt very painful to write. Not like emotionally or anything.
00:14:56
Speaker
Just like I was very anxious about it because I wanted it to be received well. okay I wanted external validation and I got it. And that's awesome for me, but not great for my growth. So this one as like a person, I guess. So Pitiful, I really.
00:15:13
Speaker
oh well, Pitiful was written almost like the skeleton that was written in like two months, just like not thinking about it. I didn't even know if I was going to publish it. Mm hmm.
00:15:25
Speaker
And i think I just felt an energy and I wanted to... well This is like... i think it felt freeing because i was writing it for myself and I think I was writing The All Plus Flesh because I think I thought...
00:15:42
Speaker
it was time for me to release a book and not that I was ready to release a book. Sure. Um, I had just, I had had some conversations with people and like strike. Well, the iron is hot.
00:15:53
Speaker
Well, people know your name and they don't, they like do it. And, um, So I did it. And I mean, that book is very difficult for me because it's also a book I wrote be and I feel the tension and resentment in it because i it was, it's like a coming of age queer poets book where I talk about my family and,
00:16:16
Speaker
ah I don't know, being uncomfortable yeah yeah in my life. yeah And I feel that in the poems when I read them back. And I don't like, I don't like that. I feel like I should have gone with my instincts and ran towards the things that made me uncomfortable and that I thought were interesting instead of what I thought other people wanted to hear.
00:16:42
Speaker
um And I think one of the things that I like about Pitiful, I actually enjoy, not to say I don't like my first book, but with Pitiful, what I like about it is that I didn't want to perform anything. Yeah, yeah.
00:16:57
Speaker
In fact, I kind of wanted to be gratuitous. And maybe that's its own type of performance. But like, I wanted to just be... funny and gross and sexual and talk about things that I hadn't seen being talked about in poetry, like indigenous poetry specifically. Whereas like, like, like eating disorders, they're really disgusting things.
Confessional Elements and Personal Narratives in Poetry
00:17:20
Speaker
yeah And we sort of only have this very like teacup version of what an eating disorder is.
00:17:27
Speaker
And actually it's like having terrible breath because your body's starving. And that's just a reality. Like Ariana Grande right now, her breath, you know, it's rancid. but but so yeah um And that's just the same. Yeah. That's sad. And it's disgusting. We should know about this.
00:17:46
Speaker
so I wrote about it. And the idea of like. oh my God. The idea of of. giving some kind of almost compulsive expression to things that we're aware of, but we aren't always. That was something that I really found myself coming back to you as I was reading through it, is this idea of you were creating these connections to that some things that I was very familiar with and things and some things that I wasn't.
00:18:10
Speaker
But you were finding these overlaps that were suddenly, you know, sometimes in writing like this, You have those moments where it's almost like a remembering, not a learning, you know, and you're like, oh, that's how I could have said it. And that's how, right? You know, and and that to me is sort of, that's one of the magic tricks of poetry, I think, is is those moments of recognition rather than. Rather than discovery. Yeah. Yeah. It's like something deeper, right? It's those moments that feel like it feels like you're tapping into something deeper and you're like, yeah. Oh, right. how How could I have forgotten that? you know And and um and i feel like that's an experience I have while reading a lot of poetry. And it's definitely an experience I had while reading this poetry.
00:18:49
Speaker
So... This book itself, it didn't strike me as it was in itself a clear-cut memoir, but there's obviously, you know, a deeply confessional element. And on top of that, you're also exploring everything, mythology to pop culture to, you know, kind of experiential, the gamut of experiences, you know?
00:19:13
Speaker
I think often about this piece of a writing of advice i was I got, which was to write from the scar, not from the wound, you know? And I think that builds into, the I've got a few questions around that, but to start with, how do you feel like you know when a real experience you've had is ready to be transformed into some kind of poetic form?
00:19:39
Speaker
when I don't have the compulsion to totally tell it as it happened. of I've been recovered from my eating disorders for eight years now. And I used to have this like very, i i would I would start writing poetry or nonfiction and I'd have to get it right. I'd have to get it to what it actually felt like. And it's like, I i didn't realize at the time that I couldn't get it right. yeah No one can. yeah And that's not the point of of like art, of poetry, is to get it right to life. We live life. That's what happens. yeah and
00:20:17
Speaker
And like art is just... book like The art I'm making or trying to make is... is about the it's like the parallel version of myself.
