Joseph Massey
Appearances
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
Rain washes the dust from train windows as we barrel through the poem of America. What you were and will be again, I see you in silos rising like fists from farmland. America, the land itself says, fight. America, you defy the narratives imposed to poison your majesty. There is no other time to watch her rise again.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
Well, I'll tell you what inspired me. It was when Trump was, when the assassination attempt occurred in Butler, PA, I started to kind of come around to Trump because that assassination attempt, when he stood up with blood on his face, everything became much more real to me. Trump was no longer like a character. You know, he wasn't some showman or carnival barker like I had
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
kind of had in my head about him for a long time. And it became so real, so viscerally real what the stakes were with the election. And so I think the poem started writing itself then. But then after he won, I decided to just go for it and to try to make it happen. But even if I didn't get to read the poem at the inauguration, I wanted to end up with a poem that I was proud of. And that
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
fellow Americans could be, could be proud of as well.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
That's where you could buy it. And you can get it as a Kindle ebook or as a paperback.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
Yeah, well, I wrote an essay for Quillette that goes into great detail about the whole thing. It's my side of the story. Anyone can check that out for all that for all those details.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
But yeah, I was living a decent, clean life after being kind of a drunk in my 20s and being a bit inappropriate at times, as I admitted in the in the essay and various public declarations that when they didn't go anywhere, it was just throwing chum to sharks. But Yeah, it was brutal. It all started with a fake letter.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
It was a forged letter written by somebody who claimed they met me at a poetry reading. And then I called her hot. And it was put on a WordPress website. And then this woman that I had been involved in, involved with, posted the link with malicious intent. And it just spread like wildfire through the poetry community and beyond. Into the wider literary world, it was mentioned in Publishers Weekly.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
There was a disgusting, defamatory article published about me in some magazine that's defunct now. But at the time, it got a lot of traction. And so I immediately lost jobs. I lost a job I had at the University of Pennsylvania. I lost book deals. I had a book coming out with Wesleyan University Press that was scrapped. And I lost all my friends. I lost all my social networks.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
So it took a year, all of 2018 and most of 2019 to kind of just rebuild a sense of self again, which I did through God, through Jesus Christ, and through the Catholic Church specifically. And then I was able to re-engage my poetry in a way that was even more vital and important. I realized that I never wrote poetry to become successful. It was always a survival, kind of a survival skill for me.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
What's to stop me? Other poets are the ones. You're not allowed back once you've been canceled. And in my case, I'm even more of a boogeyman to them because, well, I published that essay in Quillette, which at that time in 2019, they were all screaming, oh, he's publishing in a fascist publication, Quillette of all things. And then I dared to self-publish and appear on your show.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
And I started expressing political opinions on X or then Twitter. And so now I'm not called the things that they were calling me before. Now I'm the fascist. And the funniest thing I was called recently because of the inaugural poem I wrote was the poet laureate of white people. which I thought about including as a blurb on the back of the book, but then I decided against it.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
That's solely the reason. That's the only reason. And when I posted a picture of myself wearing a Trump t-shirt, it was like being canceled all over again. Getting messages from friends or people I thought were friends. I can't believe you would do this. I can't believe it. I'm like, what? Why? And they never really have any concrete arguments. It's just pure reactivity.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
And it's not the kind of behavior I ever expected from poets. Growing up and reading poetry, reading Rimbaud and Blake and et cetera, I mean, these people were outliers. They were rebels, right? They weren't just towing the line. And poets these days, like every other artist in every other field, they seem to just tow the line to keep the federal, to keep the grand money coming.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
Yes, yeah, yeah. And I wonder what percentage of them just do it to keep themselves out of the line of fire, you know?
