Literary Thunder: Welcoming Patricia Smith to the Loft with Arleta Little

In this episode, we are joined by the Loft's Executive and Artistic Director Arleta Little. Arleta is also an author and poet, and we celebrate Patricia Smith's upcoming Nov 7 visit to the Loft.   

Arleta reflects on her own creative practice and collaborative poetry collection, Black Swallowtail, tracing how early promises and personal evolution shape a poet's voice. The conversation turns to Patricia Smith's legendary career—from her origins in Chicago's slam poetry scene as a four-time national champion to her mastery of persona poems, narrative craft, and the musicality of spoken word. Arleta also offers details on leading a virtual book club around Smith’s collection The Intentions of Thunder and closes the episode with a live reading of Smith’s powerful poem "When the burning begins."   

Additionally, the episode shares a throwback clip from the Short Story Summit featuring authors Julie Schumacher and Megan Giddings discussing burnout and sustaining creative energy.

Show Notes & Links

HIGHLIGHTED EVENTS

Patricia Smith Live: Reading & Conversation in Support of the Loft (Nov 7): https://loft.org/events/patricia-smith-live-reading-conversation-support-loft

Patricia Smith Book Club (Oct 28): https://loft-lit.circle.so/c/sessions/patricia-smith-book-club

BOOKS TO PURCHASE

The Intentions of Thunder by Patricia Smith: https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/The-Intentions-of-Thunder/Patricia-Smith/9781668055731

July Sun by Aamina Ahmad: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/783240/july-sun-by-aamina-ahmad/

Black Arts by Megan Giddings: https://www.harpercollins.com/products/black-arts-megan-giddings?variant=44717895221282

Patient Female by Julie Schumacher: https://julieschumacher.com/writing/novels/patient-female/

Black Swallowtail by Arleta Little and Ta-coumba T. Aiken: https://duluthart.org/shop/black-swallowtail-by-ta-coumba-t-aiken-and-arleta-little/

POEM

When the Burning Begins by Patricia Smith: https://poets.org/poem/when-burning-begins

Support the Loft

Support Our Community: Become a Friend of the Loft: https://loft.org/join-support

Join the Loft's free Digital Community, the Loft Writing Network: https://loft-lit.circle.so/Loft-Writing-Network

Transcript

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SPEAKER_04 0:06

Welcome to the Loft Lit Pod, where words catch fire. I'm Chris Jones, Director of Community Engagement at the Loft Literary Center in Minneapolis. Whether you're a longtime friend or tuning in for the first time, we're glad you're gathering around this fire. The Loft advances the power of writers and readers to craft and share stories, to create and celebrate connections, and to build just life-sustaining communities. One of the purposes of our show is to deepen connection between writers and readers. So before we get to our featured interview, I wanted to point you to a couple of upcoming offerings as well as a little clip from our short story summit. Our first highlight is the Loft Writing Network. If you're not aware, the Loft has a new digital community platform where you can connect with peers around writing projects and the writing life. It's really a great space. There's free opportunities. You can just sign up for free. And then we have a paid space which allows even deeper connection and a peer peer-led writing sessions as well as peer-led accountability sessions. There's a space to share work in that space. But we in the free space we have meetups and shared resources all around the idea of helping you connect better with each other and making writing a little less lonely. You can find out more about this space at loft.org backslash network. That's loft.org backslash network. Secondly, we're going to be highlighting the Patricia Smith event today on November 7th in our conversation with Arlita Little. That is with National Book Award-winning poet Patricia Smith. In advance of her visit, Arlita will be hosting a virtual book club on that Loft Writing Network around her National Book Award winning collection, The Intentions of Thunder. So that book club will be priced at $25. But if you sign up for the November 7th event and purchase a ticket for that event, you will get a code for free access to the book club to help get you ready for the November 7th event. So we hope to see you at the November 7th event as well as at that virtual book club led by the Loft's executive director. And finally, before we get to our main conversation, I thought we could look back at a recent event at the Loft, the Short Story Summit on September 30th. This gathering brought three short story writers together, Amina Ahmed, Megan Giddings, and Julie Schumacher, all celebrating new short story collections. And we presented this in partnership with the University of Minnesota English Department. After each author read, we started an audience conversation, and I am tuning you in to this point where one of the participants or audience members asked the question about what these authors do when they're feeling burnout and when they don't want to write anymore. How do they cope with that? How do they push through it? And here is the response from Julie and then Megan.