00:20:30
Speaker
So like there is a like persona is really important to me in my work. ah Like the person in this book is not me. and is me, um but slanted a little bit. yeah ah And so everything, like like I think a lot of my friend, Sophie, Sophie Crocker, she is a poet and also she's a one of the editors at Poetry Trapper Keeper. She interviewed me and she asked me about vulnerability. And I said, well, everything in Pitiful is a choice and it's emotionally manipulative, like all art is.
00:21:07
Speaker
But I'm choosing to do that like and that. I could have taken any of these poems out, any of these lines out, any of these words out, and I didn't. And I kept them in for a reason. The reason is sort of for the reader to figure out or or in in like feel for themselves. yeah Yeah. yeah
00:21:28
Speaker
So paying attention to yourself is you know something that my show has been pretty preoccupied with. you know The idea of like really... really getting to understand what is this about. you know And I'm curious, in your in your experience of, because of work,
00:21:46
Speaker
because of of this because this work You know, like you say, it's not necessarily like a not necessarily a true story, but it's it's an exploration still of of truth, right? um um Do you find that that... Does that feel like a more liberating process or does that feel like it's harder to move past the experience um um that you keep on kind of creatively returning to? Sure.
00:22:13
Speaker
Oh, I feel like I couldn't write this book if I wasn't already past it. Yeah. Yeah. would i i I don't I have no triggers anymore. eating disorders Except for losing weight, which is like but that's because if if like I'd sick and I'm like can't eat a lot in a week and I i lose some weight or whatever, then I get a little bit scared. But it's it's sort of like far enough away that I'm like, oh, that's an emotion I'm having and a reaction to this that is totally unrelated to what's happening in the now.
00:22:47
Speaker
But there's no words or pictures or anything I could read or see. that would trigger me. sure So I'm not sort of like this. This is just i like I've lived many of these experiences with the memories and therapy and I feel super comfortable with it. And I think it's it's it. That's what that's why I'm writing about it. Yeah.
00:23:12
Speaker
ah I really don't think like when I was actively like I still had an eating disorder when I started writing poetry for the first time I so i was at Douglas College taking my first poetry class with Elizabeth Baczynski and she was actually the first person who was like you could be a poet you should try that. bless her I love her she's great.
00:23:34
Speaker
ah but she ah she also so also how dare you you know yeah how dare she but she like I was still very sick and I tried to write poetry about it and it just came out as like metaphor gibberish yeah yeah because I was trying because like You either are trying to talk around it or you're just saying the thing. Yeah. Neither works. Yeah. Neither works. It's like I got to, like, there's tons of, like, things that I guess are lies in Pitiful. But does that matter? No.
00:24:06
Speaker
That's all right. So... In post memory, you know, which which really struck me as one of the kind of like spine, you know, spinal columns of of the book, the the the narrator, the speaker, you know, they're they're in a psych ward, which, you know, my money is one of the more extreme forms of isolation that we can conceptualize, you know, especially when, you know, you're there involuntarily and your body is kind of become the reason that you can't
Isolation and Identity in Care Institutions
00:24:35
Speaker
leave.
00:24:35
Speaker
um
00:24:38
Speaker
And I think one of the more oppressive elements is this idea of the doctors being able to hold the terms of release and being able to decide what your freedom looks like. Can you talk a little bit about what that kind of loneliness felt like in that sort of, well you know, I don't know if that comes from a direct experience of yours or whatever.
00:25:02
Speaker
where that was coming from but can you speak a little bit to the to to that to that isolation to that to that feeling yeah i guess it but it made what i felt inside or internally external so it was it's like a very real um like experience of being caged yeah um I was always, always the only non-white person yeah in the ED section of the psych ward in Manitoba, which is very strange. ah
00:25:37
Speaker
and So... The prairies general. yeah yeah yeah And so, like, yeah Native people don't have bingosaurus, I guess. Right. cool and And because of that, it was isolating on like multiple levels. I mean, when as it as like as ah as a teenager, it was also comforting because like I was in foster care at the time. And so it was a cage, but it was also my home. yeah Like I was in. There's almost a familiarity to it. Yeah. Yeah.
00:26:11
Speaker
It's like sometimes I, I remember when I went to Homewood Health Center when I was about 18 or 19, I don't remember exactly. a But i yeah I, referenced part that a little bit in post memory where, so well, the psychiatrist told me that I hold people emotionally hostage. And at that point it was because I was homeless.
