Southern Writers Magazine SW March 2018 PDF MASTER.compressed | 页面 10

John C. Mannone
Scientist Pulls Poetic Roots
from Earth and Sky
by Patricia Hope
T
he physicist Richard Feynman said, “Physics isn’t
the most important thing. Love is.” Retired physicist
John C. Mannone can write about love and physics,
plus hundreds of other topics that often leave his readers
in awe. He says the inspiration for his work “comes from
the everyday wonders—from the way that raindrops ripple
a pond to the way a meteor fireflies the starry night—they
leave impressions that morph into poetry.”
Mannone uses his background as a way to delve deeper
into the subject he is writing about, whether it
be stars and planets or emotion. “How I got into
writing poetry is somewhat mysterious,” he says,
“but I think it’s anchored in my faith conversion in
1997. I didn’t realize it then, but I was emotionally
investing in people, an idea central to becoming a
‘good’ poet.”
In fact, Mannone says, “I should hate poetry
because a college teacher didn’t like my analysis
of Spenser’s The Faerie Queene and gave me a
poor final grade. I was only interested in math and
science, but little did I know that my liberal arts
education would prove invaluable to me as both a
physicist and as a poet.”
For example, after he was hired by a small
college to teach physics and astronomy (to non-
science majors), he was “determined to make it a
memorable experience by defusing the mathematics and
infusing the science with history and literature.”
He explains. “I looked for profound events in history
where astronomy played a key role. ‘Paul Revere’s Ride,’
a poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, was perhaps
most influential. He wrote many poems (and letters)
containing elements of the night that enticed me to study
the astronomical landscapes in his poetry.”
Mannone admits, “My poetry often involves themes of
love, Christian spirituality, and the mundane rendered
special. I write in virtually all genres with the only
requirement that it be literary quality having literary depth.
Though I’m a scientist, I try to avoid work that is clever,
but I’m not afraid to use scientific terms as long as the
words have music and their meanings are clear.”
Mannone notes that even though he wrote with good
10 Southern Writers
imagery when he
started, his work
lacked clarity and rhythm. “After I learned to write with
clarity, my publication rate tripled to about 30 poems/
year. After perfecting rhythm, my publication rate
doubled again to about 50 pieces per year.”
For Mannone, “clarity is more than just sharpness
of image and sound.” He emphasizes that “every word
has to count and every word has to be the right word.”
He says that rhythm is the “tempo of the poem,
while literary depth,” he cautions, “is that
‘something’ that gives it universal appeal.”
Mannone is proof that what he says works.
He publishes about 100 pieces a year with about
700 total poems (and other creative writings)
published.
He believes his “conversational voice” has
elevated his poetry by its focus on “impeccable
rhythm and effective line breaks, as well as the
inclusion of poetic devices whenever possible.
This voice allows for edginess that would
otherwise be difficult with lyrical poems.”
Mannone says he pays attention to
fundamental elements, which he sums up in a
mnemonic he calls “LIMS,” for the essentials for
poetry, but valid for creative writing in general:
Language, Image, Music, Structure. (Image refers to all
sensory details, not just visual.) He emphasizes, “I don’t
believe in writer’s block; I frequently write—capturing
ideas on backs of junk mail envelopes—and I publish
aggressively.”
Mannone’s works include Apocalypse (Alban Lake
Publishing), which won third place for the 2017 Elgin
Book Awards; Disabled Monsters (Linnet’s Wing Press),
a book on disability poetry featured at the 2016 Southern
Festival of Books (Nashville, TN); and Flux Lines
(Celtic Cat Publishing) 2018. This full collection has
love-related poems using scientific metaphors.
He is the 2018 celebrity judge for the National
Association of State Poetry Societies; 2017 winner of the
prestigious award in Appalachian literature—the Jean
Ritchie Fellowship; 2017 Horror Writers Association