Interview with Mary Norbert Körte (pt 2)

This is part 2 of a multi part interview. Listen to part 1 here. After an initial interview, former Catholic Nun Mary Norbert Körte requested a follow up discussion because she felt she had been too harsh on her family. With the fire crackling in the background, she elaborated on the topic, including how her mother worried because she was hanging out with “people who commit adultery and don’t eat right.” She continued to discuss the connection of Beat (as in Beat poet) to the word beatitude, the notion of poets as “oddballs” like the Jesuit priest Gerard Manley Hopkins, the coincidental names of places where she has found herself living and how she has felt guided all her life. She also talked about how that guidance in life also happens in her process of composing poetry as Jack Spicer talked about. Poet as radio “receiver.” She also shared about themes from her fear of the afterlife to Denise Levertov. To hear the original audio from this interview, click here. Check out more of what the Lab does here, and listen to more current and archival podcasts on Spotify or on our website. Come to the Cascadia Poetry Fest to feel like Mary at the 1965 Berkely Poetry Conference!