In Conversation with Poet Julie Poole

In this episode, Claire and Annar chat with poet and writer extraordinaire, Julie Poole. This episode airs on June 1st, 2021, which is the publication date for Julie's first full-length collection of poetry, Bright Specimen, published by fellow small Texas press, Deep Vellum. 

We had an enchanting conversation with Julie about her poems in Bright Specimen, which were inspired by her exploration of the Billie L. Turner Plant Resources Center at The University of Texas at Austin, the largest herbaria in the Southwestern United States.

Julie takes us on a journey into the herbarium, describing what it was like to discover that space, and how it became a sanctuary for her where her poems began to blossom and multiply into this beautiful book. 

Working at a small desk in the back of the building in the tower that was a sniper’s outpost in the 1966 UT mass shooting, Julie writes in her afterword that "Nature is the path forward; all of the lessons of unity are there.” 

To read more about Julie and her writing, including her incredible essays published in places like HuffPost, Publisher's Weekly and The Texas Observer, visit her website https://www.juliepoolejp.com

Julie Poole was born and raised in the Pacific Northwest. She received a BA from Columbia University and an MFA in poetry from The University of Texas at Austin. Her first book of poems, Bright Specimen, was inspired by the Billie L. Turner Plant Resources Center at The University of Texas at Austin and will be published by Deep Vellum on June 1st, 2021. She has received fellowship support from the James A. Michener Center, the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation, and Yaddo. In 2017, she was a finalist for the Keene Prize for Literature. Her poems and essays have appeared in Borderlands: Texas Poetry Review, CutBank, Denver Quarterly, Poet Lore, Cold Mountain Review, HuffPost, and elsewhere. Her arts and culture writing has appeared or is forthcoming in Publishers Weekly, Sightlines, The Texas Observer, and Texas Monthly. She lives in Austin, Texas, with her growing collection of found butterflies.