You can usually find writer James Jay behind the bar at Uptown Pubhouse in Flagstaff. He may be serving drinks, but he’s thinking about poetry. “Conversations with regulars and strangers alike provide loads of potential subjects and situations to write about.” He’s certainly made the most of his barroom experiences. For years he wrote a column for FlagLive called Bartender Wisdom. His third collection of poems is called Barman, and he’s just published another collection through Foothills Publishing, Whiskey Box.
Bartending is only part of James’ life though. He has an MA degree in Literature from Northern Arizona University, and an MFA in Creative Writing from the University of Montana. He’s taught poetry in public schools, jails, colleges and universities. He also served as president of the Northern Arizona Book Festival for ten years.
James’ poems have a thoughtful economy of words, a poetic realism that touches on and elevates many everyday topics. “Anything can be a poetic source of inspiration. Anything can be a treasure.” He’s continually receptive to new ideas for poems. “I always have a journal and pen with me. I dash down things, a lot of which I never come back to. The act of scrawling helps keep me motivated, however. When I do return to those words it becomes a scavenger hunt, a sifting and sorting. I love finding these artifacts. It’s through the act of writing the poem that they become something else. It’s then, if all goes well, that I can make the real discovery and stumble into thoughts or feelings or ideas that take me by surprise. Nothing into something.”
Arizona’s high-desert landscape has a strong influence on James’ writing. “My dad was in the Army and we bounced around a lot, but Kingman is where I ended up for the longest period. That desert I played in as a kid, with its creosote, mesquite, tumbleweeds and distinct, precise vegetation, shaped the pace and way I like to see things, smell things, experience the world. That permeates my writing, regardless of the subject or location.”
He’s lived in Flagstaff for many years, but also spends time teaching poetry for the Missoula Writing Collaborative in Montana. “It’s hard to imagine living anywhere else than the West. I enjoy visiting lots of different places, but the West is home. My wife Aly is an ultrarunner and knows miles and miles of trails in Flagstaff and throughout the Coconino and Kaibab forests. My sons Wilson and Henry have been cutting firewood with me since they were little, and they dig anything outdoors. We have three rez dogs, and during the pandemic we fostered dozens of pups with parvo. All this informs everything I write, what I’m interested in reading, and where I keep my attention and focus.”
Sharing poetry through teaching is fulfilling and inspiring for James. He finds that poetry acts as a great equalizer, no matter the locale. “A sonnet, whether at the university or high school or jail, is a sonnet. The ability to listen to and communicate with a host of people becomes essential, and the poems do the heavy lifting in this task.”
Like teaching, his experiences with Northern Arizona Book Festival have been rewarding. “It was an honor. I was able to meet some of my literary heroes, like Robert Bly, Dorothy Allison, Tim Seibles, all of whom are tremendous ambassadors of poetry and literature. I tried to get as many up-and-coming writers
and mid-career folks into the festival as well in hopes of connecting with the audience. You never know which writer will speak profoundly to someone. I’m thrilled to see it still going strong and pushing into its third decade.”
James shares the history behind the following poems. “I’ve written hundreds of Whiskey Box poems over the years. When I’m working at the pub and breaking down boxes for the recycler, I’ll sometimes pull interesting boxes aside and write poems, sonnets, notes or letters on the backs of them. Mainly I mail them out to folks. I don’t generally keep any copies. Mostly I remember them, kick them around in my head, and then revise the ones I like and shape them into poems.”
For James, poetry’s recurring beauty continually amazes him. “Lines I’ve heard or read decades before come back to me at various times. Whether it’s on early mornings walking the dogs, during conversations with old friends, or waiting to checkout at the grocery store, I find lines of poetry return to me, oftentimes as powerful as when I first read or heard them. I love poetry’s endurance.”
More at foothillspublishing.org/james-jay
I found first the scanned arrest record
for my great grandpa
through the genealogy research
to which I subscribed monthly.
Bad check writing. Sixteen years old. Nebraska.
The family had come down on tough times.
He only found the ledgers, claimed his confession
to the court. It’s not like he pilfered firsthand.
Buy of this what you want.
He’s not my great grandpa anyway.
He’s yours. Your family had come down
on those old and familiar tough times.
Whatever makes you feel better, keep.
The rest toss back, so many tiny fish hooked
on a wide sea of bad luck. You passed those bum
checks, so you’d be in a tale, whatever the role.
Because you went quietly, the sheriff kept
the cuffs loose. This evidence is my record.
The box of Talisker 10,
go inside
with your fingers
and pull up a flap.
There, there rests
Richard Hugo’s lines, not Scottish at all.
Wide forehead
like a Cadillac,
mechanic at Boeing,
forever American,
he spent time on Skye
jotting notes in journals.
Press them, map-flat,
and be content as a fellow
moved to dayshift.
For the Guggenheims,
he fired off poems
for a book. For you,
he left words
elsewhere,
cast onto currents of the sea —
We are what we sing.
Dee Cohen is a Prescott poet and photographer. deecohen@cox.net.
