Podcast Summary: Khashayar Kess Mohammadi, "The Book of Interruptions" (Buckrider Books, 2025)

Podcast: New Books Network
Host: Holly Gattery
Guest: Khashayar Kess Mohammadi
Date: February 9, 2026
Episode Theme: A deep-dive conversation with poet, writer, and translator Khashayar Kess Mohammadi on their latest poetry collection, The Book of Interruptions. The discussion traverses the book’s conceptual genesis, its formal and musical qualities, the intersections of language and identity, and the persistent themes of diaspora, war, art, and the “screaming” city.

Main Theme & Purpose

This episode presents an intimate, contemplative exploration of Khashayar Kess Mohammadi’s The Book of Interruptions, focusing on its origins, formal innovations, philosophical provocations, and its place at the intersection of cultural narrative, migration, sexuality, and personal/collective histories. The host, Holly Gattery, and Mohammadi discuss the ways their poetry “interrupts” and reimagines narratives about the Middle East and its diaspora, the physical and musical qualities of writing, and the poetics of the unsettled city.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Origins and Structure of The Book of Interruptions

• Intentional Construction:
  Unlike Mohammadi’s earlier work, The Book of Interruptions was written with a central concept from the start. “This is called the Book of Interruptions because there are interruptions of all the... what we call common thought that has roots in destructive colonial and imperial thought, both from inside and outside the Middle East.” (B, 08:13)
• Mentorship Process:
  Mohammadi credits development and mentorship (with poets Zoe Imani Sharpe and Rahat Kaurd) as central to shaping both the form and philosophical depth of the book.
  • Zoe Imani Sharpe: Focused on form and format.
  • Rahat Kaurd: Helped explore intricacies of Middle Eastern identity, diaspora, intergenerational issues, and internal/external colonialisms. (B, 06:31)
• Interrupting Narratives:
  Poems deliberately “interrupt” reductive or destructive common narratives about the Middle East. The book’s structure mirrors this act of interruption.

2. Musicality and the Act of Speech

• Writing as Speaking:
  Mohammadi discusses a shift to composing poetry orally before transcribing—an approach that foregrounds cadence and performativity.

  “A work that I cannot read comfortably is a work that I do not want to publish. And I'd like to think I don't have pieces that I don't want to read because I write within the act of speech.” (B, 10:33)

• Evolution of Practice:
  This method began in their book Daffodils and was furthered in collaborative and solo projects, emphasizing poems structured by oral cadence rather than visual arrangement alone.

3. Visuality and the Stage of the Page

• Page as Performance Space:
  Mohammadi approaches each project with an evolving sense of how it appears visually:

  “Each project comes to me with a different format and how it's supposed to look... it's not immediate, but maybe, you know, even when you see like the Book of Interruptions, yes, it is one book, but it is, I want to say at least five projects...” (B, 14:15)

• Material Practice:
  The physical act of writing—with different pens, paper sizes, and notebooks—shapes the poems’ visual form, impacting their eventual layout and typesetting.

4. Language, Translation, and Farsi’s Influence (Thread from 19:58)

• Farsi’s Imprint on English-language Poetry:
  The host and guest discuss how Persian (Farsi) shapes Mohammadi’s English; both in expression and conceptualization. Farsi “roots in the gut,” giving Persian poetry a profound presence and musicality.
  • Mohammadi elaborates on the complex legacy of Persian Sufist poets and the shift from rousing to soothing interpretations of their work in Western and diasporic contexts.
• Quote:

  “Philosophy doesn't always remain within the same relationship to its people. And I really wanted to explore that, that whole idea of mystic...” (B, 24:41)

5. Reading & Analysis: “Before We Begin” (Introductory Poem)

[26:45] Kess reads the full text of their introductory poem, “Before We Begin,” which sets the tone for the collection:

• Themes: prophets, prisoners, city as character, tradition vs. insurgency, cycles of violence and “madness,” the city’s unrest.
• Notable Line:

  “...a city that screams and screams and screams.” (B, 29:43)

6. The City as Unsettling Force

• City as Character & Symptom:
  Mohammadi repeatedly returns to the idea of “the city that screams,” using urban spaces as metaphors for collective unrest, contradiction, and the machinery of control.
• Unsettling the Reader:

  “If there's a word I could use to describe your work... I'd say I'm consistently and delightfully unsettled. And I think people need to be unsettled.” (A, 30:34)

• “Civilizing the Imagination”:
  Mohammadi associates “civilizing” with removing potential, with the city as an amplifier of both systemic and personal turmoil.

  “Cities are a big part of where we find, you know, security personnel and the act of, you know, making the people civil. And when I say civil, I mean it in the most derogatory way possible.” (B, 31:07)

7. Current & Future Work

• Mohammadi is editing their next poetry book (with Acidoctrin Press) and also writing daily, often sharing snippets on Instagram.

• “I have another full length that I finished, but... I'm just looking at it because it is full length in terms of pages, but I'm not enjoying everything within it. So I am trying to make that a better book before I consider doing anything with it.” (B, 34:41)

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Interruption and Narrative:

  “This book started as a bunch of interruptions of common narrative. So wherever I thought there is a common narrative that I basically do not agree with or I find too reductive, I found interruptions of that narrative that I could bring into this whole book of interruptions.” (B, 07:08)

• On Writing as Speech:

  “I begin at those cadences and reach a poem that makes sense as opposed to having an idea, writing it down, and then editing it while reading it out loud.” (B, 12:08)

• On Farsi and Sufi Poetics:

  “What Rumi does is that he writes in a rasmi or militant or rousing frequency. So he. When he writes, you find it difficult to sit because it is. With every word, it is rousing the reader into action... And it is interesting to me that these poets are now used to say, oh, you are feeling anxious against this world. Here, here's a poem about a rose and the beloved and the sun. And now you can feel okay and not worry that there is hunger, that there is war, that there is oppression.” (B, 23:13 and 25:54)

• On the City:

  “The city is the most palpable place for it. I'm not saying it doesn't exist elsewhere, but all the great machinery... that governs us... it all goes back to the city and how it interacts with its greater natural ecosystem... I've always found myself going back to that.” (B, 32:05)

Timestamps for Key Segments

• Broad overview and genesis of the book: 04:57–08:27
• Musicality and writing as speech: 10:22–12:46
• Visuality and the stage of the page: 14:14–17:11
• On Farsi, Sufism, and poetic inheritance: 19:58–26:24
• Introduction: “Before We Begin” poem reading: 26:45–29:49
• Discussion of city as metaphor/theme: 29:49–33:26
• Current writing and upcoming projects: 34:37–35:47

Conclusion

This episode offers a rare, multi-layered conversation that moves between personal anecdotes, close readings, poetic philosophy, and the material practices of writing. Listeners come away with not only a sense of Mohammadi’s poetics—rooted in “interrupting” and unsettling—but also their influences, formal innovation, and continued artistic trajectory. The discussion is candid, affectionate, and intellectually rigorous, making the complexities of The Book of Interruptions accessible, provocative, and deeply resonant.