SPEAKER_03 3:03

I I just feel like that's the question for every writer. How do you keep it going? You know, it's partly the same with any habit. How do you keep yourself exercising, flossing your teeth, um, you know, being nice to the cat, whatever it is. Sometimes you don't want to be nice to the cat, but um you realize that even if you don't want to be nice to the cat today, or tomorrow the cat might seem like a nice animal once again and stop biting and scratching you and behave itself. Um because yeah, some I would say sometimes months have gone by where I've thought, I I just hate what I'm writing. I don't like it at all. I heard Megan once say, you said this. I uh you said something. I know, I'm holding this against you very deeply because you said um, I love writing. And I thought, oh, kill me now. Kill me now. I know you did. I will quote you until I die saying that. Um and I you know, I'm sure it's different for everybody, but I think there are moments when the writing, there's nothing better. You know, there's just nothing better. And you have to remember that those moments will come back, even if they are not here right now, they will return.

SPEAKER_02 4:15

So sometimes when a student tells me this, I ask them if they're being too rigid even about the idea of what writing is. Because sometimes to me, I can spend my writing time for an hour just walking around trying to figure out a problem. I'm not actually writing, but I know that there's a problem in the story that I have to figure out. And I'm sitting there just being a writer is so embarrassing. And also, one of my students yesterday in workshop described something about me as a millennial core, which was so cutting that now I'm like anxious about saying something too earnest to you. Um it was hateful. Um she apologized, though, so it was fine. Um but it's worth it for you to think a lot about so much of like the writing advice that people have out there, it's based on class and wealth. You write every day, and almost every person who has said that has never had to go take care of the kids, or I guess take care of the hateful cat, or have to like figure out how to live and survive. And so some of it is have you internalized unrealistic standards for production? How often are you also thinking about how much emotional time and weight it takes to actually be creative and interesting and giving yourself grace and building that into the writing? Don't worry about it. About the writing process. And so some of it might be too have you actually built yourself a successful writing process that isn't always about production, but is about saying something interesting and well. And I know it's a little rich from someone like me who does say shit like, I love writing, and then Julie doesn't let it go for the rest of the time we know each other for forever. Um but it is also helpful to remind yourself that if you can write one good thing a year, even if it's a paragraph, you have done more than someone who's said, I can't do anything. And then it builds and it builds and it builds. And I get to say that because I'm old now, and so I get to have the time. Don't get mad at me, either of you. Um but to have the time to say, like, yeah, it does sometimes, sometimes it takes 14 years to write seven pages. Sometimes it takes three years to write 78,000 words. The human brain is mysterious. Be nice to yourself.

SPEAKER_04 6:48

Such a really beautiful and amazing night. Uh, I was so glad to gather these three writers together. Uh, please check out their three new short storybooks. They're all worth your time and attention. Uh, and I want to uh I'll put those notes in the show notes below. So now on to our main conversation. Today we're joined by the Lofts Executive and Artistic Director, Arlita Little. Arlita joined us to talk about Patricia Smith's upcoming visit, and I was really looking forward to this conversation because I know Arlita has been reading a lot of Patricia's work and just really, really excited about this uh upcoming visit. So, here, without further ado, is our conversation. Well, welcome everyone. Uh, I'm really excited today. Uh, we're joined by Arlita Little, who is the Lofts Executive and Artistic Director, also an author and poet. Um, and she will be joining Patricia Smith on stage on November 7th at uh House of Hope in St. Paul, which we hope you will all be part of that audience. Uh Arlita, uh, welcome. Welcome to the podcast.

SPEAKER_01 7:52

Hey, Chris. Hi, everyone. It's so wonderful. I'm excited.

SPEAKER_04 7:56

Yeah. Um, you know, before I've always liked to kick these off. I know we're going to talk a lot about Patricia today, but uh before we get to our Patricia Smith conversation, uh, this is the first time you've been on the Loft New Loft podcast. Um, and I thought it'd be really nice to just uh connect with you a little bit uh first before we kind of get into Patricia. Um and I think maybe, you know, I think a lot of people are familiar with your work at the Loft, but maybe not your work as an artist, or maybe they should be more familiar with your work as an artist. So I wanted to kind of check in with you about uh your own creative practice. Um, your book, Black Swallow Tale, came out in 2024. Um, that was a uh poetry and visual art collaboration with artist Takumba Aiken. Uh, and I think it's a fantastic book. I'm gonna put a link to that in the show notes below. Um, but I'm wondering if you could start by telling us a little bit about that book, uh, what that kind of taught you about your own creative practice and what that's led to you working on right now.

