interview with Jason Grundstrom-Whitney
In Off the Coast’s interview series, we correspond with a writer about their latest book. This issue, we wrote to poet Jason Grundstrom-Whitney.
Jason Grundstrom-Whitney’s poetry has appeared in 3 Nations Anthology: Native, Canadian, & New England Writers and in the Underground Writers Association’s Anthology of Maine Poets. The band Osha Root recently produced a CD featuring his music and poetry. Jason has spent a lifetime working on Native American Rights, Sexual Assault, and Domestic Violence survival, Hospice and end of life care, homeless and environmental issues, and alternative medicine practice, A Bear Clan member of the Passamaquoddy Tribe, Jason studied with native teachers and many others while he hitch-hiked across America for two and a half years. Jason is a father, grandfather, and husband, and he has been in recovery for 37 years.
A.T.: For those who haven’t yet read Bear, Coyote, Raven, can you write a little about each of the titular characters? What place in the narrative does each fill?
J.G.W.: It was really a challenge to use these three cultural characters, as there are over 500 tribes across Turtle Island, and to represent them in a concise manner, giving the respect due across so many perspectives that each tribe brings, so I improvised certain characteristics with each character.
At times Bear is with the medicine, gathering and using it in a ceremony. At other times he is the traveler—the one that gathers people, arguing with other characters, such as Puma, and having the the deep human connection that people associate with Bear and how we learned to gather medicines and connection from him/her.
The Raven at times is the one that brings the light—sometimes creating mischief and at other times being the one that creates the condition for love and wonder.
Coyote is definitely mischievous and brings a smile and laughter but also has a cosmic dimension as well.
All three are woven in and out, sometimes talking animal form, other times human form. They are always in their travels informing, bringing story, gathering medicine in the wider aspect of medicine—meaning all life and our experiences in this vast web in which we live. Together they form a narrative as old as time but new as the dew on the tulips this morning.
A.T.: How did you go about taking up the mantle of characters with so much cultural importance? I think of the “thousand-eye glance” from your poem “Dragonfly”; they have so much history and scope.
J.G.W.: The dragonfly has so much significance in many native cultures. In the Hopi tradition they are considered medicine and have the powers of healing and transformation. In the Navajo (Dine) tradition you will often see a dragonfly in sandpaintings, and they represent water. I tried to incorporate both in this with a curious note. You have a 'Medicine Keeper' looking to another 'Medicine Keeper' for their perspective and the ‘thousand-eye glance' that Dragonfly carries. It is really teaching us that we see so little in the world with our veiled perspective as we have too much in the way—the way we preconceive what we see, our projections of what we 'think we see', and the incessant chatter we have with our busy minds.
A.T.: Can you explain the experience of making a CD with the band Osha Root? What sparked that process?
J.G.W.: Osha Root was started by pondering, 'what would my poetry sound like if done as they read Rumi in the Middle East with music, and what would happen if we changed each song with sounds from Turtle Island musical genres?' So I started this project with Bob Colwell and we have so much fun. Sometimes I have no idea what we are working with until I get into the studio, look at one of my poems and then we just simply create. We call it 'climbing into the sandbox' or 'fingerpainting' and we so love the process and playing out. I love performing my poetry this way!
A.T.: If you were to identify a poetic lineage for your work, what would it be?
J.G.W.: Mostly the mystic poets:
Li Bai
Du Fu
Han-shan
Lao Tzu
Li Po
Matsuo Basho
Thich Nhat Hanh
Kabir
Jalal ad-Din Muhammad Rumi (I call him my teacher. I was turned onto his writing in the 70s by students from Iran.)
Hafez
William Blake
Walt Whitman
Emily Dickinson
Joy Harjo
Leslie Marmon Silko
Cheryl Savageau
A.T.: The characters are always traveling in this book, always navigating some new distance. How does place influence your work?
J.G.W.: I was raised out west in Arizona, California, Utah, Nevada, and Colorado, then when I got kicked out of college due to my behavior (Substance Use Disorder and PTSD), I hitchhiked around Turtle Island for two and a half years, being homeless and all the rich experiences this provided. I love all the vast geographic space of Turtle Island. I often dream of the desert. Place is very important for the context of the poems.
A.T.: What’s something seemingly distant from poetry that has significantly influenced your poems?
J.G.W.: I have been in recovery for 37 years, so these experiences have definitely influenced my work. When I got into recovery, one of the tools for recovery I picked up was writing. I write every day and on days when I can't, I just don't feel right. I consider that and music as part of my daily hygiene. Music is another big influence for my writing. I have played in bands all over Turtle Island and feel it important to pick up my bass and harmonica or wind instruments daily. Another influence is working as I have for over 30 years as a social worker and licensed alcohol and drug counselor. I have worked with many different populations and have loved the work. My family has been such a big influence—my Clan Mother, Joan M. Dana; my wife, Lisa; my children, Sarah, Leif (and his fiancé Abigail), and Josh; and my grandchildren Kael and Jailynn. I love them all so much!
A.T.: Who is an underrated poet that more people should read?
She is well known but I feel we should laud her praises even more—Cheryl Savageau. The first time I heard her read from Dirt Road Home I was astounded. I love her work. She has a new book out, Out of the Crazywoods, which I highly recommend. It is a stunning and beautiful memoir, filled with story and vignettes and challenges cultural definitions of madness and a holistic and cultural context in which to heal.
* * *
To accompany this interview, we have included five of Jason Grundstrom-Whitney’s poems from Bear, Coyote, Raven.