Per Diem Pres: Wessel, White + Chhetri,

the veiled house

The web is washed and primed. They will paint it violet and the whores are at Denny’s deciding between sweet or savory and when ghosts arrive at your door, begging for treats, you welcome them into your veil. Let them smell your hair, the shampoo that makes you coconut and the citric quench of an iced greyhound. The widow hammocks you with her tresses, putting all your tricks to sleep. (Arisa White)

In case you haven’t heard of American writer Daniel Handler’s Per Diem Press, it self-describes as “an extremely independent publisher dedicated to elegance, ferocity, and bewilderment, funded by cash given to the proprietor whilst visiting the set of a filmed adaptation of his work.” Literally funded via the per diem the author received through the filming of the Netflix adaptation of A Series of Unfortunate Events, the press announced on Handler’s Facebook page as an open call for submissions, with three titles to be selected from whatever came in. As he posted on his page, back on December 15, 2016:

Over the past year or so I have spent some time in Vancouver, peeking at the Netflix production of A Series of Unfortunate Events. Every day I am there, I am given a small handful of American dollars - a “per diem” designed to cover my expenses. I don’t seem to have any expenses - I’m on the set all day long - and in Canada, this American cash seems particularly silly, so it’s remained unspent.

In time, this became a somewhat substantial amount of money, and I began to think I should do something suitable with it. Thus, the establishment of Per Diem Press, which will publish a single chapbook of poetry in early 2017, eight 4” X 5”pages, saddle-stitched, with a cardstock cover, hopefully designed by the noted illustrator Lisa Brown just as soon as I make her a martini and ask her. The poet will receive $1,000 and a nice stack of copies. The remaining chapbooks will be distributed to my postal club and on the road as I promote my forthcoming filthy novel All The Dirty Parts. If logistics permit, the poet and I will read together at least once.

I absolutely love that Handler chose to produce small books with this money, and am rather amazed that he would be generous enough to even consider such a thing (I’m reminded of when Michael Turner was given a hefty advance from Doubleday, circa 2000, and shifted part of the money into a short-lived imprint he edited through Arsenal Pulp Press). Almost immediately after I sent my own submission (naturally) in to his open call, I was startled to discover in my files that Handler had actually been an above/ground press subscriber a decade earlier, back in 2008, which provided the knowledge that his interest in poetry, and chapbooks, had some kind of history (my knowledge of Handler’s generosities on social media I’ve known of for some time, but my knowledge of his work or interests otherwise remains embarrassingly thin), and one I was thrilled to realize I was some incredibly small part of. The result of his initial call, according to an article of Handler’s posted at Lit Hub, was some 1,200 submissions, which were then whittled down to not one, but three elegantly-produced chapbook titles, each of some eight pages of writing, all of which appeared in 2018: first one thing, then the other by Elizabeth Clark Wessel, “fish walking” & other bedtime stories for my wife by Arisa White, and jurassic desire by Rohan Chhetri.

january

I can’t seem to write anything anymore.

Not sure if what it is is sadness

or just an anxious pressing away

or the absence of.

I can tell you

I was comfortable all day,

my stomach full when I wanted it to be.

They scraped my teeth clean,

and I bled like an ingénue in a horror film.

Decay here and here and here, the dentist said

pointing to shadows on the photos of my yellow teeth.

I paid with my blue credit card,

which I use for personal expenses.

It was cold outside, but the sun was shining.

It was a day on earth

I read for a while and had sex in the afternoon.

I didn’t feel the baby move and wondered about

that dim space inside, where everything was being

primed for a mind. I didn’t clean a goddam thing.

My body got older and uglier.

I avoided the mirror. (Elizabeth Clark Wessel)

I’ve known the name Elizabeth Clark Wessel for a while now, although I can’t for the life of me figure out why, given I haven’t read any of her four other chapbooks (I suspect I’ve seen her name around in a variety of journals, etcetera, as well as here). The poems in her first one thing, then the other read as singular, ongoing thoughts, working and searching their way toward reason. Hers are theses in search of themselves, arguing and reaching in every direction until the narrative allows the through-line to make itself known; hers are poems less concerned with conclusions than with attempting to seek out the appropriate questions. As she writes to open the poem “night”: “Where are the best poems of your life  Have they already passed you by / Can you even go straight for it / You don’t feel brave / You feel uncertain [.]”  