00:26:35
Speaker
It was private. institution that the government was paying for because no one would take me in Manitoba anymore. Yeah. So... I mean, I certainly was holding people emotionally hostile.
00:26:49
Speaker
But also these were, except for the OHIP patients, yeah everyone was like a private, rich person at this eating disorder ward. And did get kicked out for being intense and crazy. But like, they were all intense and crazy, but in an acceptable way. And like, what are you supposed to be in that environment? What am I... What do you want from me? Yeah, it's just like, we were worried, like we'd have to like go jean shopping or something. And like, I have no home. When I go home, it's wintertime. Like where am I going to stay Winnipeg? Really, right? Oh God. It was ridiculous. You know, so this is, you know, you talk throughout book around, you're exploring patriarchy, the medical sexism, as you're talking about the bigotry. I think this was a pull quote of not only sabotage the treatment of the conditions, but often of making them worse.
00:27:44
Speaker
And there's this line, ah her sadness is always prettier than mine, right? And that one really, i that one was a hell of a lot. But you're you're discussing this idea of like, being forced into competition with with white patients in the ward and things like that. and Well, oftentimes that was just a competition that all eating disorder patients had with each other.
00:28:07
Speaker
It is a competitive illness. yeah It's a contagious, socially contagious illness as well. yeah I became, like I chose my eating disorder when I was 11, as much as you can choose shirt something like that. yeah Because I wanted, I read a memoir yeah and I wanted to be like the woman in the memoir
Recovery Journey and Personal Agency
00:28:26
Speaker
so badly.
00:28:26
Speaker
Actually, she's Maria Hornbacher. She was the, one of the blurb people, blurbers. I don't like that word. Blurber. Yeah, the blurbers. I couldn't like it. I think, I don't know. I think it's, um but i i read her memoir when i was 11 and i was like it's awesome i'm like it's fucking let's fucking go yeah i still own my like my a copy that i stole from the selkirk public library um and i met her la yeah and i went up to her and was like okay this is either gonna kill with her or she's gonna be horrified and disturbed but disturbed but it went up to her and i was like hey
00:29:03
Speaker
Like, I'm Brandy Bird. I'm a writer. i just want to let you know that, like, you're the reason i had an eating disorder and not something worse. and she yeah And then she was like, you know what?
00:29:15
Speaker
I had an eating disorder and something worse. So it's OK. And she laughed. And I was like, OK, good. yeah This is like, I really do believe that, that like eating the eating disorder was something I chose to protect myself from something worse. Big time. Big time. Yeah. Well, you know, I i i think about that a lot. I've talked about with the guests in the past around like, you know, sometimes whatever, you know, whatever ah whatever the addiction manifests itself as, sometimes even though we socially see it as destructive, and yes, it is, you know, these are destructive choices we're making. Sometimes they are keeping us safer. They're the thing that's actually keeping us alive in that moment. Because if we were if we were just raw dog in reality, we wouldn't be here anymore. I can i can speak pretty, you know,
00:29:59
Speaker
not Gratuitously in the moment, but you know I can definitely speak to my own destructive choices that I made that that while I wouldn't make them today, they're why I am here today. Yeah, that's exactly what i feel about it as well. yeah And like i I chose to recover. Well, first off, i it it was a choice, but it all it was also the result of like a really good therapist yeah and medication that works.
00:30:24
Speaker
And, but it was also like my choice to be so uncomfortable yeah for so long. Like, honestly, when i recovered from bulimia, I gained so much weight because I was still binging. yeah I just refused to purge. And eventually it's, it it it evens itself out yeah because it was like, well, there's, there's no reward anymore. yeah i'm not losing weight. Why am I doing this? And i was I was able to just like regulate myself and now I feel like I'm like like if if if life is like the maslow Maslow whatever the frick his name is yeah yeah i know the way the pyramid yeah the needs yeah because I feel like I have the guys with the ni yeah i feel like i have i have many needs there most of them are okay yeah and i like ever I'm getting them met so I can like go higher in the pyramid and I feel i I'm certainly not self actualized sure yeah yeah'm I'm like trying. Yeah. Yeah.
