Interview Q&A with Michael L. Utley
We present our first exclusive Q&A Interview with Michael L. Utley whose literary works have graced our Spillwords pages and earned him the title of April’s 2025 Author of the Month.
- What does it mean to be selected as Author of The Month?
Being named Author of the Month feels a little surreal, to be honest. As a highly introverted person, I’ve always been accustomed to never being heard. I was always that quiet kid who kept to himself, who grew up to be that silent fellow who self-isolates due to deafness and depression as well as introversion. I was nominated for Author of the Month last year but wasn’t selected as the winner, so while being nominated again this year was an honor, I was content to just be a nominee and left it at that—no expectations. When the email notification arrived with the results, I had to read it a few times before it sunk in. It’s a thrill, and there’s a sense of validation, a sense of my voice finally being acknowledged. It’s also deeply humbling, and I’m grateful for the support of those wonderful folks who cast their votes for me, as well as for the editors who were kind enough to publish my poetry.
- How have your friends and/or family influenced your writing?
From a practical standpoint, there’s not a lot of familial influence on my writing. My older sister wrote poetry as a teen but was very private about it. One of my nephews had a small poetry blog during his university days; another nephew had a writing blog for a while. Aside from this, there’s no one in my immediate family who writes, so I’m not sure where I picked it up. My late mother was always supportive of my creative endeavors, and while she didn’t understand my poetry, she always encouraged me to write. I think the main influence my family has had on my writing is the wealth of material they inadvertently provided me during a severely dysfunctional childhood. At age sixty-one, I’m still sifting through some difficult memories and writing about them as a means of cleansing my soul. While these traumatic memories are difficult to handle at times, I feel blessed that I’m able to put them on paper or screen and impose order on them. The act of writing is cathartic, and life-changing.
As for offline friends, my buddy Jeff is a constant source of encouragement, and I don’t think he realizes just how much his support means to me. Online, my fellow bloggers in the WordPress community influence me daily through their talent and kindness. Without them, my words would wither and die.
- What inspires and motivates you to write?
What inspires and motivates me to write is the deep-seated need to connect with the world in a way that feels safe and nurturing. Although I’m quite reclusive now, a part of me yearns to reach out and experience the world, people, feelings, emotions… It’s a bit of a dichotomy to be an introvert who deals with social anxiety yet desires to have friends and somehow fit in. Writing has been the bridge that spans the gulf of loneliness and separation from the world. As a deaf guy, writing is really the only way I can communicate, so it’s taken on a much larger sense of importance for me than it might for a normally hearing person. I experience a kind of confidence when I write (although that pervading feeling of awkwardness never goes away), and this allows me to be able to put my true self out there for readers to see, something that’s impossible for me to do in person due to my deafness and anxiety. But perhaps most of all, I’ve always possessed an innate yearning to create, which has manifested itself in music (prior to my deafness), nature photography and writing. Harnessing memories, raw emotions, and life experiences and building worlds that thrum with intensity and profound meaning sates some deep thirst in my soul.
- Can you tell us about the catalyst that sparked your writing journey?
I think being a lonely kid—an introverted farm boy in a dysfunctional family who didn’t fit in at home or at school—is what triggered my desire to write. When you’re alone, sometimes you feel as though you’re drowning, suffocating, because you have no voice, and no one to listen even if you did. I recall stories I wrote in elementary school and junior high, ridiculously stupid tales that delighted me to no end because words were oxygen to me, and I was able to breathe through writing. I was painfully shy in my youth, so there was no way to communicate verbally with anyone, and really, no one cared anyway. I was introduced to Tolkien as a twelve-year-old kid and that was like a door being kicked open forcibly, revealing a verdant, living, breathing new world where lonely kids like me could find a home and create our own adventures. I believe writing not only gave me life, it saved my life.
- Please share a glimpse into your writing process.
My writing process is scattershot, chaotic and improvised at all times, it seems. I write in sporadic bursts among agonizingly long stretches of writer’s block. I’m sure major depression plays a part in this frustrating and inefficient method of writing. When my muse strikes, there’s an energy, an excitement, a palpable sense of confidence, and I can close my eyes and the words come to me easily. I’ll get lost in a poem and hours will pass unnoticed. Everything quiets down (sort of redundant for a deaf guy) and my focus is steady and precise. I call it The Zone, and really it’s simply being lost in the moment, with no past regrets or future worries to distract the sublime flow of inspiration and creativity. It’s during these periods that I truly feel alive, truly feel human, as though I have something to say and I’ve found my voice at last. However, these periods never last long, and there’s an expected crash that occurs. I feel exhausted, depleted, empty and purposeless. I’m unable to write on a schedule. I’m unable to write from an outline or pre-planned set of notes. My muse is extremely fickle and quite negligent in her duties of providing a steady flow of inspiration. So, I must take advantage of these surges when they occur and get as much written as possible. I marvel at people who write prolifically according to a rigid schedule, but I know I can’t write that way. I do the best I can and hope the inevitable block won’t last too long.
