This week’s installment of Ten Questions features Nicholas Goodly, whose poetry collection Star Power is out today from Scribner. Throughout the book, Goodly takes delight in the multifariousness of artistic influence: Grace Jones rubs shoulders with Tom of Finland while Hitchcock blondes bump up against Jacolby Satterwhite. The collision of luminaries can be both comic and poignant; in mistaking Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus for Titus Andromedon, the “Black gay best friend” of the Netflix comedy Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt, the poet observes how the tongue itself is a contested space, as a speaker works against other’s expectations in the struggle to be “author of his own fate.” The collection’s cohort of guardian angels can confer the power of queer “bibliomancy,” the poet promises: “These are the last days of binary thinking. Take a book. Read it like an invocation.” Charif Shanahan wrote that the poems of Star Power “are alive with defiance and play, fire and chill, demand and dismissal; they meditate and conjure, they trouble and revere, claiming the center—where they belong—as they sing of Black queer life, the icons and legends who paved way for their children.” And Danez Smith hailed Goodly as writing with “a once-in-a-lifetime Black mad genius.” Nicholas Goodly is the author of the poetry collection Black Swim (Copper Canyon Press, 2022). Goodly was the recipient of the 2017 Chapbook Fellowship from the Poetry Society of America, runner-up for the 2019 Cave Canem Poetry Prize, and a finalist for the 2020 Jake Adam York Prize.
Nicholas Goodly, author of Star Power. (Credit: Caleb Jamel Brown)
1. How long did it take you to write and assemble the poems in Star Power?
I am essentially at a constant stage of writing, but I believe the earliest poem in this collection is from pre-pandemic 2020. By 2020 I decided, because I lived in an environment where not many people looked like me, to write poems that felt like they preserved and uplifted parts of my identity. I didn’t want certain parts of myself to fade away, so I wrote them down. I wanted the writing to be more and more uncompromising until I felt I got to the heart of who I am. I [was] finding solace in artists I admire, but also finding joy and love in my early models of community. And then I realized that the poems I was writing may not only be for me, but instead for anyone who is living their life without the celebration they are due. Once that clicked, the poems really took off and I really challenged myself to get even wilder in style.
When I taught at the Kenyon Review Young Writers Workshop that summer, where it is required to write several times a day, the book began to form in earnest. It was also at this time that some of my best friends and I met over the course of several days to critique each other’s manuscripts. We articulated what we observed from the collections and suggested ways to further develop the vision. I give thanks to these people because they were the ones that gave me the confidence to pursue this book so fiercely that it was meaningful. It’s good to have a group of friends who make you feel like you can do anything.
2. What was the most challenging thing about writing the poems in the collection?
One of the most challenging aspects of writing Star Power was organizing the collection in a way that made sense and felt intentional considering the book’s comprehensive scope of subjects. I’m writing poems about celebrities and art; there are biographical poems, prose poems, lots of form experiments, humorous poems. Navigating the book’s range in a way that makes sense to the reader was an obstacle. [I had] to make the journey feel productive for the reader, to keep the momentum charged. It was important to get an outside ear on this, so I collaborated with other poets on different arrangements right up until the last final edits to try to get it right.
3. Where, when, and how often do you write?
I’m not particularly precious about the when and where of my writing. Luckily for me, I can produce a lot of bad work at once. And even more lucky for me, my favorite part of the writing process is editing. I always want substantial amounts of drafts that I can come back to and work on and piece together. This can look like anything from breaking down essays into poems or taking old journals and composition books and reshaping them into a collage. If there are days when I’m not writing, I need to at least read. At the bare minimum, I make sure to draw or doodle. If you keep those creative muscles limber, even in small ways, that artistic spirit never goes away.
4. What are you reading right now?
Right now I am reading Baldwin by Nicholas Boggs (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2025), James Baldwin’s biography. I’m really enjoying his relationship with Beauford Delaney. Boggs writes their bond beautifully. Baldwin understood how important dialogue with other artists in different mediums is, which I really appreciate. He also seemed to understand how great he was, and wasn’t afraid of claiming that. To be honest, it’s refreshing to see [that he] struggle[d] so long before he “made it.” It just goes to show that even someone like the mighty James Baldwin can go under the radar at first. The key is continually showing up for yourself and doing the work.
5. Which poet, in your opinion, deserves wider recognition?
I wish more people were introduced to Harryette Mullen sooner. Her work amongst the Language poets has been incredibly eye opening for me in the process of writing this collection. If more readers of poetry encountered her sooner, not only would this show the capabilities of a Black woman abstract poet, but I believe her work forces us to be more imaginative and to make bigger leaps, which would benefit all of us.
6. What is the biggest impediment to your writing life?
I think I’m at my best when I’m allowed to obsess and continually return to the same topic every day for extended periods, long enough for things to get weird. So there’s a moment sometimes when I’m working on several projects at once where I feel like I’ve lost the plot. However, what I’ve found by sticking to each project as best I can is that strange interactions start to emerge between the pieces. I find common ground in subjects that on paper should have nothing to do with each other. They begin revealing things to each other. I just have to remain receptive to it.
7. What is the earliest memory that you associate with the poems in the collection?
Childhood memories are a returning theme in this collection. I look back as often as I am looking forward. I believe the earliest referenced memory in the book is of my dad holding me on the porch and because of a series of miscommunications I told him I lived in his eye. I’m also interested in the fact that I only remember this so precisely because of a home movie of it. Is that actually remembering? Is this how we can time-travel to happier places? I use Star Power to revisit, but also to interrogate the necessity of revisiting.
8. What was your strategy for organizing the poems in this collection?
I knew that I wanted the book to start off with big personality and I also wanted to end the book with joy and celebration. In between there, where do I put anger? Where do I put the tragedy? It felt like trying to make a bunch of strong-willed voices work as a team. It was really helpful to organize the poems by grouping similar things together. It helped to be really obvious about it at first. “These are the romantic poems, these are the sexy poems, these are the sad poems, etc.” Once I got some pillars up from each of these categories, I could start to make more nuanced choices between them. I also use the “How to Star” poems to signal a shift in theme. These poems typically are more intimate self-portraits. They are my attempt at being vulnerable and honest to the same degree that I am being colorful and boisterous in some of the other pieces.
9. Outside of writing, what other forms of work were essential to the creation of Star Power?
I was drawing with all the colors in the crayon box on this one. This book is about art; it is concerned with the abilities and failures of various mediums that I’ve experienced. I’ve been dancing since I was three. I’ve always had a strong interest in visual art and began taking that more seriously since writing Star Power. I did musical theater growing up (because of course). I’m really excited about this project because it gives a shout-out to all these versions of me. I feel like I am getting closer to representing my full self, not just Nicholas the poet.
10. What’s the best piece of writing advice you’ve ever heard?
The best writing advice I’ve ever received is to not read anything just because I think I should. This was in response to me expressing my frustration with texts that were difficult for me at the time. I believe this advice, at its core, is about honoring your own canon. You have agency in what you fill your head with. Explore what you believe needs to be explored. Write about the things that mean something to you. If no one knows who and what is close to your heart, it is your duty to make it shine for someone else. Every single writer comes to the page with the chance to present their truest self to the world. Don’t waste that opportunity to write your perspective to please someone else. Share your story because you never know who needs to hear it.