00:31:23
Speaker
I think, um I think you really nailed something that I, I don't always know if I have the right words for it, but it is that concept of like, I know for me, I was stuck in, in my loops because it was easier because it was familiar. And then once I broke them and I started replacing them with, you know, what I guess you could call healthier, but I don't mean What even, what does that even mean? it' They're just different. I just, but like,
00:31:46
Speaker
they were hard to maintain at first. And then, you know, it's it's like other processes. It's like working out. It's like the muscles just got better. yeah Yeah. The muscles do get, they get stronger. Even if you take a break, they're still there. They come back faster. And I felt, I felt also like, I really appreciated the fact that I like gained weight and quite rapidly because it forced me to like live in my body and,
00:32:12
Speaker
Like, again, like be my biggest fear, which was, which sounds shitty to say, but it like, I mean, at its heart, eating disorders are about many things and they are about weight. yeah And I think not addressing that is, does a disser it this disservice to people's actual suffering. And so like learning about body neutrality and being like, I don't actually care. Yeah.
00:32:40
Speaker
It's made it a lot easier. And then like I've come into my own with my gender and my sexuality. And I feel like I couldn't have done those things yeah if I was binging and purging and trying to lose weight all the time. Because you you just don't have the brain space for it. You couldn't think, you know. i didn't have the space for anything. No friends, nothing. I literally watched TV, ate, and threw up. yeah So but what's life was pretty boring. That's the thing. It's like you're so consumed by it, you can't get out of it. And yet at the same time, too, when you reflect back, you're like, I was doing nothing. Yeah, it's like I used to. i Oh, my God, it was so dramatic. I would listen to Nine Inch Nails every day is exactly the same. And I'd be like, he's so me.
00:33:18
Speaker
And it's actually like, yeah, ah that's how it is. Literally. That's how it is. You've written about how, you know, the sort of the cure, you've you've written the cure as this idea of like a eugenic concept, um which I find fascinating. now I really love this, this framing, you know, the idea of sort of the the eradication of the animal, you know. um and and I just, yeah, there's something that just like really, you know, pun intended, but really like bit me, you know, right?
00:33:49
Speaker
For you, what does recovery mean if The cure in the sort of biomedical sense is something that you were kind of mindfully rejecting.
00:34:01
Speaker
I think recovery looks like
00:34:07
Speaker
For me, recovery looks like abstinence from behaviors, but not because, but also like I don't define what that means. So for me, what that means is not binging and purging.
00:34:19
Speaker
And except I did have a relapse. I had it when I had a manic episode. Sure. I don't actually remember it. Unfortunately, when I get manic and psychotic with my bipolar disorder, which doesn't happen often. Thank God. Yeah.
00:34:34
Speaker
But when that happens, when that happened three years ago, two years, don't remember, was told I binged and purged in the hospital at VGH. But I don't consider that a relapse because, like, I don't.
00:34:47
Speaker
Well, first off, I don't remember it. Second off, I'm sure I was just trying something. yeah and Especially when you when you get it. I know when I get into those modes and my brain just goes into, like, you go into instinct, you know, and it's like you're going sub thoughts. Yeah. but like i So for me, that's still abstinence because I didn't make those decisions. That's exactly what I mean. Right. Yeah. so we're yeah yeah I don't know why I did that. like yeah yeah What happened there?
00:35:13
Speaker
Yes, but for other people, recovery just looks like maybe they do it every three months. sure Maybe they do it once a week. Maybe they're still struggling with the thoughts and not the behaviors or the behaviors.
00:35:24
Speaker
And theyre they have pretty functional, normal lives. I think for me, it that kind of recovery wouldn't have worked because I was so all or nothing. Yeah. ah That for me, I really had to define it as abstinence and abstinence.
00:35:43
Speaker
Also like really focusing on my choices yeah and what I had control over because my eating disorder was about control in some ways and also punishment ah for myself and other people and everybody who I thought had wronged me ah and like all these systems that had wronged Yeah.
00:36:05
Speaker
um Yeah, so I had to, like, sort of come to terms with the fact that, like, I'm pretty vengeful as a person. Yeah. And have to, like, figure out what my responsibility is. I put this, like, this sticker in it that says refuse victimhood. And, like, I just want to revel in the fact that I can make choices and have agency this society which tries to strip us of all of that. Mm-hmm.
00:36:33
Speaker
And maybe that's false and I'm living in the clouds, but I'm trying. no I think i think you're you're really speaking the language that I've been trying to push a lot recently is this idea of like, I've sort of been...
00:36:50
Speaker
I haven't been able to find the right words for it because it always feels like it's a sort of like I found myself kind of bored by victimhood. ah been I've been bored by my own victimhood. I've been bored and I hate saying it like this, but it's the only way I can right now. I've been kind of bored by the so other people's stories of victimhood as well. And I've just been it's it's almost another version of saying what we're ah we're against.
