We Call Upon the Author to Explain—Darren C. Demaree

With over 20 years of writing under his belt, former SAFTA resident Darren C. Demaree breaks down his poetic style, themes, and inspirations with Sundress intern Rachel Bulman. In an interview based on his two-decade spanning collection Now Flourish Northern Cardinal (Selected Poems 2005-2025), Demaree discusses his process and stylistic choices throughout the included poems, aptly described as ‘‘painfully—and wonderfully—human’’ (Manuel Iris). The collection is a finalist for the Ohio Book Award in Poetry as well as the 2026 Reader’s Choice Award.

Rachel Bulman: Starting broad, this collection covers two decades of work, from 2005-2025. In your own words, how has your writing developed since you started publishing works?

Darren C. Demaree: I think the challenge, the experimentation, has become much more important to me. I think it’s much more fun to try new things instead of continuing to refine a particular voice. It’s taken my writing to a lot of different places. Not all of them worked, but if you’re going to be a lifer, if you’re going to write all the time and as long as you can, this is the only way to enjoy it. Failing is acceptable. It didn’t used to be when I was younger. Now, my assumption is that if I’m bored in the process the readers will be bored when they read it. The tethers, the music, and energy of the work can really vibrate if you’re challenged in a new way.

RB: I noticed a distinct tonal shift when the poems turn to ‘‘Emily.’’ How might you describe what changes in your poems from before to after?

DCD: That’s my voice. That’s my natural cadence and poetic leanings. I respect that those poems might be successful because that’s when my mind is really lithe and strong. Processing and pulling at the most dynamic love I’ve ever known opens me up in undeniable ways. I feel different when I write the Emily poems. I fear nothing when I write the Emily poems.

RB: Many of your poems have many versions, sometimes up to #300: ‘‘We Are Arrows,’’ ‘‘Nude Male with Echo,’’ ‘‘neverwell,’’ etc. What about this format appeals to you? And something I am curious about is: how do you know when to stop?

DCD: I map out a book-length sequence the same way a novelist might map out a plot. It looks different, it takes a different focus on the music and energy and will involve purposeful word and phrase repetitions to give the reader markers to follow along some very long paths, but it’s very similar. I’ll have arcs planned out that are a certain length. I know when the first one is finished, and then it’s building out from there what the length of the project will be. Those really take a lot of time to prep, but it’s so easy for them to go off the rails it’s worth it to spend that time.

RB: That’s a brilliant and (at least to me) an unfamiliar way of approaching writing poetry. Could you talk about how you developed that system, or how you found your own rhythm with it?

DCD: I think with large, connected poetry projects, like a numbered book-length sequence, it’s really easy to get lost in something that never ends and leaves the reader grasping for something more than just poetic vibes. I wanted more control than that. If it’s mania you still have to control the energy of it. If it’s philosophical it can’t be a list of questions consuming each other. The ideas and pacing, the actual artistry of it, can’t be buried in the bigness of the project. That takes a lot of planning. I came by it honestly, with a lot of failed attempts to learn how it would work best for me.

RB: Your poetry occasionally exhibits fascinations with certain people or things—Emily, Sam Cooke, etc.—how do you identify an inspiration, and is there a conscious criterion?

DCD: The Emily one is easy. Writing about Sam Cooke in Lady, You Shot Me (2018) or when the Weatherman bombed the Thinker outside of the Cleveland Museum of Art in Bombing the Thinker (2018) or the Ray Mancini/Duk Koo Kim title fight in Temporary Champions (2014) were fascinations of mine that I really wanted to research and learn more about. It’s been a long time since I’ve done a research-inspired collection. It puts the guardrails on a project for me, or at least it used to. It frames things in a particular way that I haven’t been interested in recently. Maybe I’ll come back to it again later, but I’ve been much more interested in philosophies and politics and language-play for the last decade.

RB: Animals: bears, sheep, owls, wolves, etc., are abundant in this collection. Can you speak to their inclusion in your poetry?

DCD: Are you with the deer? So much of the friction in this world revolves around the question of are you living with an attachment to the natural world? I think it defines us. I want my work to feature what I consider to be a vital pivot point for humanity. Can we hold this world as close as we need to, but never consume it? Loving and identifying with animals opens up that lane the same way landscapes do.

RB: ‘‘Emily As the Length of a Fox’’ brought to mind a comparison to Ted Hughes’ ‘‘The Thought Fox’’ (1957) I’d noticed earlier in the collection but hadn’t been able to identify. I read the poem as observant, impersonal and, in places, brutal, can you talk about the inspiration behind this and the ‘‘Emily’ series?

DCD: Interrogating this love, this relationship, forcing it into surreal or palpable weirdness or nature or stark and defiant honesty or any number of things is my mind and heart working to its ecstatic hum. It makes a ton of sense for everyone that’s met Emily. I’m coming up on a thousand of these poems published. There will be more after that. That’s what she is. She’s the inciting incident of my whole world.

RB: Although you continually shift the structure later in the collection, what inspired the decision to have ‘‘The Field Party #1’’ act as the first diversion from your established enjambement-heavy poetic format? Feel free to elaborate on the use of structure in your work.

DCD: I love what prose poems allow me to do with language repetition, especially when I also abandon punctuation. My form is always dictated by the rules of engagement for the project. How can I get away with what I want to do in a way that is understandable? How can I defy all that when I want to? The aspect of play and challenging yourself as an artist is dramatically important. My form choices inevitably come from that. Even in The Luxury (2023), a book about nature catastrophes, which had a strict syllable count, that was done to force me to write as if I was choking. Form has to have a function or it’s just a conceit to be done away with.

RB: The collection is heavily influenced by location, specifically Ohio. Could you discuss the relationship of this location to you and to your poetry?

DCD: Other than the several months I lived in Tuscaloosa, AL, I’ve lived in Ohio my whole life. It’s been nose to nose with me since I was born. I love it. I hate it. It wants to change me to be like it, and I refuse. I write about Ohio because I’m engaged in an active battle between what my home is, and what I want it to be. It’s defined me that way. I’m not backing down and I’m not moving. I’ll always write as an Ohioan with a great tension. That’s why I can’t stop doing it.

RB: Lastly, is there anything else I didn’t touch on that you would like to discuss? Any new projects or releases coming up?

DCD: My newest book, Got There: Poems on Vanishing, came out in April from April Gloaming Publishing. It’s a book inspired by a photograph Alina Stefanescu took. I’m really proud of it. I hope folks will check it out.

Now Flourish Northern Cardinal (Selected Poems 2005-2025) is available from Small Harbor Publishing

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Darren C. Demaree is the author of twenty-five full-length poetry collections, most recently Got There: Poems on Vanishing (April Gloaming Publishing, April 2026). He is the recipient of an Ohio Arts Council Individual Excellence Award, the Louise Bogan Award from Trio House Press, and the Nancy Dew Taylor Award from Emrys Journal.

Rachel Bulman (she/her) holds a BA in English and Creative Writing as well as an MA in Publishing from the University of Exeter, specialising in interactive and children’s fiction. Her written work has appeared in The Book of Choices, Velvet Fields, and Exeposé, among others. Find her on Instagram @worm.can.read, through her online portfolio, or ask the bridge troll who taught him his riddles three.