SPEAKER_01 9:01

Yeah, uh Black Swallow Tale was uh an iterative poem, and it has uh 14 stanzas that I um kind of crafted as a result of the poetry challenge um many years ago. Uh and it came together as this kind of unfolding story uh about my own um poetic development um and life as things uh as kind of decades unfurled uh and there were different happenings that cracked me open uh over the course of my life. And um, and so I put that into a poem uh using the metaphor of a butterfly, a black swallow tale. Um this uh idea that this butterfly had kind of haunted me throughout my life. Uh I stepped on a butterfly when I was in sixth grade and um I made a promise to it that I would write a poem about it uh and didn't all through college, all through uh my twenties and thirties uh and forties. Um and uh the occasion of this poem um really was this idea of okay, let me go back to this promise I made to this butterfly, um, which also was a kind of metaphor for the promise I made to myself uh as a poet to write, you know, to live up to this fluttering thing inside me. Um so uh, you know, I read the poem uh after it kind of came together. I read it to Takumba uh one day when he was working on his um mural that he uh was doing at the McKnight Foundation. I was working there at the time. And uh he came and sat in my office and I shared it with him, and he cried uh when I got to the end um and said, We should we should do something together. And so that planted a seed. Um ultimately uh uh when I came back to him, I said, you know, why don't we um try to pair my poetry uh with your visual art? And he has an incredible uh of of work. Um and he said, Well, hey, take a look at some of these paintings um and uh see what you think. Um now, usually people think that the book is aprastic, but in fact, the collaborative process for that book really was um recognizing the story that was unfolding through the stanzas of my poem and then pairing each stanza with a painting of his that it seemed to evoke or speak to. And these the the work came together in a conversation. Uh both of it, both of both pieces of it already um birthed. Uh, but the collaborative process was to find the conversation um between the two uh and to to pair them together in what ultimately became a book um published by the Duluth Art Institute and uh in conjunction with uh an exhibit of Tacumba's work um two years ago.

SPEAKER_04 12:20

Yeah, it's such a um that's such I love that story behind it, but it's such a rich book. Uh, if you get your hands on it, uh and as I mentioned, the note will be in the show notes below. It the the impact of that kind of that word and visual piece is really powerful uh as a reader, and it's not one that you get, especially with poetry, it's not one that you get to experience very often. Um, you know, there are graphic novels and graphic, but graphic poems and graphic sort of like that kind of like intermixing of um visual and poetry is is I think rare. And it's it's really a treat to read. So uh I encourage it's I I love the the outcome of it, and um I you know I I encourage people to to check it out if they haven't already. Um, you know, as you as you've kind of like kind of gone through that process, um, yeah, you're busy in your life and and busy at the loft, uh, but how has that uh translated to some of your own creative work that you're working on now?

SPEAKER_01 13:25

You know, um one of the things that is core to my practice is writing retreats. In fact, I've kind of made uh a profession of developing writing retreats uh and this opportunity to get concentrated or dedicated time uh with my own voice uh in oftentimes a natural setting or even in my home alone where I stay uh while I'm working on something is really core. Interestingly enough, the first time I met Patricia Smith was uh at a writing retreat for the Givens Foundation for African American Writers. It was in 2010. Uh, and she was the national mentor uh for uh the retreat that year, uh, along with the state mentor Alex Pate. Um, and this this idea that for me is so core to my process of inviting uh writers away, inviting yourself into a time of concentrated effort in community and with some guidance uh in uh loving, you know, loving connection uh with others while you're kind of nursing a work. All of that for me has just been a core part of my creative practice. Um, whether I'm on retreat alone or whether I'm with a group, um being able to have other voices um in solitude, uh together and focused on our passion, uh really nourishes me as an artist.

