Can you go through the step-by-step process of writing this poem from the moment the idea was first conceived in your brain until final form? Although it’s hard to remember the exact circumstances around the writing of this poem, this is what I know: I was in graduate school at Florida International University, and I was constantly obsessed with home because I missed it so much. I thought about all the things that made my family and my upbringing so special, and one memory I can never forget is this one, where my Dad painted our Santa Claus decoration brown, where my mom made sure we were surrounded by Black dolls, and where Christmas was always filled with Black music and joy. So I know the poem must have started with those feelings, and I had to find my way in–Jesus was the way. My family is very spiritual, and growing up, it always struck me as amazing that my parents instilled Black pride even in our spirituality–my grandma really did have a painting of a White Jesus on her wall, as many grandmothers did, but that my Jesus was Black made all the difference in my life. The poem sort of spilled out from there.
Copyright by Ashley M. Jones
Where were you when you started to actually write the poem? And please describe the place in great detail. I was in my Miami apartment at my little desk, probably rushing to meet my deadline. My apartment (which I shared with my older sister (Monique), who is an entertainment journalist and author) was small but comfortable, and it was the first place (other than my dorm room in college) I had lived outside of my parents’ home, so those few walls became my place of comfort in an uncomfortable (homesick) situation. My memory isn’t great, which is rather inconvenient for a writer, but that apartment was beige, above all else. The color came from artwork hung on the walls, smells from the kitchen which we cooked in each night, music from my laptop as I wrote, and laughter between my sister and I.
How many drafts of this poem did you write before going to the final? (And can you share a photograph of your rough drafts with pen markings on it?) This poem probably went through a total of three drafts–I don’t revise a lot, which is perhaps blasphemous, but that’s just my process. I went to critique with a version, and I remember it not having as many songs listed. Then, I updated that version for the final project, and the editor of this book (the poet Derrick Austin served as editor during his residency with Hub City Press) made a few small changes which resulted in the version in my book.
https://www.facebook.com/derrick.austin.589
What do you want readers of this poem to take from this poem? I want readers to understand the importance of representation, primarily–of course I want them to reflect on their own holiday traditions and hopefully feel the joy that comes along with those memories, but I want them to think about what it means to be erased in our society. Santa Claus is imaginary, yes, but for children who aren’t White, seeing the most joy-making entity as a White man can make them feel like goodness and joy and merriment is something that’s not for them. To imagine Santa as any race, gender, religion you like can do quite a lot–our Black Santa allowed us to feel celebrated, down to our skin, during Christmastime. This is not to say that kids can’t celebrate with a Santa who doesn’t look like they do, but again, it’s really about the representation and visibility that has been woefully absent in our culture and our country for far too long. When we think about repairing all those ills in our society, we can do some of that repairing work with something as Santa.
.
Which part of the poem was the most emotional of you to write and why? The most emotional part of this poem is probably, now, the lines “Go to a roadside Christmas shop. / Buy a pale, smiling Santa. / Let your daughters wonder / how he turned brown overnight–“ because that memory is one I already held so dearly, but now, in the wake of my father’s recent passing, that memory reminds me of how much my dad loved us, always. He wanted us to feel happy, celebrated, loved, protected, and full of wonder, and he’d do anything in his power to make sure that happened. Anything, including spending the night painting a plastic Santa brown (meticulously, I might add!)
Middle: Ashley M. Jones’s father doing gardening.
Far Right: Father and Daughter gardening.
Copyright by Ashley M Jones.
Has this poem been published before? And if so where? This poem appears in my first collection, Magic City Gospel (Hub City Press 2017)
The poem also appears in the Gritty Southern Christmas Anthology by Bluewater Publications.
Gritty Southern Christmas Anthology is available on November 8. 2021. The ebook is available for pre-order at the link below for only $2.99. (You may have to copy the link and post it in your search engine)
Ashley M. Jones is the Poet Laureate of the State of Alabama (2022-2026). She holds an MFA in Poetry from Florida International University, and she is the author of “Magic City Gospel” (Hub City Press 2017), “dark//thing” (Pleiades Press 2019) and “REPARATIONS NOW!” (Hub City Press 2021).
https://www.hubcity.org/books/poetry/magic-city-gospel
Her poetry has earned several awards, including the Rona Jaffe Foundation Writers Award, the Silver Medal in the Independent Publishers Book Awards, the Lena-Miles Wever Todd Prize for Poetry, a Literature Fellowship from the Alabama State Council on the Arts, the Lucille Clifton Poetry Prize, and the Lucille Clifton Legacy Award. She was a finalist for the Ruth Lily Dorothy Sargent Rosenberg Fellowship in 2020.
Her poems and essays appear in or are forthcoming at CNN, POETRY, The Oxford American, Origins Journal, The Quarry by Split This Rock, Obsidian, and many others.
She co-directs PEN Birmingham, and she is the executive and founding director of the Magic City Poetry Festival.
https://pen.org/pen-america-chapter-birmingham-al/
https://www.magiccitypoetryfestival.org/
She teaches in the Creative Writing Department of the Alabama School of Fine Arts, and she is part of the Core Faculty of the Converse College Low Residency MFA Program. She recently served as a guest editor for Poetry Magazine.