SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
When I lived and worked in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, I always loved spending time at Midtown Scholar. It is one of my favorite bookstores in the world. It's a converted old theater with cozy wooden walls, several floors of books, a stage, a balcony filled with little tables and a coffee shop. Midtown Scholar is also one of poet Kate Baer's favorite bookstores. So on a rainy day last week, we met there to talk.
KATE BAER: I always go to new releases first...
DETROW: OK.
BAER: ...And then I do poetry.
DETROW: Baer is a best-selling poet who lives in central Pennsylvania.
Has the way you browse a bookstore changed as you've become more of an established author?
BAER: I don't believe blurbs. Maybe I shouldn't say that. I don't believe blurbs as much because now I see how burbs are exchanged.
DETROW: Yeah.
BAER: And it's not that they're not authentic all the time. It's that there are lots of networks in publishing, just like in every industry. And so I'm not as much picking up a book and saying, oh, they said it was good, so I know it's good. It's more - I think it's more of, like, a subjective...
Are we going upstairs?
DETROW: I think so.
BAER: OK.
DETROW: We head up to the balcony to talk with her about her latest book of poems, "How About Now." Sitting in the poetry section, her name and her books are prominently featured alongside other heavyweights.
BAER: It never ceases to amaze me that I get to share shelf space with incredible poets like Ada Limon, Sharon Olds, Wanda Coleman, all these wonderful poets. It's incredible and it's such a privilege.
DETROW: Baer's new book is filled with poems that wrestle on the page with the realities of middle age and what it means to be vulnerable. She takes that head-on in this poem, "Tacenda."
BAER: (Reading) I typed my dirty secrets onto the page. My mother said, I don't particularly like that poem. My husband said, oh, wow. My children said, I don't know why I can't read any of your books. There is a complaint among the writers on kith and kin not reading any of their books. Oh, if I could, I'd slice myself in two - one for my life and one for you.
DETROW: I wanted you to read that because there's several poems in this book along that theme, and you write so openly about your life. You write in ways that really are vulnerable, that just put everything out there. And you also live your life...
BAER: Yeah.
DETROW: ...And there are several poems at that intersection. I'm wondering how that's changed over the years, how you think about what's material and what isn't and what goes in the book and what doesn't and what is too private and what is something that you just have to address in a poem.
BAER: Yeah, it's a very tricky and hard line, I think, for a lot of writers when you're writing from personal experience. I love poetry because it hides under the guise of fiction. It's in the fiction sections. It's labeled as fiction. But for so many poets, and especially for me, the work is so deeply personal, and it's very obvious that it's personal, that that can be hard. I really have to ask myself when I'm - I feel that guarding. I have to ask myself, am I not writing about this because of my ego? Am I not writing about this because I'm going to be embarrassed about talking about my sex life that my dad will read about, or I'm talking about something that I find shame in and embarrassment in? Or am I trying to protect somebody else? And I do think there's that distinction.
DETROW: Yeah.
BAER: There's that advice, you know, write as if your parents are dead or - my in-laws live 15 minutes away, and so there is a very tricky line there about who I'm protecting. And I try to write from a place of deep honesty and share as much as I can about my life because I find that's where the good stuff is. But I do definitely keep things to myself, especially about my children.
DETROW: Right.
BAER: I just try to keep it from my perspective.
DETROW: Yeah. You have a poem, and I think I read that you said this is your favorite in the book. The title is "You Used To Text Me For Nudes, But Now It's Just For Information For Our Taxes."
BAER: (Laughter).
DETROW: And it's a really funny title, but I think a lot of people in long-term relationships...
BAER: Sure.
DETROW: ...Immediately relate in one way or another.
BAER: Yeah.
DETROW: That's, like, a very - it's a very real thing.
BAER: Oh, I love that poem. I will say, though, it's not because of the title that I love that poem. There's very few times in a writer's life, or I'm just going to speak from my experience, where the angels kind of sing and there's this four-part chord that happens. I write so much by ear. And when I wrote the last two lines of that poem, it says, put your mouth to the horn and call me back to you. And I heard the angels sing. I thought, oh, that's it. That's what I was trying to say. And it feels so good. That's happened maybe four or five times in my life. That's why that's my favorite poem, because it just - it came to me...
DETROW: Yeah.
BAER: ...And I was finished. And like I said, that's - you know, 90% of the time that's not happening.
DETROW: But there's a lot in this book of wrestling with am I content with where I am right now?
BAER: Sure.
DETROW: Shouldn't I be more content with...
BAER: Yeah.
DETROW: ...Where I am right now? How much were you thinking about that beforehand? Is that something that came out the more you wrote?
BAER: Yeah, absolutely. I think that a lot of us, when we're reaching middle age, are kind of grappling with that. You're kind of holding both the feeling of I've never been more myself, I've never felt more rich and fuller and beautiful and, like, who I am, while also, you know, facing our - you know, facing my own mortality.
DETROW: Yeah.
BAER: I went through a bunch of health issues at 38 and 39, which is kind of a young, green age to have a midlife crisis, but that's what was happening. And I was kind of holding these two truths - like, yes, I feel so much like myself, but also, my body is failing me, my mind is failing me. Time is moving faster than it ever has before. My children don't need me as much anymore. Have I done what I've wanted to do? Am I who I've always wanted to be? So yeah, I think that's very relatable. I - as I've talked with other women, I find this to be a pretty common thread.
DETROW: Yeah, yeah. Does the process of putting those words to paper more often than not settle the feeling in your brain or just kind of stir up even more questions?
BAER: I think both things happen. It really depends. I do think the more I talk about whatever it is, the easier and the quicker I can reach a conclusion. And so, yes, when I'm writing something and then, you know, for me, after I write it down, I have to repeat it over and over, maybe 100 times, before I feel like it's done or if I need to keep working on it. And in that repetition, I do find myself finding peace in that, just in the same way as when I'm having a conversation with my girlfriends on something that happened five years ago, but we've found a new way of looking at it. The more we repeat those stories, we kind of come to a peace about it and an understanding.
DETROW: So the book opens with this quote from Cher - do everything you can do now. And it ends with your poem called "How About Now."
BAER: Yeah.
DETROW: We were hoping you could read that one for us, too.
BAER: I would love to. This is called "How About Now."
(Reading) We are born dying, which is one way to look at it. Another is to wake up knowing we are made of impossible things - crystal caves, singing dunes, dark matter held in mortal hope. It's true time has a way of making lists and ledgers. You say you want a garden, beds of lavender and daffodils. You say we have a lifetime. Love, we're in our lifetime. How about now?
DETROW: Kate Baer, thank you for meeting me in your favorite and also my favorite bookstore.
BAER: Thank you so much for having me. It's been such an honor.
DETROW: Your new book, "How About Now," is out now.
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