I was lucky to get an interview with Johnny Francis Wolf, the multiple Pushcart Prize nominee. The autistic hustler poet has previously written several books, including
MEN UNLIKE OTHERS, Volumes 1 & 2.
His latest, UNAPOLOGETIC, drops November 21, 2023.
Johnny, please, tell us a bit about yourself…
Johnny Francis Wolf is an Autist — an autistic Artist. Designer, Model, Actor, Writer, and Hustler. Yes. That.
Worth a mention — his Acting obelisk — starring in the ill–famed and fated 2006 indie film, TWO FRONT TEETH. The fact that it is free to watch on YouTube might say an awful lot about its standing with the Academy.
Homeless for the better part of these past 12 years, Johnny surfs friends’ couches, shares the offered bed, relies on the kindness of strangers.. paying when can, doing what will, performing odd jobs.
Of late.. Ranch Hand his favorite.
From NY to LA, Taos and Santa Fe, Mojave Desert, Coast of North Carolina, points South and Southeast, back North to PA, hiking the hills, and looking for home — considers himself blessed.
Update: He and Hemingway.. their shared love for six-toed cats and very different writing styles.. have made a home in Key West.
Why should we buy your book?
One should buy books in general, as one should take hikes in the woods, watch both MSNBC and FOX NEWS, and eat more chocolate. It is good for the soul, inspires clear thinking, shakes up one’s purview, induces sweet guilt.. respectively and together.
Eventually, in your book buying escapades, you will find yourself sated on whatever genre you’ve been bingeing upon. If, at that moment, you can recall my advice, wander over to the poetry section of your favorite local bookstore, and happenchance your way onto my book, MEN UNLIKE OTHERS (either volume, though I’m partial to Vol. 2).
If they do not have it, ask them to order it for you OR stomp out of said bookstore (unless you frequent it often) and find it on Amazon for yourself.
So yes. Buy others’ books as you wish. But be curious about poems. And maybe consider the tomes I proffer.
“Stories come to me. As a writer I will write them
down before (like dreams) they disappear.
That relief, that every day release,
keeps me sane(r).”
Johnny’s Books
Both books are Poetry, anthologies of one author’s verse.. mine..
from fantasy to personal history.
MEN UNLIKE OTHERS leans on men as subject
UNAPOLOGETIC is skewed toward earlier iterations of self
The following published January, April, November 2023 respectively.
MEN UNLIKE OTHERS, Vol. 1, A-L: 358 pages
MEN UNLIKE OTHERS, Vol. 2, M-Z: 386 pages
Why do you write?
Still trying to make it as an actor, I went the Billy Bob Thornton route. I attempted to write my own SLINGBLADE. Though, I do believe it was Sylvester Stallone who initially established the pen-your-own-first-film with ROCKY.
Mine, called JELLY DONUTS, was a fun write.. took me three years.
Tiny back story.. I was living in an under-code poolhouse in Los Angeles with lots of exposed fiberglass lining the ceiling (more a garage with fragrant automotive fluids and a tiny carve-out for pool supplies and one tenant.. me). The fiberglass did little for warmth, but lots (of bad) to my lungs. Don’t let them kid you, fiberglass is as dangerous as asbestos.
The script, about a middle-aged Cerebral Palsy ‘kid’, occupied the healing years that followed — in the High Desert north of LA. And it was during that more sedentary life, while getting back my breathing, that my homelessness began. My storied ‘massage’ (read hustler) career, my acting pursuits, my ability for side employment, all came to a hard stop during those years.
UNAPOLOGETIC: 266 pages
Author’s Amazon page
(where to buy his books)
Author links
Facebook
Instagram
Twitter (X)
TikTok
YouTube
Favorite videos:
MEN UNLIKE OTHERS
UNAPOLOGETIC
TWO FRONT TEETH
(acting tour de force alluded to earlier)
WRITING became HEALING. And I’ve plenty more of both in me, and needed. My lungs are better. My head, my demons, my past.. all mending. My search for a home, ongoing (though Key West feels as close to one as I’ve felt in years).
P.S. The script, JELLY DONUTS, received little attention, then.. but I haven’t given up on it. Armed with new contacts, I can begin sending it out again. This time to the right folks.
Why Poetry (and lyrical Short Stories?)
Some years ago, when living in New Mexico, Christmas arrived with me, my roommate, her son.. all broke.
Barely two nickels to rub together between the lot of us, gifts would have to wait that year.
“Instead.. write Carl and I, each, a poem,” Rhonda suggested. “I’ve always loved your playing with verse,” she added.
I did.
