Marsha Warren X Tyler Knott Gregson

A poet
A photographer
A Buddhist
A chaser of the light.

Tyler Knott Gregson see’s life through a different lens. Colors and nuances of the human heart we sometimes miss in the hustle and bustle of life. Maybe it has to do with him living in the beautiful mountains of Helena, Montana- nature has always had its way of speaking directly and seamlessly to the heart.

When I first stumbled upon Tyler’s poetry, it did just that- it spoke to my heart. In a sea of poetry his stuck out to me and in some magical way, it was always what I needed to read in that exact moment. Having a love/hate relationship with social media, it was moments like that where I saw a sliver of positivity that shone through the dark corners of being “online”. Social media really has a way of making one feel lonely in a crowded room and so when someone changes my perspective or unknowingly offers me the advice I needed, I say hello.

And that’s what I did in the form of a virtual sit down over coffee…

MW:  Do you remember the first poem you published? Was there any fear? Fear mostly from the spot of being vulnerable, not so much what people would say but that you were sharing your emotional scape with strangers?

TKG: Honestly, I’ve never had any fear or apprehension, hesitation, or anything other than a complete and total ambivalence towards posting the work I come up with.  It’s not for anyone other than my own brain’s relief, to be truthful.  It makes me feel better to write, it makes me, for the few moments it takes to write the poem, feel a little less crazy, a little less fractured.  If there is vulnerability in the sharing, I suppose I don’t really notice it, or see where it lands, as once it’s out of my mind, on paper, it’s done, and gone, and it takes on a new life as some flower from some seed I really didn’t mean to plant.  Who knows what gardens come from doing it this way, who knows what weeds, it is just the only way I know, really.

MW: Do your poems stem from personal experience or are they based on collective observation?

TKG: In short… Yes.  Haha, I know that seems like a copout, but both, always.  I kind of think I go through life and learn by osmosis, just sort of absorbing and inhaling everything, swirling it around with everything that’s already inside, and then kicking it back out as something new, something stained by who I am and who I’m becoming and who I was and all those whos.  There is a lot to this thing of life, and I’m just trying to navigate it as best as I can, with what I’ve got.  I think the poems are reflections of that.

MW: Seemingly you do not struggle with writer’s block. You have tapped into some beautiful well of words that is providing endless inspiration. What’s your secret to keeping writers block at bay?

TKG: Thank you for this.  I think the root of it all is something I kind of thought of as the conduit vs. the conductor theory.  If you try to be the conductor, try to use your batons to orchestrate the way the words fall, the shape they take, the song they make, you’re going to run out, plain and simple.  It’s not sustainable.  I think the entire reason I’m still going, some 2300 poems in 2300 days in, is that I’ve embraced the conduit role instead. I don’t control the words that come, I don’t try to steer them or shape them, I just let them come how they are, and I write them when they come.  I don’t sit down TO write, I sit down when there are words, I write when there are things inside that don’t want to be there anymore.  This is all and this is it.  No blocks have come from this way, so I think I’ll stay with it.

MW:  I have often been told that I’m a hopeless romantic and that the type of man I’m looking for doesn’t exist. My response always goes, but he does, because I have seen bits of him in the beautiful poetry I’ve read, love stories I’ve read, songs I’ve listened to, have all been written by men. People tell me men “aren’t emotional” and I’m the first to jump at their throats and say “that’s simply not true.” Your poetry oozes with sensitivity and an observation of emotions that I’m talking about. What are your thoughts on “men not being emotional”?

TKG: I think being in touch with emotions is what makes us human, not man, not woman, not any of the gender roles we associate with.  Men that are unable to be in touch with their emotions have blocks in so many different places that are holding them back from being their full selves, being a fully formed human that is capable of all the things they say you’re hopeless for being, for believing in.  I’m not interested in manufactured and forced views of gender, or sexuality, or anything else, I’m only interested in what makes people Feel.

MW:  What would be your, or one of your, I made it moments? I’m talking about that moment when you step outside yourself and observe all that’s going on around you and you’re just filled with so much joy and pride.

TKG: This answer is probably going to sound horrible and self-defeating and maybe a bit negative and who knows what else, but to be honest, I haven’t had any of these.  None of the moments so far in my life have felt worthy of pride, really, and I don’t know if they ever will.  The closest I ever come is when I am in nature and I share a moment of connection, of trust, with a wild thing.  That’s the only critic I listen to, the only barometer of what kind of person I am, that really adds up.  Wild things know, they inherently know, the value of us, the meter of our hearts, the kindness in our souls, and they respond to that.  A moment of this is worth ten million book signings with ten million people in attendance.  That’s the absolute fact.