00:37:10
Speaker
And I'm far more interested in what people are for. And i hate that Mark Carney just said that sentence the other day, or at least I heard him say that sentence the other day. And i just it made me want to throw up. But I was like, no, that's actually what I'm about is like, how do we build?
00:37:28
Speaker
And we can still tell hard stories and we can still tell true stories and we can still tell stories. wounding stories and all the things that happened to us, but they don't have to be.
00:37:39
Speaker
And now it's almost like here's the past the hat of tears. It's like, what, how do we, how do we use this to push and and go forward with it? You know, I find sometimes for myself,
00:37:53
Speaker
my My stories of you know pain and trauma and yada yada were always with an excuse to stop. There was ah always an excuse to stay and pause. and And now I want to use them as ways to motivate and move.
Trauma Narratives and Indigenous Literature
00:38:07
Speaker
Yeah, i there's a great essay out in Toronto Review by Joshua Whitehead, actually, about... Another blurber. Yeah, another blurber. We actually grew up in the same small town, Selkirk, Manitoba. We were at the same middle school for one year. younger. I'm younger.
00:38:26
Speaker
yeah ah But he's much more beautiful. so but but he He has an essay in the Toronto Review today about reparative reading and paranoid reading, specifically with like indigenous literature. And i i really agree with the point he made about like the TRC being this like the ultimate like people like Canada as a whole is a concept consuming, just like trauma and torture and very real sadness and suffering and what really came of it.
00:39:06
Speaker
Like I remember my grandma, my cook, She got a settlement for residential school. And she never really spoke to me about it ever. oh um and And the only thing I remember, she didn't speak English to me very much. I i don't understand Soto, but she would only speak Soto really to me. i joke um I lived with her for for briefly when I was a teenager before I entered foster care.
00:39:39
Speaker
And She was looking at Stephen Harper on the TV once and she just said, he's a snake. And I was like, that's just what they... like She shouldn't have had to like prove her suffering to the government. She should have just said, he's a snake. yeah Because he is. He's a snake.
00:39:59
Speaker
And and that that this she shouldn't have to prove that she suffered. yeah And she like that application was like... like they they've since like tried to soften the blow with other applications but even the day school application was was really like it's if if you're talking about gratuity yeah you're talking about gratuity like that that no gratuity is tipping yeah no it that's tipping but it's gratuitous in terms of it's just like it's grotesque in the the details that it's asking for yeah and and so like now they like I got a settlement from the mess I'm sorry I don't mean to like, it's just that that like, the the razor of gratuitous is just like, that yeah. That's wild. Yeah, that really hurt me off. I hate it. hey but's But yeah, like I got a settlement from the Manitoba government for being in in foster care. And they were like, cool. Well, they were like, cool. But then i found out from...
00:41:02
Speaker
they they When I entered into care, I was given three different first names. So they i didn't get my settlement for like a year and a half. Or no, no, no.
00:41:13
Speaker
Yeah, a year and a half because they they were looking at the wrong names.
Early Influences and Impact of Literary Figures
00:41:19
Speaker
Yeah. So they had to figure out what- you yeah and then Yeah, and then like Pegwus First Nation child and Family Services were like, right we don't know them. And then like the provincial branch was like, we don't know them. And it turns out they did. They just knew three different versions. So so this is something we've been kind of dancing around. And and you know there's there's a line in Post Memory about, you know I recognize myself in poetry, the you know the idea that I belong, right?
00:41:46
Speaker
you tell me about the sort of the first time poetry gave you that feeling? You know, what were you reading? What did it actually feel like to go like, oh this is sort of like, i don't know if this is mine or like this is me or, you know, that kind of feeling.
00:41:59
Speaker
um I wrote a little essay about this, actually, on my subs. i just ah but but And ah basically, a friend of mine
00:42:16
Speaker
Shawn Robinson, who is a poet, a wonderful, wonderful poet. We were joking around that Sylvia Plath is like evil Emily Dickinson for for a Little Girl.
00:42:27
Speaker
ah And it's true because those were the two yeah poets that I connected with most that I remember connecting with yeah the most in my life. So i the two poems I remember really connecting to are Poppies in October by Sylvia Plath.