I had not dabbled much in lyrical writing, prior. Poetry, couplets, rhyming were ever gambles I’d hazard a stab.. but only now and again.
I was, howbeit, that Holiday Season, in the midst of penning (attempting to pen) the script I cited above.
Not schooled in the fundamentals of screenplay writing, I reasoned poetry, photos, song links might be nice sprinkled throughout the dialogue and action. I had no one telling me different.
Rhonda found all this fun.
I recall her sitting on the side of my bed, suffering through my emotive enactments..
the script pages I wrote that day.
“I think I like the poems best,” she’d often opine at the end of my overwrought readings.
So.. I blame (thank) Rhonda Lynne Wingo for my poetry.
“Maybe you should start a Facebook Page for your verse.. drafting one poem per day.. at least for a year.”
That year has never ended.
Which other author has had the biggest influence on your writing?
I may indulge the reader with a poem here.. a back matter dedication for an unpublished book that I hope to send out to agents and presses soon.
special
thanks to
e. e.
cummings
and
Highlights
magazine
(I swear
I read
the first
in the
second
as a child)
on poetry
forever
hooked
thereafter
What is the best thing about being an author?
Is relieving the daily pent-up emotions that gather in your favorite itchy, inner nooks.. the ones that leave your ribs atingling. The closest thing you can get to masturbation without the need for paper towels.
Stories come to me. As a writer I will write them down, before (like dreams) they disappear.
That relief, that every day release, keeps me sane(r).
And what is the hardest thing about being an author?
Is having to have a day job..
foregoing the pleasure of writing until one is done, home, exhausted.. finding, often, you’re almost too weary to write.
I work in Fausto’s Food Palace in Key West. I am a stockboy proud of the labor, the service I provide customers.. of my neat shelves and orderly stock bins. I am happy to have a job working for the Island’s social hub and favorite meeting place.
But the duties are physical, serious exertion is required off and on all day. The job is very well suited for stronger, younger men.. or men unlike others (wink), like me.
The end-of-day weariness is its only real downside.
Do you have any tips or recommendations for other authors?
Please, please, please edit your manuscript carefully before showing the world. Misspellings and bad grammar lose eyes quickly. Awkward phrasing, even faster.
And lose my eyes, instantly.
Don’t ever think close enough is good enough.
It. Never. Is.
Ever.
MEN UNLIKE OTHERS took 18+ months just to cull, organize, proof, polish.. even AFTER it was already written and BEFORE it was sent to prospective agents and publishers. (Definitely polished well even PRIOR to presenting it to my favorite editor, Ian Tan, for proper book editing.)
And keep sending it out. Took me months and months to find my first publisher, the brilliant Abigail Wild.
Lastly. Get yourself a good laptop. Using an iPhone is nuts, IMHO.
Set your damn bar higher.
And now it's time to yank out your Palantir! Let’s talk about the future. What new projects are you working on?
There are two future books almost complete as manuscripts.. front and back matter plotted, covers planned.. I seek literary representation.. and a presser for each.
I will find both.
The books are:
BINGE
and
Box of Chocolates
To continue my earlier poetic sampling, I include a poem from each, in said order.
I give you paper idols (BINGE) and errant glow (Box of Chocolates).
paper idols
Victors spill
from pages inked,
triumphal over
villains
etched in
evil pride as
vices
drawn..
POW! and BIFF! and BAM!
they’re dead.
+
Would that day be
filled this
merely,
afternoons of sox
and rug.
Effortless, all
foes be blasted,
razed and ravaged,
reading pulp.
Paper cuts my only bruise.
Comic books, their
truth
I choose.
errant glow
it started with a blush below his ear
an aura whispered low for no one hear
and as it spread from lobe to collared edge
dispersal of a semblance seemed allege
this vivid bit of brilliance on his throat
illuminated radiance afloat
all emanating out from light within
pursuant of a blazing on his chin
+
effluvium of vapored lumens rose
an almost height of limpid eyes when nose
appeared to stymie sneeze of air and art
asphyxiate the tapers in his heart
the trammelling of cleverness and flair
compelled the boy release the gift as glare
begrudgingly emerged upon his face
bedazzle of a window in disgrace
+
ascendent from a welling down below
accelerant of shiny shimmers grow
unnatural allow so pure a beam
extinguishing.. the only way would seem
if left inside a vessel wishing give
is torch that needs another place to live
where strange is something easy to unlearn
or flames will find a scowl worthy burn
Do you have any dreams you’d like to share?
To work as a writer full-time. Not have to worry about money.
To write a novel. All prose, no purple. (Actually all outlined and prepared.. only seeking time and longer weekends.)