Arisa White’s “fish walking” & other bedtime stories for my wife is a wonderfully rich and striking collection of dense prose poems composed with the care, cadence and halting breath of bedtime stories for more mature ears, containing wisdom and depth and a deceptive calm. “She gave up her mustang for the carousel,” she writes, to open “her heart, her horse.” A New Yorker living and teaching in Maine, White [see her ’12 or 20 questions’ interview here] is the author of numerous full-length collections, including Black Pearl, Post Pardon, Hurrah’s Nest, A Penny Saved and You’re the Most Beautiful Thing that Happened, which was a nominee for the 29th Lambda Literary Award.

The poems that make up Rohan Chhetri’s jurassic desre are expansive and ambitious, composed as a series of lines that tumble, accumulate and threaten to overwhelm by how much they contain. His poems exist as narratives describing the minutae of scenes-as-objects, turning each story around and over to catch what others might have easily missed. I’m amazed by how much they contain. Nepali-Indian poet Chhetri’s full-length poetry debut was Slow Startle (Winner of the ‘Emerging Poets Prize 2015’), published by The (Great) Indian Poetry Collective; since the publication of his Per Diem chapbook, a second full-length poetry manuscript was awarded the 2018 Kundiman Poetry Prize, which includes publication through Tupelo Press. The second section of his poem “restoration elegy” reads:

The sundown flaring over the pacific,

& the one long fold of a wave trying to swim back

to shore. The evening air a cross between lantana

cameras & eucalyptus, both airy signposts of childhood,

like an old croon of a ghazal in praise of alcohol

remembered only in a regressing sadness now.

You hear the river back home has changed its course,

flooding through the living rooms of your town,

an angry murk roiling with a singular desire to bring

to surface every lost map of your grandfather’s revolution.

In the valley, they haven’t finished blinding the children

with the 12-gauge, & somewhere else they’re erasing

borders as the bombsites turn green over hurried graves.

In the half light, walking up to your apartment,

the evening fog looming over the ridges, you encounter

a family of deer come down from the barren hill

to nibble on dates & blue-eyed grass. At night,

you hear the coyotes howl, & you pray for the fawn,

the only startled passenger of the unit, no more

than a few weeks old, flicking its clean ears & wobbling

by the bottlebrush, not used to the stench of the animal

hunger that stops its mother still on her tracks.

12 or 20 (small press) questions with Kate Angus on Augury Books

Augury Books is an independent press based in Brooklyn, New York. Committed to publishing innovative work from emerging and established writers, Augury Books seeks to reaffirm the diversity of the reading public. Our authors have received awards such as the O. Henry Prize for short fiction, the Great Lakes Colleges Association’s “Discover” Award for creative nonfiction, and the Tony Quagliano International Poetry Award. Our authors have also been nominated for the CLMP Firecracker Award, the Lambda Literary Arts Award, and have been featured on the Poetry Society of America and the Academy of American Poets’ websites. Founded in 2010, Augury Books has published and continues to publish outstanding poetry, nonfiction, and fiction by a diverse range of voices. In late 2017, Augury Books became an imprint of Brooklyn Arts Press. We are a proud member of CLMP, the Community of Literary Magazines and Presses. Our titles are distributed by Small Press Distribution (SPD). Our editorial board is dedicated to fairness and quality of work.

Kate Angus is a founding editor of Augury Books and the author of So Late to the Party (Negative Capability Press, 2016). Her poetry and nonfiction have appeared in The Atlantic, The Washington Post, Poetry Daily, Verse Daily, The Academy of American Poets’ “Poem-a-Day” newsletter, Best New Poets 2010 and Best New Poets 2014. She is the Creative Writing Advisor for the Mayapple Center for Arts and Humanities at Sarah Lawrence College.

1 – When did Augury Books first start? How have your original goals as a publisher shifted since you started, if at all? And what have you learned through the process?

Augury Books was founded in 2010 with an eye towards publishing innovative and exciting work from new and emerging writers. That hasn’t changed. But we have expanded! We started off only publishing poetry, but in 2014 we opened up to short story collections and creative nonfiction titles. We’ve also had some editorial board turnover. A few early-days editors (Christine Kanownik and Matthew Cunha) stepped down due to time constraints, but since 2012-2013 we’ve had a pretty stable editorial board of myself, Associate Editor Kimberly Steele, and Assistant Editor Nicolas Amara. And this past November, Augury became an imprint of Brooklyn Arts Press so now Joe Pan/BAP is our publisher. 