00:42:44
Speaker
I used to be able to recite it from memory. i don't think I could do it now. That would be a great party. Oh, yeah. If only. That's what i'm going to do in comedy class. I'm just going recite Sylvia Plath's poetry. but Like Courtney Love at the Mickey Mouse audition. as oh my God. Should have done that.
00:43:01
Speaker
Should have done that. Yeah. but you write it it or You recite it in like a Jerry Seinfeld voice though? No, you have to do it. You have to put your chest into it. Okay, fair. I was thinking of like how do you make it your own, right? I'm going to do Sylvia Plath in slam poetry voice. I Great. yeah yeah but But it was that, it was it was Emily Dickinson, I got a like a used copy for Christmas of the collected poems of Emily Dickinson and after great pain, a formal feeling comes and I was like, oh my God.
00:43:32
Speaker
I have never experienced language like this before. And it's because I was 11 no, nine. I was nine. yeah So literally. you literally haven't experienced language. yeah um And then i was at the Selkirk library again. i used to spend a lot of time there and I would also steal and put back my stolen books because I didn't want my mom to figure out that like I was taking out adult books. edge I took out Ariel and i was like, oh, oh yeah.
00:44:00
Speaker
This woman's crazy, just like me. And there's literally a song, literally a poem called Mad Girl's Love Song. Wow. That's so romantic. And it was. and it is And that's why people do it.
00:44:13
Speaker
But I've grown up now. with yeah Yeah. I've put away childish things such as romanticizing suffering. No, I actually haven't. yeah but But there's something about there's something with the first century and then reflecting and being like, you know, because I still have a very deep respect for Sylvie Plath. adore her. And at the same time, too, I don't find myself going back to her a lot. I do go back to her a lot. And I think my friend Sierra Louie, she's a comics artist and we did the MFA together.
00:44:41
Speaker
She has a really hilarious scene. So she's Chinese and she's Chinese-Canadian and she made... a zine out of every anti-Chinese thing Sylvia Plath ever said. Whoa. And like made the... I just think that's such a funny idea for a zine.
00:45:03
Speaker
And I'm like, yeah. Right. yeah realize She was ah horrible. yeah horrible yeah Yeah. Well, I mean, the what is it? The the the bell dryer? That's her book, right? that's Yeah, yeah, yeah. yeah it's it's it's um Half that book is just slurs. yeah It's just like, whoa. It was very important to me. And it's still an incredible book. Also, the Maggie Gyllenhaal audiobook is so good. i'll be Although, something hearing Maggie Gyllenhaal say some of those slurs is is interesting. Yeah. But like, I no i have an appreciation for
00:45:38
Speaker
syvia platt still i i think she was Particularly her last book had such an like a fire it. That's like the literal definition of the word awesome. yeah Regardless of the other shit she said. is but and Even in that book, she says some pretty horrible shit. Yeah.
00:46:00
Speaker
Like, I don't know, it's it's a document of time, a document of poetic voice, like a do a document of like femininity in that era or a specific kind, which is like this white middle class femininity educated, but still being expected to be like a housewife. Yeah.
00:46:21
Speaker
that I can appreciate. Yeah. Yeah. But also that scene by Sierra, so funny and so like cutting. Well, and I think that, I think that it's really important to not like, I've always been really reticent to completely erase artists. Yeah.
00:46:38
Speaker
from the past who have used language that we wouldn't use today, you know, because to me, it's like that's how we ensure that that language comes back, that that behavior comes back is if we just completely abolish it and erase it and just say,
Gossip as a Cultural and Emotional Tool
00:46:50
Speaker
no, we don't look at it. We don't talk about it. We don't like obviously we don't want to be recreating it. We don't want want to be celebrating it. But to just when whenever anything like, you know, whenever we anything, you know,
00:47:02
Speaker
trying to use not overly loaded, but also not overly flowery language, but it's like whenever bad stuff happens, we always have this impulse to just be like, and then we never look at it again. And then it comes back and we don't know how to deal with it because we ignored it. think that's a particularly waspy impulse too.
00:47:20
Speaker
i And it's like, I find in my family, like not talking about things is the product of... A lot of colonial big time habits that maybe were picked up not in because like.
00:47:36
Speaker
In my dad's community, when he was growing up, everybody knew for everything about everyone and everyone sort of just like helped each other yeah or if they couldn't help each other, then they suffered together. At least they knew what was going on. Yeah. And and it's it's like my my dad, i have a poem actually about this. It's thinking about my dad getting like this rabbit sickness one winter where they didn't have any food. So they were trapping rabbits and he really only was eating these like highly...
