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The Sisters of Song, Myth, Poetry, Prayer: A Conversation with Maya Salameh
“I think the places in this book (especially Damascus and San Diego) are reconstituted in that they are mangled in my recitation of them, and I allow them their mangledness. By insisting on the presence of Arabic on the page,…
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A Reclaiming and a Reckoning: A Conversation with Diana Whitney
“So what do we do with the rage? We can make meaning from it. We can shape it into some form where it’s manageable, whether that’s a form on the page in a poem, whether it’s a story we can…
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On Natalie Shapero’s “Stay Dead”
In Shapero’s words, “everyone is a worker.” If many of life’s actions are performances done for payment, so that even oxygenation is “a service / the woods provide,” then art forms like acting, painting, and writing are also determined by…
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Invocation of the Black River
Melissa says squatting in the river is like squatting behinda restaurant. Or over the toilet of a rural restroomseveral hours into a road trip. This is a moment of restwhere I must engage my core muscles. I lookat Erin unswayed…
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The First Book: J Brooke
“The book was always meant as political in its simple existence— the adding my voice to the annals of Trans/Nonbinary collective is an act of anti-erasure. While writing this, though, the incoming administration became even more vile in its attempt…
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Pop-Tart Crumb
“All my life is telling obstacle from sweetness and i must smell to know – i smell everything for its scents – i smell rock most often – wet wood – i smell linoleum, hair of dog, smudge of olive…
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Now More than Ever, We Need “The Happiest Band on Earth”
It’s a sentiment at the core of The 502s’ origin story. In 2015, Isola and a pair of cousins founded the band, and while they were searching for a name, Isola and one of the cousins (who happened to live…
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Gendering Food and the Solidarity of Rituals: A Conversation with Alicia Kennedy
“Being rooted in my neighborhood has made my writing better because I listen to other people who aren’t on the internet. I listen to people who have very different perspectives on the world, and sometimes I hate people that I’m…
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Three Poems
Nights like these, the sky tips like a kicked over bucket and tens of millions of wings are stitched to the Mississippi wind’s long seam. But glass houses false stars and promises of endless flight. Then, sends dark dreams. At…
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The Timelessness of K-Dramas and Folktales: A Conversation with Jimin Han
“Breaking a big project down into small steps helps. In terms of time, I’m at my best when I write in the morning, first thing, even though it’s hard when there are all the social media notifications and emails to…
