What circumstances are ideal for writing poetry?

I like to write poetry anywhere at any time. When I was younger, I often sought out a few hours to myself and dawdled intensely with poems in a notebook. Now I often draft new works in the Notes function on my iPhone.

Roughly how many drafts do you produce before ‘finishing’ a poem?

I produce anywhere from two drafts to more than a hundred. I work at poems until they seem right. Sometimes this happens over the course of weeks; sometimes over a passage of years.

Which poet would you most like to talk to – and why?

I’d like to talk to the original Gilgamesh poet to better understand that work’s weirdness, or Sappho because of her brilliance at registering the true weight of intimacy, or Thomas Wyatt, who thinks so beautifully in his poetry.

What do poets need most: solitude or a coterie?

I’m not sure that poets need a coterie, although in my case sympathetic friends, fellow poets, and trusted confidantes are a wonderful antidote to solitude – and such people are sometimes generative of new work. I certainly need solitude, and continue to search it out.

What have you learned from reviews of your poems?

Some reviewers read my poems in ways that are more interesting than my own readings of them. Some reviews are quirky and enjoyable for their ‘slant’ view of what I have written. Some have taught me about the querulousness of humanity.

If Plato allowed you to keep one poem or poetry collection in his Republic, what would it be?

Shakespeare’s Sonnets.

Do you have a favourite line of poetry (or couplet)?

I have many favourite lines or couplets. One is: ‘It will not stir for Doctors – / This Pendulum of snow –’ (Dickinson)

Is poetry generally appreciated by the reading public?

Poetry touches people immediately and powerfully at weddings and funerals, and many people continue to read poetry. Although contemporary poetry is often marginalised, it continues to rejuvenate and enliven our language and its meanings, and resist banality.

Paul Hetherington is head of the International Poetry Studies Institute (IPSI) at the University of Canberra and a founding editor of the journal Axon: Creative Explorations. He has published eleven collections of poetry, along with five chapbooks. He won the 2014 Western Australian Premier’s Book Awards (poetry), was shortlisted for the 2013 Montreal International Poetry Prize and commended in the 2016 Newcastle Poetry Prize.