We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Ariel Neidermeier. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Ariel below.
Ariel , thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Learning the craft is often a unique journey from every creative – we’d love to hear about your journey and if knowing what you know now, you would have done anything differently to speed up the learning process.
It’s funny because “learning” to be a poet, in my opinion, has less to do with learning about poetic form, diction and the use of image (for example) and more to do with living (with an “!” I like to say) so that you have experiences of depth and meaning that you can write about. So much of poetry is about conjuring feeling and unless you’ve lived a life of deeply felt experiences then it might be difficult to do that. The other aspect of poetry that I would say is an essential skill is having the courage to be vulnerable and deeply self-reflective. Poetry that discusses traumatic experiences with little reflection and acceptance can lack a fullness of narrative and wisdom that I think great poetry inspires. To me, being a poet is about having the courage to not just write about your deep experiences but also to process them and plum them for deeper truths in your writing. That’s what resonates with people. Not just trauma dumping.
Ariel , love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?
I am a poet and writer. I have worked as a freelance writer in AdTech for about 5 years now. Poetry is my passion and a pursuit that I hope to live by in the future. In terms of my poetry, I am most proud of being featured on KALW’s Bay Poets series for my poem “All of Us, Oracles”. I also recently performed at Beast Crawl, Oakland’s premiere festival for literary arts & performance, with The Racket Reading Series. I am currently working on my first full-length collection of poetry and have a Substack poetry newsletter forthcoming called The Spiral.
For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?
As an artist, it’s rewarding to live a life in which I lean into my wild creative ideas. I think many people (including myself before I became a poet) who self-identify as “non-creatives” have vibrant artistic ideas but write them off because they don’t make a living as artists and, therefore, their ideas are deemed “pointless”. To proclaim oneself an artist, there must be a root part of you that believes you have something unique to say through your craft. Such a core belief is a beautiful thing for every human being to hold — to believe in the strength of your POV, to believe you have creative ideas that are worth pursuing. I wish for everyone to have this feeling. I wish for everyone to see themselves as artists.
Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?
Recently, I was accepted to attend the Napa Valley Writer’s Conference. The conference is competitive and I had initially been wait listed to attend. I had a lot of insecurity come up for me at the conference — one, because I had been wait listed initially and two, because most of the attendees had either completed or were in the process of completing an MFA in poetry. I have considered attending an MFA program since I started writing poetry but it is something that I am very much unsure of. Attending NVWC was very expansive for me because I got to meet and work with so many poets I deeply respect, and it really demystified for me the need to earn an MFA as I felt like I could keep up with the writers I met and, if anything, my lack of formal education seemed to impart a unique perspective and voice.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.arielneidermeier.com/
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/arieldawnn/
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/arielneidermeier/
- Other: https://arielneidermeier.substack.com/
Image Credits
Photo by Rod Rosete.