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
Yeah, yeah. Oh, I know. There's apparently a big cancellation going on right now. I won't say any details, but it's just as ugly as it was in 2018. And so I realized a year or two after the cancellation started that I wasn't going to be allowed back. And I'm going to have to do it myself. And so this book and the prior two books, three books are published under my own imprint.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
And so they can't cancel me. They can't pull my book because they think I'm a fascist or the poet laureate of white people.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
It does drive them crazy. Yeah. And I can't say I mind.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
Well, I would like to take the number one spot from Maria Shriver. Maria Shriver has a book of poetry out and it's abysmal. She's not a poet. She's not a poet. She could have not broken the lines up and it would have been probably maybe a better book, but she's not a poet.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
I should take that spot.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
That's absolutely right. Yeah. I was living in substandard conditions in a basement apartment and just starting to make it, working at UPenn part-time. And then the cancellation happened and it lost everything. And so it's been a steady process of rebuilding. But you're right, I've never stopped rebuilding. And that drive to write poetry has been with me since I was a child.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
You know, it's always been a survival tool. It's always been something I use to process the world and make sense of the world around me. They can't take that from me. And any real artist isn't going to let a mob take that from them. So anyone who's being canceled, just keep doing what you're doing.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
Oh, absolutely. Yeah. I mean, I, I live in an, in an amazing apartment that has heat and, uh, doesn't have mold on the walls. I have a great cat. I don't ask. Jarvis is great. I have a wonderful tuxedo cat who makes sure he makes sure I get to bed at a certain time and wakes me up at four in the morning. It's like living in a monastery or something. And, um, Yeah, I live in upstate New York now.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
It's great. It's beautiful. The landscape is great. My poetry is paying for my groceries and paying my utilities and paying my rent. That's not a common situation for a poet, unless you're Maria Shriver.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
Yeah, it's a contemplative thing. lifestyle i walk a lot and while i'm walking i'm thinking about poetry or i'm praying and prayer is a big part of my life and all of that is inextricably connected to my creative life to the poetry um i feel like most things i do are in service to the work um
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
Even when I'm on the couch watching White Lotus, for example, like I need to come down a little bit from all of it and kind of tune it out. But everything's in service to the work. And that's the way it should be.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
You know, that's the way I've always lived, whether I was canceled or not canceled or standing at a wine and cheese party after a poetry reading and just wanting to run out the back door. It's always just been about the art for me.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
Yeah, I think of it as a form of meditation and prayer. More so meditation, because you're forced to slow down. It's one line, one word at a time. And there's a lot of silence in poetry. There's a lot of space around the poem. And there's a lot of room for thinking and contemplating. And that's the whole goal of my work, whether I'm taking a picture or writing a poem, is to
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
get the viewer, the reader to slow down and to take the world in as it is. in the present moment and maybe to feel less impacted by the toxicity of, you know, social media, even though I, I, I consume it as well, but there needs to be there needs to be some outlet that is away from that. And that is nourishing for the spirit and for the heart and poetry does that. Yeah.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
Absolutely. Yeah. I don't feel any of the doom and gloom. Even the tariff stuff didn't freak me out. I didn't understand half of what I read anyway about tariffs. But part of the poem, America is a Poem, is written on a train ride from upstate New York to Chicago and just going through flyover country and seeing one town, one city after another kind of gutted because industry left.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
Um, and seeing what, what has been this, this kind of wreck that's been made of, of these small towns that once thrived and you could see how they once thrived, but all the bars and the baseball fields are, you know, boarded up and grown over. And, um, that inspired me. And then when Trump won, it just, the poem just wrote itself. You know, I mean, I think Trump won.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
I know Trump won because America refused to roll over and die, uh, under you know woke policies woke agenda um that is out to to destroy the country you know to destroy actually to destroy the idea of like objective truth you can't have a country where there's no objective truth um and that's just at the most basic level
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
I liked it. I thought about changing it. Yeah.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Media's False "Maryland Dad" Narrative and Left's Spin on Illegal Gang Members, with Steve Deace, Delano Squires, and Joseph Massey | Ep. 1049
Thank you, Megan.