SPEAKER_04 15:00

Uh well, I I love that connection because that's obviously where we're we're heading to have this conversation about Patricia. Um you're helping uh moderate the conversation. Patricia Smith is a National Book Award-winning poet, uh, has been to the loft uh several times, but not for a while. I think it's been maybe around a decade since her last visit, and a lot has happened uh in her work and in her career uh since then. Um I know you've been immersing yourself in her work in preparation for her visit. For somebody who maybe is unfamiliar with her work, um, how would you maybe describe her work, her voice, uh, and the experience of reading her poetry?

SPEAKER_01 15:44

Oh my gosh. Um so, you know, fundamentally, Patricia Smith is an American poet. She is rooted in the African-American experience, um, both her personal experience, but also as a culture bearer of history, of tradition, of music, uh, of uh all the things that we we grasp onto that uh we call culture. Um she grew up on the west side of Chicago, the only child of uh working class parents. And um as part of her uh literary coming up, uh you know, she recognized um the value of the people around her, the stories that were unfolding in the everyday. And her father was a guide for her uh in that. Um and uh she actually came up through the slam and spoken word scene in Chicago, uh, and ultimately becoming a four-time national poetry champion, the most ever awarded uh uh in that. Uh, and um uh from that tradition, um, really learned uh how to craft story in a way that arrests a person's attention. Um she is masterful at the her choice of detail, uh at her attention uh to craft, um, and uh in taking huge things, you know, thing big as Hurricane Katrina, you know, uh as big as uh huge historical events, um, and creating an entryway through a personal experience, um, whether that be uh someone she read in the news, whether it be her own relative, uh, whether that be someone from the tradition of Motown, because she was a child of Motown. Um, yeah, she she is masterful of uh at fitting huge ideas, concepts, experiences, history into tight, well-crafted poetry.

SPEAKER_04 17:57

Yeah, um thank you for for uh sharing that because one of the things uh that I wanted to reflect on and ask you about um so last uh maybe it was two weeks or three weeks ago on the show, uh we had Alessandra Dutton on, and she was talking about historical narratives and re-cre retelling stories that have already been told in a new light. And I think Patricia is very well known for trying to do this through a lot of persona poems. Um she gives life to photographs, to inanimate forces, to sort of forgotten figures in history. And I'm and and you've kind of just touched on the idea of like the the personalizing of these sort of bigger moments. Um and I'm wondering about if you can expand on that, on her approach to that, and what makes her that kind of kind of storytelling so vital.

SPEAKER_01 19:02

You know, uh I think the the amazing thing about persona poems in particular, and she does more than persona poems, but she's definitely known for her persona poems, uh, is that they humanize, right? That they actually give us uh an entry point into a human experience, even for things that are not human, right? Uh making them real and accessible uh for a human reader, you know, um, and uh using language uh to open someone's mind, open someone's heart, uh, to make them available to an experience that uh may be foreign, strange, different, um, may not even be uh be human, uh as she is uh it may be the voice of an enemy, uh, as she does through the her um uh spoken word poem, the skinhead, which is incredible. Um uh and to actually um draft craft in language, you know, an experience other than our own uh and make it accessible. I think that's one of the real gifts of the persona poem and something that Patricia Smith does exceedingly well.

SPEAKER_04 20:20

Yeah. Uh one of the other things we've mentioned, I mean, a four-time National Uh Poetry Slam award winner, that's the most in history. Uh, I became familiar with Patricia Smith um early on at my time at the loft as a spoken word artist. That's how I knew her. I mean, she's grown into becoming just this force of nature poet, but that's really where I began my uh kind of understanding of who she was. And I think there's something so powerfully sort of like musical and about her work. And it's sort of like when you read it, it sort of demands to be read aloud sometimes. And I think that that sort of sparks from that history of her being a slam poet and a spoken word poet. Um you know, when you think about her work, uh what do you think gives what I would call sort of like this this musicalness or musicality to it? How do you think she achieves that? Or what what is it that about her work that like that that feels like it's so vital and and should show just you want to read it out loud?

