Hey you, meet Soph!🩷

an interview and a poem!

Hello! We are so back babieeeees! To kick off our official return from Hot Poet Hiatus, I (Larissa) sat down with our new poetry Trapper and Keeper, Sophie Crocker, for a little Q&A which we will get to in a moment.

While we were on hiatus we were offered our first brand partnership (ikr… can you believe it?). This offer came to us in the form of a suspiciously personal email asking us to collaborate on matters of mental heath advocacy. If you know PTK you know we love collaboration and mental health advocacy so I responded curious to know more. I only realized after their second email that it was an offer to promote a well known online counseling subscription service which has been cited in many controversies. I told them “thanks, but no, thank u”. Don’t get me wrong, therapy is important, I’m a big fan. It’s also inaccessible to most due to a variety of barriers, including geographic, financial, and linguistic. If you find online talk therapy helpful and a worthwhile investment, I am proud of you for making that choice. But I’m not here to sell you a product (much less one I don’t personally use!)

It’s been a tough six months since we last published work, and the last few days have not been different. To continue PTK we must believe that art matters, that poetry is, as Sophie puts below, a way to survive. Why am I telling you this? Because I could be getting paid Hundreds? Thousands? Tens of dollars (Idk how much cause I didn’t really look it up) to tell you to download a therapy app but I am not. Instead, in light of the current ICE raids and growing violence in the US, if you do have some money to spare and you really want me to tell you what to do with it, I encourage you to donate to the Immigrant Defenders Law Center : https://www.immdef.org.

<3 Thank you.

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Meet Sophie Crocker <3 🐭

Larissa: Hi Sophieeee! can you tell us a little more about yourself?

Sophie: Hiiiii Larissa!!!! Hi PTKers! I’m Sophie (she/her). I’m doing my MFA in writing alongside Larissa. We met on the first day because we were both giving out stickers. (Sounds like I’m describing kindergarten). My favourite colour is silver, and my favourite letter is V. In my spare time, I pole dance and play Dungeons & Dragons. Literature wise, I work for PRISM International, and I’ve been published in The Adroit Journal, The Malahat Review, Best Canadian Stories, Best Canadian Poetry, and elsewhere. You can buy my debut poetry collection, brat, at sophiecrocker.com or wherever you get your books. My Insta/Bluesky/X: @goblinpuck.

The Author’s copy which has been stickerfied

L: You know, you have some pretty big shoes to fill here… are you scared?

Sophie: I’m always scared! They’re huge shoes, and I’m honored to wander around in them like a toddler in her mother’s heels. I’m really honored that you and Kelly have given me this space to grow and learn from PTK. I’ve only had lovely interactions with PTK’s reader base so far, so that helps quell the fear a bit. Thrilled to be here! SMOOCH!

L: Why did you say yes to PTK? Do you like-like us like that?

Sophie: OMG Larissa don’t tell everyone about my crush. But yes, of course I do! Mostly, I was really excited to work with Larissa. I think she has incredible insights about poetry. They open my eyes all the time. Larissa is also just fun and talented and one-of-a-kind. Plus, I love the ethos of PTK – making poetry for the (hot) people.

L: Ok. So, for the longest time PTK has been a place for fun, experimental, unprecious poetry. Both Kelly and I prided ourselves on having found poetry writing via non-academic backgrounds. You have a BFA in writing. Are you going to make PTK boring now?

Sophie: Yes <3 No, I know that PTK is about accessible, non-precious poetry, and I really need an outlet for that. So don’t worry. I’ll be continuing in the Kelly and Larissa tradition of scrapbook poems, fun poems, cool poems. I’m not going to get all academia on you guys.

L: What do you write about?

Sophie: Actually, you summed it up well very early into us knowing each other, in that I write a lot about feminine suffering and survival. I also write about small animals, film, revenge, circuses, and speculative worlds. Here [at the bottom of this age post interview]’s a poem of mine, previously published in Eavesdrop Magazine (def check them out if you haven’t)

L: You’ve done standup, you’ve done improv – what’s the intersection of comedy with poetry?

Sophie: Both are about surprise, upending expectations, specificity, playing with language. Sometimes I’ll hear a standup set that’s would basically be poetry if it were written down. Comedy and poetry are both ways to survive. IMO, comedians and poets are both good in bed.

L: lol. On that note of survival — Jenna Jaco once accurately described PTK as having “not-a-zero-sum-of-death” (along with all the pink silliness). Your work also straddles these well. How do you find comedy in the deep dark spaces?

