VS Season 6 Episode 10

Toi Derricotte vs. Stillness 

Transcription by: Akilah Muhammad

[MUSIC PLAYING]

Ajanaé Dawkins 

Hii, my name is Ajanaé Dawkins, and I think I am entering my tree hugger era.

Brittany Rogers

Hi, I'm Brittany Rogers, and I'm wishing a good day to Quinta Brunson, and Quinta Brunson only.

Ajanaé Dawkins

I know that’s right. And you are listening to VS, the podcast where poets confront the ideas that move them. And we’re you’re co-hosts!

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Brittany Rogers

Hey, co-host!

Ajanaé Dawkins

Hi, co-host.

Brittany Rogers

(Giggles). Ooh, that’s gone be my favorite thing forever, I swear.

Ajanaé Dawkins 

We gone be eighty, and I’ma be like, hey co-host. Aggravating. Speaking of the kind of joy and peace that might be possible in our future lives, I am curious, best, what’s something that allows you to practice stillness.

Brittany Rogers

You know what, I think that the most true answer is anything that puts me like, deeply in my body, I think then forces me to kind of be still. So if I'm singing along to a hymn, like that's when I feel the most connected with myself, or if I'm doing something like I'm skating, right? I can't focus on nothing, but my legs hurt (laughs). And somehow like that activity, that movement of the body I think makes my brain a lot more still. Which for me is the ultimate stillness because I don't think my brain is ever still.

Ajanaé Dawkins

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. And no, it is not. 

Brittany Rogers

(Laughing). Wooow.

Ajanaé Dawkins

But, I love it though. I love your brain. I do, it’s just, ya know (laughs).

Brittany Rogers

Look, she be goin’, okay, she be goin’. 

Ajanaé Dawkins

She be, a mile a minute! (Laughs). But, that makes sense. The answer seems very true to you.

Brittany Rogers

What about you?

Ajanaé Dawkins

Um, dancing, karaoke, that kind of thing at like a party, or watching TV actually. Like watching TV or books. And I think it's because it's impossible for me to think about the things that concern me. Like if I'm dancing, similar to you, I'm singing to the words, I'm in my body. If I'm doing karaoke, not if I'm performing, because when I’m performing, it might be my own work that's a mess, but like I'm singing somebody else's song. Or if I'm watching something just very light hearted that I've seen before, and that I'm committed to.

Brittany Rogers

Well, luckily today we had the pleasure, and honor, and just ultimate joy of listening to Toi Derricotte talk about her own practice with stillness, and listener you're in for such, such a treat.

Ajanaé Dawkins

Toi Derricotte is the recipient of the 2021 Wallace Stevens Award from the Academy of American Poets, and the 2020 Frost Medal from Poetry Society of America for distinguished lifetime service to American poetry. Her sixth collection of poetry, “I” New and Selected Poems was shortlisted for the 2019 National Book Award. Her literary memoir, The Black Notebooks, won Anisfield Book Award for nonfiction, and was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year. With Cornelius Eady, Derricotte co-founded the Cave Canem Foundation in 1996. She is Professor Emeritus from University of Pittsburgh, and a former chancellor of the Academy of American Poets. Super excited for this interview.

Brittany Rogers

Let's get into it, best. 

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