To meet other writers crazy about words.
Anything else you would like to say before we close?
1.) A favorite foreword of mine, written by a friend and mentor, Jim Conley (author of ‘There Will be Time’) for MEN UNLIKE OTHERS, Vol. 2, sums up my style nicely.
“Any understanding of what lies ahead requires a brief discussion of neurological disorders. Specifically, we need to talk about synesthesia and you.
Synesthesia, the blending of perception whereby one sensory experience produces a response in another sense, is often viewed as an exceptional condition. It is not, at least not in a syllabic language such as our own.
Each letter corresponds with a sound and, though pronunciation may vary with time and geography, each word evokes an auditory sensation. When we 'see' a word we also 'hear' it, grapheme and phoneme inextricably linked.
What distinguishes poetry from prose is this binding of sight and sound. A poem must be heard not just read. Audible literary devices have been under siege for the past century or so. Recent readers rely on written representation, rejecting rhyme, rhythm, and the rubric of recitation.
Poetry went silent in the madhouse aftermath of modernism - we learned to stop listening because it 'limited' poetry. In doing so we abandoned what makes poetry poetic and separates a sonnet and a phone book.
As you read this collection be prepared to listen. Do not be afraid to move your lips or even read it aloud as you take it in. Tap your fingers and nod your head, let your eyes hear the words and imagine what more can be seen in the sounds.
The best poetry follows an eternal metronome. From the dactylic hexameter of Homer through the terza rima of Dante and the blank verse of Shakespeare, a drum always guides us. What you are about to read, much like you, has a pulse that should not be ignored.
Now go listen.”
2.) The dedication from that same book affirms your growing suspicions. Your author is gay.
“To Andrew Holleran.. writer, teacher, and member of The Violet Quill.
I found his novel, Dancer from the Dance, when needed to the most. I recall vividly when first espied. It was unceremoniously stuffed into one of those black wire, squeaky-while-they-turned, pulp fiction holders that drug stores often featured back then.
I was likely trolling Christopher Street when stopped into the Village Cigar store for a pack of smokes and, unwittingly, his book. I attended college during the day..
with school at night.. bars and alleys.. lessons in the dim and hidden.
There was acceptance in the words this ex-altar boy would read.. affirmation far beyond any momentary passion felt between the piers and trucks.
And oh, those words. Wrapped them round his readership as fed us wondrous light and sound.
He folded them about this lad whose arms but craved to someday write.. when had enough to say.. when lastly found his voice.”
“…especially the young ones, come into the canyon
for the first time, quiet as deer, some of them,
coming to your hand for salt: their dark eyes wide and
gleaming with the wonder and the fear we had all
felt at seeing for the first time life as our dreams had
always imagined it… at seeing so many people
with whom they could fall in love. “”
Photo: Johnny at 20
3.) My preview for UNAPOLOGETIC.
“I would not be a writer today had I not braved the internet criticism (received plenty) and risked the potential online plagiarism (though I’ve always held such social media word thieves could find better bards to steal from).. had I not sought out an audience to tender my tales.
I am forever indebted to the mentors I met, the friendships I forged, the learning-by-reading the brilliant words they, too, shared on Facebook.
—
Mine are bald and artless yarns with thorny roots and frizzy leaves. Some feel unfinished. All remain unscrubbed, unbuffed.
I’m nervous revisiting this simpler time, rereading the runes of someone more dewy-eyed.. inking, as I did then, with impulsive and unguarded ease.
Unapologetic, seems.
—
Left to my own devices, I might hide these prequel iterations.
The resulting primordial ooze will soon sit before you.. a gathering of raw, awkward phrases and sing-songy rhymes that dare the reader to look past the grammar (or lack thereof) and find the bold, unripened core, the pits, the pith..
the skin unpeeled.”
-
Lastly:
Title of my first book (MEN UNLIKE OTHERS) refers to the author’s typic connection with no one. At least to few.
A voluntary sequester.. deeming to be different by design.
Whilst sensitive, gay, and brooding is not an unusual trio of descriptors — required reading for some Creatives — his particular combination of these and other manners more unruly makes for a lot of not fitting in.
He details some of this factious flummery here, relating it all to his tilt toward men, love of animals, fondness for writing — a disparate coterie of sundry druthers for some — interwreathed and inextricably tangled for him.
Whether with words veiled or self–evident, pithy else limerical, honeyed vs. grim, real ere imagined — Johnny writes of and for humans like himself..
... and men unlike others.
I wish you the very best with your art, Johnny. In whatever form, color, and shape it takes.
Likewise, I hope lots of readers discover your writing.
Thanks for doing the interview.
