How About This presents Jenna Lyn Albert

Featuring a poet and activist from New Brunswick's capital city

Welcome to Atlantic Canada Mondays, a regular feature of How About This where we interview interesting residents of the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and Newfoundland and Labrador. Today we welcome New Brunswick poet and activist Jenna Lyn Albert.

Here’s Jenna Lyn!

Jenna Lyn Albert

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How long have you been a writer and has your focus always been poetry?

I’ve been writing short stories and poems since I was a kid. I loved to write horror stories and still have some of the short stories I wrote in my high school English class.

I didn’t really consider myself a writer until I had my first poem published in a journal. It was a poem about a runaway boa constrictor and feeling homesick once I moved to Fredericton called “Unnamed” and it was published in The Malahat Review. Getting that acceptance letter was the moment I really started thinking of myself as a writer, it was a big milestone for me.

My focus wasn’t always poetry, but I fell in love with the genre during an undergrad poetry class I’d taken with Dr. Anne Compton at UNB Saint John. From that point on, I gravitated toward writing poems over anything else and even changed my education plans. Originally, I had intended on going to law school after my undergraduate degree but caught the poetry bug and pursued a Masters in Creative Writing instead. No regrets here!

An avid reader and their cat

What is one thing about poetry that you wish more people understood?

I wish more people understood how fun poetry can be. I teach an Intro to Creative Writing course and one of my favourite poems to share with my classes is “Working Titles for Guy Fieri’s Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives” by Lucas Crawford. The poem is fun and playful and an absolute treat to hear performed live. It goes through each letter of the alphabet and offers, as the title suggests, alternative titles for Guy Fieri’s Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives. Whenever I’m hitting writers block or feeling uninspired, I go to poems like Lucas’ to remind me that poetry can be fun and not a chore. There’s so much joy to be had in poetry.

Do you prefer writing with pen and paper or are you more comfortable with a keyboard?

I tend to write more comfortably at a computer, as I often have countless browser tabs open (Youtube or Spotify, any research pertinent to a poem, a thesaurus) and can edit as I write a bit easier—though I do love writing with pen and paper when I’m on a road trip or at a reading.

Many poems start as drafts jotted down on paper (or in the Notes app on my phone) and become fully realized once I type them out on my laptop. I’m notorious for rearranging lines on a page, so being able to copy and paste things where I like helps a lot during the editing process.

You were Poet Laureate for Fredericton, NB for a couple of years.  What is the role of a poet laureate?

The Poet Laureate’s role is to engage with the community through activities, programs, and events to demonstrate the power of the arts to inspire, influence, and inform. During my laureateship, I was able to offer a variety of free workshops, collaborated with local organizations and festivals to curate zines or exhibitions, and started a poetry podcast called elm & ampersand, which is on hiatus at the moment but we hope to revive once COVID settles down.

I was also responsible for writing a handful of poems over my term as laureate, some of which had specific themes (the 50th Anniversary of Official Bilingualism for example) while I was able to choose the topics of others. It used to be part of the Poet Laureate’s role to share a poem at the beginning of each City Council meeting, but that is unfortunately no longer the case after my laureateship.

a feline book guardian

I know one of your poetry readings to the Fredericton City Council caused some controversy. Overlooking that for a moment, would you say that it was a worthwhile experience to take on the Poet Laureate role?

My laureateship was definitely a worthwhile experience and I have a whole new appreciation of poetry now. I had the opportunity to meet so many new people and share an artform I’m passionate about with them, all of the pros of the laureateship far outweighed the cons.

It was incredibly rewarding to work with youth especially, to see them fall in love with poetry and start to create their own poems on their own terms. I did a few classroom and library visits as laureate and those were major highlights for me. The kids loved poetry (phew!) and blew me away with their creativity. Moments like that made any lost sleep over the controversies worth it. I don’t regret any of the poems I chose to share at city council, as they incited meaningful conversations and deserved to be heard in those spaces. I was given a platform and used it to shed light on issues that people in Fredericton care about, issues that should be talked about at the municipal level, like abortion access and systemic racism. I hope my laureateship showed folks that poetry is more than pretty words, it can incite change, it can bring joy, it can entertain and enlighten.

How did you become involved with supporting Clinic 554 in Fredericton?

