Poet John Grey talks about his first publication, writing process, and the combination of character and personal experience in his poems “Neat” and “Neighborhood BBQ,” selected for publication in our first issue, Paremphasis.
Jessica York
“It’s like Poetry is a second language,” said writer John Grey when it comes to the world of writing poetry. This is a language he mastered at a young age, first by jotting down stories in the margins of his sister’s books, and then getting his first publication in a local newspaper in his hometown.
This poem was about sports, and Grey said the experience “seemed natural.” Since then, he has continued writing and getting published. Creating stuff, in his own words, is something that he was interested in doing, and now, it also happens to be his career.
Born and raised in Australia, and now a long-time resident of New England, Grey treats writing as his full-time job. Grey said that he tries to write at least eight poems a day and shared his method of writing, which involves taking old poems that he has written and then seeing if they can be mixed and matched to create something new.
His writing is sourced from all sorts of inspirations, and even though they are rooted in personal experience, all the stories conveyed are from a character’s perspective, like his poem “Neighborhood BBQ ”.
Having had his fair share of BBQs during his childhood, he took that experience and expanded on it to create the environment we see within the poem.
“I consider myself a writer first, then a poet second,” Grey said, “any subject for me is fair game for poetry.”
This holds true in his other poem, “Neat,” which talks about a messy office space he once had in his home, and the comparison it shared with his mind.
“In my old office, there is no bare floor. It was all papers,” Grey said.
Grey said that the messy office is as reflective of the narrator’s mind as it is his own, as he said he has a lot going on and is a self-proclaimed “organized mess.”
Grey said that his favorite part about writing is seeing the finished work completed and then seeing it published.
“When I was younger, I was happy to have just written something,” he said. “Now I tend to write something for a purpose… [to] [h]ave it published and have people enjoy it.”
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THE PAREMPHASIS MAGAZINE 
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