SPEAKER_01 21:32

Well, I think uh there's a few things. Um, one, I mean, she kind of was suckled on the music of Motown, you know, uh growing like that music is in her bones, in her cells, it comes out in her writing. Uh, and and not just the music, but the words. She will uh openly celebrate Smoky Robinson as one of the poets, her her early first poets that influenced her and uh committed. Her to a love of story, you know, and the ability to tell story with music. But even though she evolved through the slam tradition, one of the things I love about Patricia Smith is that she didn't rest on her laurels as the national champion, uh slam champion. Uh, she actually, at a later time in her life, went back to school. Uh, she decided to, even after writing four books, uh, go back and get her MFA and really study the technical elements of poetry, how to work with form, how to work with prosody, how to, how to uh work with rhythm, really to arrest the attention of a reader uh and to open up possibilities, you know, within work. Um, so I think it's a combination of uh what the music that is uh in her that flows through her, uh into her writing, uh, but also that attention to craft uh and being able to um put a bead, get a bead on rhythm and work that uh into a poem in such a way that it hooks the reader and takes them on that adventure, that journey, that ride, uh oftentimes in um in another way uh way of being, you know.

SPEAKER_04 23:20

I I love hearing you talk about this work. It's so clearly that you're just like you know, just immersed in it and love it.

SPEAKER_01 23:27

Um my gosh, you know what I've discovered, Chris? When I um have the opportunity to sit down with with poets and writers that whose work I just um adore, I just fall in love with them. I fall in love with them while I'm reading their work, I fall in love with them while I'm looking at them on the stage and asking questions. Yeah, it's it's part of my process. I just recognize it and love and enjoy it.

SPEAKER_04 23:50

Well, one of the things we're we're uh kind of excited about that's coming up uh beyond her visit is that in prior to her visit, uh, you're gonna be leading this uh a virtual book club. Um for anyone who has purchased a ticket by October 16th, uh, you get free access to that book club. So I put a note in the show notes, get your tickets now. You'll get free access to this virtual book club to kind of get you primed and ready for uh for the November 7th reading. Um, but tell us a little bit more about what somebody could expect out of the out of that book club visit if they join you for that.

SPEAKER_01 24:25

Well, uh if they don't, if you don't have your copy of The Intentions of Thunder, New and Selected Poems, you must get it. Uh, it is such an incredible collection uh of Patricia's work. Whether you have been following her for 30 for her 35 years of writing or she's new to you, it's an incredible sampling uh of really her life's work. Um and so part of the discussion, I think, uh in the book club will be uh providing context for the uh poems that we'll select to read and talk about, uh, giving a little background on uh Patricia and her history uh and her writing over time, uh, and then um probing what the experience of her work provokes for readers. I think it's gonna be a rich discussion. Uh, I'm excited to uh introduce or reintroduce uh folks to Patricia's work. Uh and I think um what uh a collective discussion makes possible is the emergence of kind of deeper understanding and an experience of connection uh through the poetry. So yeah, it's gonna be good.

SPEAKER_04 25:40

Okay, yeah, yeah, looking forward to it. Um so beyond beyond this sort of like on November 7th, uh Patricia Smith is joining us. Um, and we have a wonderful partnership with uh House of Hope. Um and it I think it's gonna be a really great gathering there. But this also serves as a benefit for the loft. Um it's uh it's one of our key events in the in the year. Um we've we did one last year with uh Padre Gotuma, uh and this year it's with Patricia Smith. And I'm just wondering if you can just reflect on sort of the importance about uh events like this to help sustain the loft's broader mission, access, and future programming.

SPEAKER_01 26:24

Yeah, the I mean the Loft was born from community, it is for by and about community members. I always uh point back to our uh education program as uh ultimately a community school. Folks donate from their talents, they give, they put together a proposal, uh, they bring they of what they want to teach in community. Uh, the community votes with their feet about what they're interested in studying, and those classes go forward. Um, and then those writers in those classes get an opportunity to hone their work and bring it back out to community. Um, so the reciprocity uh in the process is not just about kind of the creative offerings as they come in and through and go back out to the community, it's also about um our physical sustenance uh and the material needs that we have as an organization. So we are completely grateful and also reliant on contributions from the communities to support and sustain our work. Uh, and that work is what we bring back to the community to sustain to nurture, nourish, and sustain that community through the power of the imagination, through the power of written and spoken word, uh, and through the power of connection and our gatherings and convenings with one another. Um yeah, uh we are uh we have host over 40 almost uh last year was over 40 events uh for the during the course of the year. And uh part of um opportunities like this uh with Patricia Smith is uh time for us to kind of come together, uh immerse ourselves in in uh the work and language of masterful writers, um, but also to recognize that uh organizations and institutions like the Loft are able to can make their contributions to community because of what community contributes uh to us. Um so yeah, it's uh an exercise in gratitude and reciprocity.