- What do you find most fulfilling about the act of writing?
The true sense of fulfillment with regards to writing is twofold for me. First, being able to create something from nothing and do it in a way that meets my own strict standards is like a brief explosion of joy. When a poem essentially writes itself and I’m experiencing this miracle of creation, I feel like my life has meaning on some level, that I have purpose and value as a human being. It excites me in a profoundly fundamental way, and I want to share it with people, as if to say, “I’m here, this is who I am.” And that leads to the second reason, the human connection that occurs when one writes and another reads. It’s an incredibly intimate act when we pour our heart and soul into a piece of writing and someone takes the time to read it and respond. Two souls shaking hands, a connection made. When I write a piece and a reader tells me it resonated deeply, there’s a sort of kinship there for a brief moment, and it reminds both of us that we matter in the grand scheme of things.
- How does the use of imagery contribute to conveying your story?
Imagery is paramount for me. It is the dynamo that powers my poetry. I won’t shy away from using blunt, brutal imagery to make a point or express an emotion in my writing. I’ve often wondered if I depend more heavily on vivid imagery due to my deafness. I rely on my vision to compensate for my loss of hearing, so I see the world in a different way than normally hearing people, I think. It certainly proved true during my nature photography days, and it has carried over to my poetry. The thing that draws me to poetry is its ability to connect with readers in ways prose can’t. I want my readers to think when they read my work; I want to exercise their imaginations. I especially enjoy haiku and senryu for this reason, as short-form poetry can be profound with dynamic imagery.
- What is your favorite reading genre?
As far as reading goes, as a kid I was a science-fiction nerd, then I fell hard for fantasy after being introduced to Tolkien. Horror has always been high on my list of genres, and has influenced much of my dark poetry. Over the past few years, I’ve begun reading less and less, but what I do read most often now is poetry. In a world rife with so many disturbing distractions, it’s difficult for me to concentrate long enough to read much anymore, and it’s a sore loss for me as I was always the kind of reader who devoured novels. Now, it’s occasional readings of poets I admire as well as poetry blogs, especially those of my writing friends in our WordPress community. Those poets I admire? Sylvia Plath, Robert Frost, Edwin Arlington Robinson, William Carlos Williams, Basho, Issa, Buson, to name a few. Poetry bloggers? Too many amazing ones to name here.
- What human being has inspired you the most?
The person who has inspired me the most would be my late mom. She endured an awful fifty-two-year marriage to an abuser, dealt with myriad medical issues, raised three kids and helped raise some of her grandkids, and always had a smile on her face, always had a kind word for everyone. She loved her garden, her safe haven among the horrors of her life. She encouraged me when no one else did. When she died, the family fell apart, sundered, scattered. She was the glue that held us all together. And while I miss her dearly, I know she’s no longer in pain, neither physical nor emotional. She didn’t live long enough to see me become a published writer and that saddens me, but I like to think somehow she knows and is proud of me. She raised me to be the antithesis of my abusive father, and for that I’m eternally grateful to her.
- What message would you have for the Spillwords Press community that voted for you?
My message to those in the Spillwords Press community who voted for me? I’m beyond grateful to receive your generous support and want you all to know this community feels like home to me. For an introverted deaf guy who never fit in anywhere, the kindness and camaraderie I’ve discovered here and throughout the WordPress writing community have given me hope and proven that there are still good people in this world. Thank you for this opportunity, for reading my poetry, and for accepting me as I am. This is a wonderful place to be.
- What would you like your legacy as a writer to be?
My legacy as a writer… I think I’d like to be known as someone who cared deeply for people, made a positive difference with his poetry, brought people together through kindness and compassion, and perhaps was able to inspire others to embrace hope despite whatever horrors they may have experienced in their lives. Words have power, and used wisely they can build bridges rather than walls, heal broken hearts and souls, and lift us out of darkness into the light. If I can touch the life of even one person through my writing, my life will have been meaningful.
- Is there anything else you would like to add?
In closing, I just want to thank everyone for this honor. It means a lot to me. We’re all in this together; we all matter; we all have value. When I began my blog four years ago, I didn’t know what to expect when I started posting my poetry. It’s been a wonderful experience thus far, and as I mentioned earlier, this feels like home to me now and I have all of you to thank for that. Keep writing, keep creating, continue to reach across borders and cultures and continents and connect with one another. Make this world a better place for all.
- Interview Q&A With Michael L. Utley - May 20, 2025
- The Bonfire - April 8, 2025
- Clarity - January 15, 2025
