My university studies were interrupted in a typical way: book publishing and life took me in another direction. My writing career began at a fast pace and took up all of my time.

In my poetry I start by examining the dynamics between poetry and prose, first in the form of fairy tales and short, narrative poems. The topics brought up in the later poems were myths, other cultures and especially the artistic interaction, rhythms, music and the effects of pictures. The relationship with the reader is particularly important to me in a caring way since the poem is speaking to another person.

Writing is a struggle against crystallization, against the wilting of language. I nobly believe that poetry carries and opens a breathing space for language. Through language, poetry is the lungs of thought and emotions, like a kind of rainforest. Another thing is the way in which this sublimity is realized in one’s own writing. Another hard assignment is how a text never remembers the possibility of what it could be, that it must submit to incompleteness. A poem does not get finished, it is just time and grinding that fossilizes it into shape in the long run. It is like a circle, where poetics and the reality of the poem meet, every time.

Structure interests me, in the same way that prose poetry is interesting to me because of its structure and narrative. These, however, easily stifle the free flowing and mercurial nature of a poem. I feel like I am constantly searching for ways to be in language, seeking to couple these two great paradoxes.

Antikythera

Antikythera, my poetry app for the iPad, is the largest work of mine so far. The possibilities for digital literature inspire me, especially interactivity. The reader’s role is at the centre, seeing which way a poem can be experienced and how it can influence.

Through Antikythera I have been woken up to how difficult it is to receive funding for a multi-art-form project, even if it is co-produced by the university. We lack the structures to support multiartistic and multiscientific projects. There are many contemporary Finnish poets who are interested in digital literature, but the rigid nature of networks and financing makes it difficult to put into practice.

More information about the Antikythera app:

• Saila Susiluoto’s essay on Antikythera.
• Crucible studio’s presentation of Antikythera.