SPEAKER_04 28:34

Yeah, so we really hope to see you all there. Uh, I think this is a can't miss uh event. Uh hope to see you uh at that book club as well. Um Arlita, this was a treat. I was wondering if you could close us out by maybe reading uh a favorite poem of yours by Patricia.

SPEAKER_01 28:54

Sure, I'm gonna choose one from uh intentions of the Intentions of Thunder. And uh this was uh this is a poem that uh Patricia Smith wrote when she was grieving the loss of her father uh and trying to grapple with it uh in language recognizing that you know she she couldn't um say everything about him uh in a poem. So what were the things that the memories, the particular details, the gifts from him that that she could say uh to uh begin to metabolize her grief when the burning begins for Otis Douglas Smith, my father. The recipe for hot water cornbread is simple. Cornmeal, hot water, mix till sluggish, then dollop into a sizzling skillet. When you smell the burning begin, flip it. When you smell the burning begin again, dump it onto a plate. You've got to wait for the burning and get it just right. Before the bread cools, smear it with sweet salted butter and smash it with your fingers. Crumple it up in a bowl of collard greens or buttered milk. Forget that I'm telling you it's the first thing I ever cooked, that my daddy was laughing and breathing and no bullet in his head when he taught me. Mix it till it looks like quicksand, he'd say, till it moves like a slow song sounds. We'd sit there in the kitchen, licking our fingers and laughing at my mother, who was probably scrubbing something with bleach or watching bonanza, or thinking how stupid it was to be burning that nasty old bread in that cast iron skillet. When I told her that I'd made my first ever pan of hot water cornbread and that daddy had branded it glorious, she sniffed and kept mopping the floor over and over in the same place. Here's how you do it. You take out a bowl like the one we had with blue flowers and only one crack. You put the cornmeal in it. Then you turn on the hot water and you let it run. While you tell the story about the boy who kissed your cheek after school, or about how you really wanted to be a reporter instead of a teacher or nurse, like mama said. And the water keeps running while Daddy says, you will be a wonderful writer and you will be famous someday. And when you get famous, if I wrote you a letter and sent you some money, would you write about me? And he is laughing and breathing and no bullet in his head. So you let the water run into this mix till it moves like mud moves at the bottom of a river, which is another thing Daddy said. And even though I'd never even seen a river, I knew exactly what he meant. Then you turn the fire way up under the skillet and you pour in this mix that moves like mud moves at the bottom of a river, like quicksand, like slow song sounds. That stuff pops something awful when it first hits the blazing skillet. And sometimes Daddy and I would dance to those angry pop sounds. He let me rest my feet on top of his while we waltzed around the kitchen, and my mother huffed and puffed on the other side of the door. When you are famous, Daddy asked me, Will you write about dancing with your father in the kitchen? I say everything I write will be about you. Then you will be famous too. And we dip and swirl and spin, and then he stops and sniffs the air. The thing you have to remember about hot water cornbread is to wait for the burning so you know when to flip it, and then again, so you know when it's crusty and done. Then eat it the way we did, with our fingers, our feet still tingling with the dancing. But remember that sometimes the burning takes such a long time. And in that time, sometimes the poems are burn are born.

SPEAKER_04 32:53

Wow. Thank you. Thank you for sharing that. Uh that's such a remarkable poem. And there isn't it though? Yeah, it's just amazing. And there's so many like that in there. Like that that's the thing. Like come join us, get this book, join us for the book club, join us November 7th. Just an amazing collection, an amazing event. Uh, Arlita, thanks for sharing some of your joy and passion around uh this visit that we have coming up, and uh we hope to see you there. A big thank you to Arlita. Patricia Smith joins the Loft uh at Hope Art Center on November 7th. Get your tickets by October 16th to get free access to that Patricia Smith Book Club. But tickets will be on sale until the November 7th event. This podcast and all of our programming are made possible by Friends of the Loft. If you'd like to support our mission, please visit us at loft.org backslash join. But that wraps up today's episode. If you enjoyed this show, please leave us a review and subscribe so you never miss an update. And until next time, thanks for gathering around the fire.