00:48:08
Speaker
like super lean rabbits and the problem is is with that that much protein you just get diarrhea but and you can die you literally can die so it's like starving to death or shitting yourself to death yeah and like we we'll take what we'll take your chances you know no so like i think about that and like how knowing like particularly gossip and like Of course it's toxic some sometimes. A lot of times. Yeah. um
00:48:43
Speaker
And it is also, it is functional in a community. yeah Yeah. In some way. There's the, I feel like I'm, I can't remember the book I i just read it in, but it talked about essentially healthy gossip.
00:48:59
Speaker
And it was the idea of like, it's actually a part of a built, well-functioning community is like kind of, Sort of talking shit about each other, but, you know, in a still a constructive way. Yeah, like it's like I think sometimes when when there's a a bitch session or like talking shit, even about your own friends, sometimes you say those things so you can process together a problem that you're having with your friend. It's a way to make sure that it doesn't build up. It's a release valve to then be like, you know, a release valve, but it's also a way to problem solve and be like, hey, so this person can't hear this. Yes.
00:49:38
Speaker
How do I say it in a way that's not going to hurt their feelings irreparably or the relationship? Because I value this person. and But in every situation, i have agency. That's exactly it. And I think, and like even...
00:49:57
Speaker
It's like I still have control and over myself and I can grieve and talk about it with safe people that I think are safe and move on and grow. And from, I think that's pretty
Motherhood and Societal Narratives
00:50:13
Speaker
cool. Yeah. and but ah Okay. i I got so many more questions that I'm but I'm just like, we gotta, to we gotta wrap things up. Something.
00:50:23
Speaker
I've got two more questions for you. Three if we can do it, but two for sure. One of them I really want to slip in because it's something we were talking about at the very start about this idea of sort of like letting sometimes letting boecee cook and sometimes reflecting and being like, oh, that maybe came out of the oven too soon. or you Right. You know, and and Something that really, really resonated with me is is the the the character or the portrayal or however you want to put it. you know i Now that you framed it about it not to necessarily being a one-to-one, I'm reworking my language. But the sort of the appearance of the figure of the mother in the book. And you know and the mother is is everywhere. It's everywhere in in in so many different frames.
00:51:04
Speaker
you know And that just, it really struck me, my own personal reading, my own personal experiences, you know, and this idea of, you know, someone who's, who's both there to give you the life, but also to kind of be your perpetual punishment. And, you know, yeah you know, i I, call for my mother and the city collapses and, you know, and, and,
00:51:28
Speaker
Did you find that writing these poems, you know, changed how you sort of understood that relationship? Or did you sort of already understand it before you could write it? I think I needed to understand it before I could write it. um I'm estranged from it. I haven't been since I was 22. Yeah.
00:51:50
Speaker
And it's it's like I have a very complex relationship with just the concept of mothers. And, like, there's this a joke, like, I've seen posts about it. It's like daddy issues are normal and mommy issues make you crazy. And I have quite epic mommy issues and I have been, i like i think the rest of my life will sort of be untangling yeah that relationship because it is sort of like that is your creator. Um,
00:52:27
Speaker
And that's an important, like I get, I, like on my last, the last poem in the book Mirror is actually from something verbatim. um when My mom said to me when I was taking pictures of myself with a digital camera, I think I was 12.
00:52:42
Speaker
And she was, she, she was like, yelling at me for some reason i don't even remember the fight but then she took the camera away as a punishment and then she looked at the pictures and she's like you look just like me you'll never escape me like a like a disney villain it was it was very it was very arch and silly and kind of camp honestly of her um but uh i i think the I think it's underexplored. yeah I think like there's this monologue. and Have you seen Stoker?
00:53:17
Speaker
The movie? Nicole Kidman. Well, I encourage everyone to go look up the monologue from Stoker of where Nicole Kidman is talking to her daughter in the movie, her character.
00:53:29
Speaker
And she's like, I hope life tears you apart. And I'm like, yes, I need more weird a mother. like Also, hereditary another good yes example of like. God, is it?
00:53:41
Speaker
motherhood as being like this sort of horrific thing. And I think that that is like in the zeitgeist right now, specifically because of discussion of like abortion and like pro-life people, like, this is a matter of life and death, and motherhood is sort of, well, it isn't sort of, motherhood is the reason. like women are literally dying, people are dying i because of, like, forced pregnancy. yeah So...