Sophie: Thank you! Ugh, Jenna is such a legend**. Finding humour is how I survive the deep dark spaces. At a reading once, I was reading this poem of mine about abuse and S.A. (Included below), and right as I read the line “when the sirens pass i still say, my ride is here,” an ambulance loudly went past, and the audience and I all cracked up because it was so serendipitous. Pain and laughter are Gemini sisters.

L: You will fit right in our slumber party! Speaking of, What is your slumber-party CV? What do you bring to the slumber party? What is your go-to slumber party activity?

Sophie: I was very committed to loneliness as a child. I didn’t go to a lot of slumber parties. But now there’s nothing I love more. I’m bringing Wavelength and a bunch of gummy candy. I usually do sleepovers about once a month now, and we’ll watch a double feature. I love horror movies at slumber parties, so that I don’t have to fall asleep with just the ghosts for company.

L: Ok. Let’s get to our burning questions. What’s in your bag?

Sophie: Always a notebook and whatever small book I’m reading. Otherwise, mostly what you’d expect from a nerd in a 2000s cartoon – inhaler and EpiPens, etc. Pictured here:

Sophie’s EDC

L: What’s your big three, and how do you justify being a Gemini in this day and age?

Sophie: Gemini sun, Virgo moon, Gemini rising. There’s no justifying being a Gemini, but that’s the fun of it. I love/hate Geminis. That’s what they’re for.

L: It’s ok, all best poets have freaky birth charts. What else is wrong with you?

Sophie: A lot. I’ll probably never be normal about food or sex or substances or men. I have debilitatingggg OCD. And I’m a double-Gemini, did I mention that yet?

L: What’s an intrusive thought you’re having right now?

Sophie: Can’t leave the dryer door open or the cat will get in there and tumble-dry herself <3

L: That’s ok, I won’t tell you mine cause my current intrusive thought is that I can infect people with my intrusive thoughts and I’m scared it will be my fault. Speaking of guilt - What’s your guilty pleasure?

Sophie: Basically all pleasure. Sylvia Plath. Gossip Girl, even the reboot. Making a premature playlist about my crush and putting Gracie Abrams on it. Frozen pizza. Physical violence. The revival of hand stuff. Three naps a day. Cherry cider. Compulsions. Having it all.

L: We can fuck with that. And lastly - as per PTK slumber party tradition: Fuck marry kill: poetry, standup, and improv?

Sophie: Marry poetry. That’s my baby girl. We’re spending our lives together. Fuck improv. I’ve Fleetwood Mac’d multiple improv teams already – shut up, I don’t want to talk about it. Kill standup. Specifically, Chris D’Elia et al. Just in case one of those guys dies, I am kidding.

The back of the Brat (by Sophie Crocker)

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**EDITOR’S NOTE: Footnote about Jenna! OMG ok, so last year was my first semester of writing school and Sophie and I had poetry class together. Our main assignment was to do a deep reading of any poet, emulate their style for the whole term, develop writing prompts based on them, etc… I chose to honor PTK bestie, and my favorite poet Jenna Jaco. This also included teaching a mini class on our chosen poets with a selection of their work and an invitation for poetic responses. Sophie wrote an amazing poem response and it was what sealed the deal that she needed to be a part of this project! More Jenna x Sophie x Larissa for PTK content coming soon!!!!!!! Ok. Now back to the show…

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i don’t want to write a Modern Love essay

but i hate that a girl has to be baptized

in blood. i don’t want a lobotomy & i’m tired

of carrying an ice pick. the trick

where i hold my breath until i turn

into a flock of crows & remember the face

of every bad man – i used to live off it,

pecking wet lettuce off the pavement.

even the good men say that one of me

is called a murder. i don’t want to be

a survivor anymore but i don’t want another story

ending in girl bones. i don’t want to write a Modern Vengeance essay

but if i didn’t i’d be so easy to kill. i don’t want to wait

at the glory hole with open scissors but i don’t want

to be waterboarded until i am a raven again

but i don’t want what’s already been done to me but

i don’t want to be another snuff film star but i don’t want

black wings to perish in. when the sirens

pass i still say, “my ride is here.” sure, i’m not scared

anymore. but i remember every face, even the kind ones.

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wow. We are back y’all!

Thank you Sophie! Can’t wait to share my poem response next week! Let the poetry tennis match begin! I hope its just like Challengers!

Xoxo

L