Competing histories and poetry of witness: Merging the arenas of 'public' and 'personal' poetry

When I contemplate those writers and poets who have influenced my own poetry and stories, I found that they all had an underlying desire in common that became evident the more I considered their work: the desire to bridge the gap between public history and private memories. That is, the blending of personal experience with the "facts" of public knowledge. I think one could make the argument that all poets do this in their work one way or another---we are, after all, products of our environments. But what is most important to me is the conscious effort of incorporating both elements into my poetry---making histories (both private and public) that are not so well-known, known.;When I first began to research this idea of private and public histories, Kevin Stein's aesthetic statement was one of the first search results I came across. In his statement, Stein voiced the qualities of his poetry that I strive to incorporate into mine, "My poems tend to favor a cornucopia of competing 'histories.' Say, Oppenheimer and the A-bomb, Kandinsky's theory of the spiritual in art, my own experience working in a box-making factory...All these are the pure, life-sustaining stuff of poetry" (Stein). Like Stein, I try to navigate this intersection of subjects that are personal to me---those I know intimately and independently, and those subjects foreign to me---that I read about and relate to through research and/or public knowledge. Incorporating both in my writing can become an act against forgetting. Writing against forgetting or writing in order to remember is certainly not a new concept. In fact, Carolyn Forche, who coined the term "poetry of witness," compiled an entire collection of other poets who wrote during times of tragedy. Much of her work also focuses on this poetry as an act of remembrance.;Both theories of competing histories and poetry of witness pivot upon the same crucial axis: that the best poetry is that which provides simultaneous insight into both the self and the outside world. Though "poetry of witness" is often associated more with the political, Forche does argue the importance of re-fastening it as "social" or public in order to open it up to different realms of perspective. Not all poetry of witness has to focus on historical tragedy and human rights. Like Forche, poets such as Kevin Stein, Rita Dove, and Robert Pinsky all illustrate this convergence within their own work and personal style. Where Stein and Forche may focus on the overlooked or forgotten as subject matter, Dove and Pinsky really drive home the idea of publicly known histories and their attachment to our inner personal selves. And this is where my work comes in.;It seems that the more I write, the more I see these two realms of history coming together in my work. I often research to write my poetry---focusing on a historical figure or event. That is, I often wonder about the untold story---the one not illustrated in our history books. For example, "Varujan's Last Letter" is written from the perspective of the poet Daniel Varujan, who was assassinated during the Armenian Genocide. By researching the "facts" about Varujan and narrating his plight through first-person, I am not only writing historical or "public" poetry but poetry that is also deeply "personal." In my own way, I am "witnessing" the genocide through the eyes of Varujan as I imagine him during his last days. I also write poems from my own personal history and experience. Several of my poems focus on the untold story of my personal history. Poems that serve as witness to events I would not otherwise experience---poems like the life of my mother's brother, Craig, who died when he was five years old, my grandmother's cousin who was a television actor during the 60's and 70's, or my own brother's incarceration at a work camp for troubled youth. It is in this way that I hope my collection of poems illustrates the convergence of both the private and public---both competing histories and poetry of witness.