I became involved with Clinic 554 once I moved to Fredericton and started seeing community rallies taking place to support them. I’d supported them at a distance before I moved here, but that advocacy ramped up once I came to Fredericton (and came out). The services Clinic 554 offers/offered (they are currently performing abortions at a reduced capacity for the time being but much of their gender-affirming care has stopped) are vital to folks beyond New Brunswick even.

We need more spaces like Clinic 554 where folks can receive reproductive and gender-affirming care without judgment or coming up against barriers. I have always tried to attend any protests or fundraisers in support of Clinic 554 and coordinated the most recent abortion and 2SLGBTQIA+ solidarity rally in Fredericton where Dr. Edgar from Clinic 554 joined us as a speaker.

Rally organized by Jenna Lyn Albert

You organized a demonstration of support for Clinic 554 in July 2022.  How did that come together?  Was it hard to organize?  How effective was the protest?

I had noticed a few folks on social media asking if there were any protests or rallies being planned in response to Roe v. Wade’s reversal and had reached out to the local reproductive and 2SLGBTQIA+ rights groups to see how I could help. Together we started planning and the solidarity rally for abortion and 2SLGBTQIA+ rights came together.

The hardest parts of organizing were working around COVID (masks were mandatory at the event) and as a team, just finding the time to plan the rally. So many folks involved work full-time jobs and side gigs and volunteer with a number of organizations, as is the case for many activists. We’re often burnt out and take on too much, so ensuring no one was being overwhelmed and felt supported was a priority.

In terms of effectiveness, I was ecstatic with the turnout. We had about 100 people show up for the solidarity rally and our speakers were phenomenal. The rally was covered by a number of media organizations and we’ve had a lot of folks reach out about how to get more involved with reproductive and queer rights movements in Fredericton and the province as a whole.

You refer to yourself as an amateur drag king in your bio.  Is it the equivalent of a drag queen for female or non-binary people?  Or is it something different?

I am just starting to do drag and it’s been a blast. Drag Kings are predominantly women or non-binary people performing a more masculine character, however there are kings that identify as men too. There’s also drag kings that present as more feminine or fluid. Drag at its core is the performance of masculinity, femininity or other forms of gender expression, so there’s a lot of gender bending.

Jenna Lyn as Guy Haute-Ween

My drag persona Guy Haute-Ween is a rather effeminate man who fancies a fine fabric. The drag community in New Brunswick has been so supportive and I cannot wait to get more involved! I have to credit my drag mother Barb Wire and drag family Heather Silk and Justin Toodeep for all of their guidance, I’ve already learned so much from them. I recently had my first drag show and cannot wait to get more performances under my belt.

I believe you are a life long resident of New Brunswick?  What are the pros and cons of living in NB?  Would you recommend it to other people?

I am! I was born in Saint John and lived there much of my life until I came to Fredericton to pursue a Masters in Creative Writing. New Brunswick is beautiful and has such a vibrant arts community. And Fredericton is one of the queerest cities in the country! I want to continue living here (my dream is to open a little queer bookstore), but the more time that passes the less sustainable staying in New Brunswick becomes.

The cons of living in New Brunswick right now are largely tied to the Cons, though a number of these issues have persisted across governments. Our healthcare infrastructure is crumbling, we do not have abortion access, there is an ongoing housing crisis, and Blaine Higgs’ government refuses to conduct an inquiry into systemic racism and continues to disrespect First Nations by banning civil servants from using land acknowledgements and ignoring the government’s duty to consult with First Nations on various projects.

At this moment, I would not recommend New Brunswick to other people. I could not in good-conscience recommend they even visit the province when our healthcare system is in this state. I want better for New Brunswick, its residents and visitors deserve better.

Pretend you wake up one morning and the Internet has been destroyed.  What is the first thing that you do?

I think I would make a coffee, put on some music, and snuggle up with a book. I get so distracted by being online and what’s going on in the world (polio is back?) that I don’t take the time to enjoy the small pleasures, like curling up with one of my cats and just reading for fun. My to-be-read pile is monstrous and the Internet disappearing would give me reason to unwind a bit.

First on my TBR pile is Trynne Delaney’s The Half-Drowned and when I’m reading I like to listen to music like The Oh Hellos Dear Wormwood or most recently Florence + The Machine’s Dance Fever—albums that are relatively chill.

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Thanks to Jenna Lyn for participating in this interview! In addition to her website, you can also find her on Twitter!