00:54:13
Speaker
i like i Like, right now, everyone's talking about sharp objects on Twitter for some reason. yeah That's a show I can never, ever watch, I think. but I tried rewatching it recently. I only got about halfway through. and i i I was like, I remember.
00:54:27
Speaker
but It's very good. I watched it when it came out. And then I was rewatching. I was like, oh, I remember why I never wanted to watch this again. Yeah. You should call it Clarkson is the mom, right? it's It's weird because, like, I have a very strange, not strange. I shouldn't say that that's stigmatizing of older women.
Balancing Personal and External Expectations in Writing
00:54:43
Speaker
I think Patricia Clarkson is very hot. Oh, yeah. i But i don't want to see her do all that. Yeah, it's troubling. I don't i don't want to see her do all that. yeah i Also, Amy Adams, my favorite white girl. I mean, and and up to Hillbilly Elegy. Oh, I did appreciate her. I block that out. i just i just I tell myself it didn't happen. She beats up young J.D. Vance in that movie. It's so funny. you know right That's actually camp. So, yeah, should have hit him harder.
00:55:16
Speaker
but yeah more More weird mothers. yeah More weird weird mothers and in in fiction. and That's what we need. Everybody take note.
00:55:27
Speaker
More weird mommies. but but I had a question about the idea of re revisiting poetry, and I thought that was the question, but I can't find it in my list now. So my final question...
00:55:40
Speaker
is there Is there something that you needed to understand about yourself in order to write this book? um Was there something you had to figure out before it could exist?
00:55:51
Speaker
Or did did did writing it kind of, did writing this kind of get you there? Or did the market did the book just kind of mark where you were in in that process? I think I needed to know that I didn't have to write what was expected of me in order to feel fulfilled.
00:56:09
Speaker
I didn't need external validation. um I think getting that external validation with my first book was very helpful in proving that like it's actually agonizing to look at lists and be like, oh, I hope I'm on this. i'm hope but I hope I'm on this. right And then you're on it or you're not on it. And if you're on it, you have to wait to to see if you've won.
00:56:32
Speaker
And then you find out inevitably you've lost everything. i've I think I lost four awards. Lost in quotation marks. Like it's very, it is very cool to be nominated for those things. yeah But I am not going to be waiting on like tenterhooks or whatever to like hear if Pitiful's on a list. Yeah.
00:56:55
Speaker
The money would be awesome. Yeah. I got a thousand bucks for being on the list for governor generals. Pretty cool. I was just, I was just on a list. Yeah. Kind of list you want to be on. um But yeah, not the one I'm on. but yeah Yeah. So I, what I discovered is that I,
00:57:17
Speaker
need to write for myself. yeah I don't like, yes, I write for my communities. I'm in in multiple communities and some of them intersect and some of them are like, like I'm in a fandom. It's like, I like, I don't, it's like, I'm writing for, for those people as well. However,
00:57:38
Speaker
It has to start with myself and maybe that's like individualist or something, but it is how I function as an artist now. i just write what I want, read yeah or would like to read or what my younger self might have wanted to read.
Future Projects and Creative Inspirations
00:57:57
Speaker
And I think that like those like parallel selves are important to think about too. hmm. Brandy Bird, had a thousand more questions for you and we just don't have time and and so we'll just have to save it for the next episode. You'll just have to write another book. i already am. I have 14 pages. There you go Anything you'd like to plug? Anywhere you would like listeners to kind of go next? Where would you like people to find You can find me on my website, which is brandybird.com or my and my professional Instagram, which is underscore bird writes.
00:58:36
Speaker
Uh, I'm not telling you any of my other social medias because they're all private for a reason. And um anything I would like to plug?
00:58:47
Speaker
um I want to plug my playlists on Spotify. Hell yeah. i have I have one called Fuck Girl, which is the playlist I listen to when I'm writing my next book. Oh, amazing. You'll need to send that to me and i'll but I'll put it in the show notes. It's such a pleasure chatting with you, getting to know you I loved this book and and this has just been such a treat ah to chat with you. Yeah, it was wonderful. Thank you. Thank you so much. and Yeah, the running joke is I have no sign-off of the show and that has kind of become my sign-off now is, well, I have no sign-off, so thank Thank you. look
00:59:28
Speaker
so Let's stop now.
01:00:27
Speaker
Thank you.