Steven Reigns, the first Poet Laureate of West Hollywood, has published more than a dozen chapbooks as well as the collections ”Inheritance” and ”Your Dead Body Is My Welcome Mat.” A lecturer and teacher of writing workshops for LGBT youth and people living with HIV, Reigns edited ”My Life is Poetry,” showcasing his students’ work from the first-ever autobiographical poetry workshop for LGBT seniors. His collection ”A Quilt for David” was published by City Lights, and his latest book, ”Outliving Michael,” has just been published by Moon Tide Press. He’s the board president of the Anaïs Nin Foundation, and here he takes the Book Pages Q&A.
Q. Please tell readers about your new book, “Outliving Michael.”
It’s a book about friendship, specifically mine with Michael Church, living in the ’90s in Florida. He was a best friend, 17 years older than me, and played the role of a mentor in many ways. He died of AIDS in 2000. This book reflects on our time together and his lasting impact on my life.
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Q. Can you also talk about dentist David Acer, the inspiration for your previous book, “A Quilt for David,” published by City Lights?
In 1990, a Florida dentist, David Acer was accused of infecting his patients with HIV. Homophobia and AIDSphobia fueled this tabloid story into major news and a major witch hunt.
I spent over a decade researching what really happened, who the dentist was, and who his accusers were. I dedicated so much of my life to researching what was going on in that dental office and realized I was telling a bigger story of what was going on in the United States at that time.
Q. Is that true for “Outliving Michael”?
In many ways, yes. “Outliving Michael” is the story of a friendship and of loss. So many people were experiencing the loss of loved ones due to AIDS. Michael wasn’t famous or publicly notable, but he was to me. Grief is long and complex, and telling about my specific experience, I’ve gotten feedback on how others can relate, who didn’t know Michael or didn’t even lose someone to the AIDS crisis.
Q. Do you remember the first book that made an impact on you?
“Delta of Venus” by Anaïs Nin. At 15, my friend Stephanie Recht loaned me the book. Of course, for a sexually charged boy, it was thrilling to read, but what stood out to me was the preface. In it, this woman with an unpronounceable name to me, talked about sensuality and sex and championed poetry. I noted it was an excerpt from her diary and soon checked it out from the library. In a few short years, I read everything she had written.
Q. You’re now the board president of the Anaïs Nin Foundation.
Yeah, it amazes me how much of an impact one writer has had in shaping my life, writing, and now how I spend my time. I’m prepping her remaining archives for inclusion at UCLA. I’ve spent hundreds of hours going through her original papers and belongings.
Shortly after joining the Foundation, I learned these archives were in a metal shipping container in a field in Malibu. My first order of business as president was to get them to a less vulnerable spot. I helped physically move them, and less than 3 months later, the shipping container was engulfed in flames during the January fires.
Q. Is it true that Nin spent her last years in the San Gabriel Valley town of Sierra Madre (which is, less notably, my hometown)?
Yes. I know she’s associated with Paris and New York, but she spent the end of her life in SoCal. She spent some time in Sierra Madre when her second husband worked as a forester. She spent her final years in Silverlake, and she died in a Los Feliz hospital.
Q. What’s something – a fact, a bit of dialogue or something else – that has stayed with you from a recent reading?
Mary Ruefle has a prose piece called “Dear Friends.” It’s such a gorgeous overview of friends in her life and feelings about friendship. She has a friend who says, “I don’t want to die, but, you know, these things happen.” It’s sweet, raw, sentimental, and those last few words have become a mantra for me in acceptance. I can’t say enough about how perfect a piece of writing it is. I’ve almost always teared up when reading it. I recently went on a road trip with Stephanie, the very friend who introduced me to Anaïs Nin all those years ago, and I read her the long Ruefle piece. It felt very full circle and special to me.
Q. Do you have any favorite book covers?
I was in Paris earlier this year. Inside a French-language bookstore, I saw this cover for Pierre Charbonnier’s “Vers l’écologie de guerre: Une histoire environnementale de la paix,” published by La Découverte. The image caught my attention first. It’s a man with bags of water tied to him, and he’s walking into a burning field. I had to catch my breath looking at it, and then noticed it was a book of essays on the environment.
Of course, that man represents what so many environmentalists feel, but I couldn’t help but relate to it emotionally. That all of us proceed forward, do what we can, even if it means being engulfed in the flames. That maybe what we do will not put out the entire fire, but it will dampen it, slow it down, and what we do will make a difference.
Q. Do you listen to audiobooks? If so, are there any titles or narrators you’d recommend?
As an Angeleno, audiobooks save me from traffic frustrations. I love when writers read their own work. Pam Houston is my favorite writer to hear read her own work. Her cadence and tenor are perfect for her characters. Her most recent memoir, “Deep Creek,” was read by her, and I relished the writing and hearing her read her own experience. She’s so skilled at storytelling and dialogue. It’s a great book and one I gifted to so many friends the year it came out.
Q. What do you find the most appealing in a poem?
I just finished guest editing Spillway literary journal and am the judge for the Saints & Sinners Festival poetry contest. These experiences had me really thinking about what draws me in. Ultimately, I want to be moved or learn something. I’m interested in an emotional experience, a truth, an insight, or a well-crafted story. I’m not interested in word acrobatics or pompous poetry.
Q. Are you someone who must finish every book you start – or is it OK to put down the ones you don’t connect with?
I used to really hang in there, slog through the most tedious of books. This stopped a handful of years ago. My free time is so limited that I’m no longer generous with my time or labor to find redeeming aspects to a book I am not liking. I feel like there is more to gain for me by following what I’m interested in. That, in and of itself, is quite broad. As a writer, I feel that cognition comes later. It’s our job to follow our urges and interests and know it will inform or develop us in some meaningful way.
Q. Do you have a favorite bookstore or bookstore experience?
I just returned from doing a reading in New York City at The Bureau of General Services Queer Division. It is this thriving bookstore founded by two visionary gay guys inside the LGBT Center. It is on the second floor of the building, with no storefront, and has the most diversely niche collection of queer books, zines, and journals. Most, if not all, of the staff are volunteers. It’s such a smart, community-oriented space. Right after visiting Stonewall, people should walk over to BGSQD.
Q. What’s something about your book that no one knows?
It was only after “Outliving Michael” came out that I realized I didn’t make it explicitly clear that we never had sex. It was pure friendship, with no sexual tension or advances. This element was meaningful to me. I never had to question motives or interest. I was young, opinionated, wild, and rowdy, and he thought I was great. He had a guest room that he dubbed Steven’s Room because I’d visit so often. He was family to me, and no boundaries were ever crossed.
For more about the author, go to www.stevenreigns.com