INTERVIEW: Sara Mae Plays Off Their Poetry and Art
Sara Mae brings their poetic talents to their deeply textured, sinuous music. In our interview, Sara Mae explains how they use their music and poetry to feed off each other.
Sara Mae is a genderqueer writer raised on the Chesapeake Bay. Their work examines the surreal, the uncanny, body horror, and intimacy. They are a 2023 Big Ears Music Festival Artist Scholar, a 2022 Tin House Summer Workshops alum, a 2022 Open Mouth Attendee, and a 2021 Sewanee Writer’s Conference Scholar. Their work appears in or is forthcoming from POETRY, the Georgia Review, Muzzle, and elsewhere. They are a 2017 Individual World Poetry Slam, 2018 National Poetry Slam, and 2018 College Unions Poetry Slam Invitational Competitor. Their first chapbook, Priestess of Tankinis, is out via Game Over Books. Their second chapbook, Phantasmagossip, won the Vinyl45 chapbook competition and was released from YesYes Books in spring 2025. They received their MFA from UT Knoxville. They write bedroom pop as The Noisy, and currently live in Philly.
Sara Mae translates these poetic achievements into sinuous indie rock. Their album The Secret Ingredient is More Meat is an intoxicating experience that is more than applying lyrics to melodies – there is a sense of texture and rhythm that is, of course, informed by Sara Mae's poetry. In our interview, we discuss all the things that keep Sara Mae inspired and how they use their music and poetry to bounce off each other.
How do you feel your queer identity ties into your performance style or music?
I’m a musician and a poet and I think of course it’s inherently queer to work in multiple mediums, and to try and carry elements of each in all I do. I love using internal rhyme and musicality in my poetic lines, I love adding visual entry points to my poetry (one formatted as a cootie catcher, one that moves visually back and forth on the page like a group of girls playing telephone and whispering to each other) or incorporating song lyrics from musicians I admire to break up the texture of the poems. And I think my song lyrics tend to be a bit more dense and literary than a typical pop song’s. I was writing my chapbook, Phantasmagossip, at the same time that I was writing my debut album, The Secret Ingredient is More Meat. Each time I arrived at the other project, it felt like relief, and I got to have new language for telling my stories.
Do you have any go-to albums to listen to in the van?
Lately it’s the new Japanese Breakfast album. I was on a 12 hour train ride across California (I had a reading in Sacramento and an offsite AWP reading) and listened to “Picture Window” on repeat. I’m trying to think about how to make that kind of on-the-road ness sustainable, which Michelle Zauner talked about a lot in a recent Vulture interview. I used to be all urgency and box checking, but I’m learning about how detours make the whole process of touring better, that it’s worth taking time for creature comforts, like peppermint or ginger tea to help with nervous stomachs before shows, or to go to that funny tourist attraction because it boosts your mood. It's easy to feel completely unmoored by long periods of travel, so I strategize where I can, and as a Taurus, for me that means obsessing over one album for a long time!!
Tell us about your favorite show you've ever played.
Music-wise I'd say either my album release show (a DIY situation with four bands at a Philly art gallery and my friends bartending special drinks) or playing Union Transfer (just such a huge triumph and the best I've ever felt on stage.) For poetry I'm just getting back into reading but I remember when I won my first big slam competition in 2017, at a venue in Manchester New Hampshire (go Slam Free!) the room was just really rooting for me and I hadn't yet built up confidence as a writer. I did a poem where I had to speak in two different characters so I physically moved my body back and forth to communicate that. It felt like my more dense language found the container it needed to really make an impact on the audience.
What's the best way a fan can support you?
Read my newsletter !! If you’re really moved by it you can become a paid subscriber. But following along in my process and being interested even when the project is incomplete, even when I’m working in multiple genres, means the most to me!!
Is there a professional “bucket list” item you would love to check off?
To be able to tour and be paid for it :) I really love the work of Douglas Kearney and Dorothea Lasky, especially that their experimental poetry is just as compelling as their lectures on craft. I would love to have the resources / be doing well enough in my career that a college or museum circuit is possible. My favorite part of every reading I've done is the Q&A where I get to dig into craft, and I love teaching one-off big concept writing workshops.
I'm also in a place where I'm really hungry for a mentor. I've had wonderful teachers but haven't found that person to get lunch with regularly or bring poems to crying. I'm hoping to get a fellowship or maybe even apply to a PhD within a few hours of Philly in the next few years, which ideally would be where you find those people to champion your work. We shall see!!!!
Philadelphians – you can catch Sara Mae tomorrow, May 15th, at PhilaMOCA