I’ve learned so much! We all had to pick up various business skills (accounting, marketing, organizing, etc.) on the fly, but what I’m most aware of is how my approach to editing has evolved. When Augury was a young press, I think I had the arrogance of youth and felt more inclined to try to impose my aesthetics on the manuscripts we published; as the press and I have both aged, I find myself gravitating more towards collaboration, specifically the kind of collaboration where editorial conversations focus on how to best help our authors shape their words into the strongest version of what they want to say, rather than filtering their vision through my personal aesthetic preferences.

2 – What first brought you to publishing?

Meghan O’Rourke, one of my MFA teachers at The New School, asked me to be her Poetry Reader at The Paris Review and I also applied to be a fiction reader for A Public Space. Because of my experiences reading through the slush pile and learning from editors at both magazines, I felt like I had some small grasp of how publishing worked. Of course, even though I learned quite a lot at TPR and APS, I wasn’t even remotely prepared for indie book publishing, but it was a great start.

3 – What do you consider the role and responsibilities, if any, of small publishing?

I think the role of small press publishers is to find, amplify, and nurture writers who for whatever reason the bigger publishing houses have overlooked.

4 – What do you see your press doing that no one else is?

I don’t think there’s anything we’re doing that no one else is. There are so many great small and micro-presses out there and they are all doing amazing work.

5 – What do you see as the most effective way to get new books out into the world?

I don’t really have a good answer—we are constantly revising our strategies for how to best launch our books so that they can find a wider audience. I think it has to be a collaboration between author and press. An author can’t carry the weight of launching their book on their own, but neither can publishers do very much for authors who won’t reach out to whatever connections they might have. Publishers need to develop and maintain relationships with reviewers, reading series curators, institutions, etc., and keep an active presence in the lit world, but authors also need to do this work as well. I say this as both an editor and a writer: writers will always be their own best advocate. No matter how much your publisher loves and believes in your work, you have to go to bat for yourself over and over again.

Authors can help by publishing work in multiple genres, for instance, to widen their readership or doing group interviews or podcasts or writing guest posts for literary blogs or speaking on panels or guest teaching—really anything that helps put you and your words in front of a wide variety of people. Doing readings helps, both conventional readings as well as those in less conventional spaces. And collaborating with people in other art forms also.

6 – How involved an editor are you? Do you dig deep into line edits, or do you prefer more of a light touch?

Both I think. I certainly take deep dives into the manuscripts we publish, doing line edits and such, but I offer my edits in the spirit of collaboration, of conversation, and I believe with the same goal shared by the author: that the final version of the book is the best possible articulation of their vision. I hope the writers whose work Augury has published would agree with my assessment of this process, but you’d have to ask them. 

7 – How do your books get distributed? What are your usual print runs?

Our books are all distributed by SPD (Small Press Distribution) so they’re available at many bookstores, as well as online. We do print on demand now so our print runs vary based on demand.

8 – How many other people are involved with editing or production? Do you work with other editors, and if so, how effective do you find it? What are the benefits, drawbacks?

Augury is my baby in many ways, but also absolutely a group effort. Over the years, I’ve relied on our Assistant Editor Nicolas Amara and Associate Editor Kimberly Steele to do much of the production work and help make many decisions. We have also been blessed in the past with some wonderful design people—Mike Miller who has done many of our covers, and Isabella Giancarlo who did our most recent interior work. We’ve also had many great interns along the way. And now that we are BAP’s imprint, we have a fantastic new publisher: Joe Pan. This press would not exist without all of these people and the amazing selfless work they have done over the years and, in many cases, continue to do.

9– How has being an editor/publisher changed the way you think about your own writing?

I don’t know that it’s changed how I think about my own writing, but it has made me much more sanguine about how and when and if my writing gets published. I know firsthand now how much goes into deciding which manuscripts are chosen and that quality of work is absolutely paramount but also other things do factor in: for example, how does this work fit into the press’s overall catalog, how many books can we afford to publish at this time, is this book too similar in some ways to something else we have recently published or, conversely, is it too dissonant with the rest of our catalog, etc. My role at Augury has allowed me to accept my own rejections more easily, and not flagellate myself as much. I now understand better that often a “No” doesn’t mean the work is bad—often it just isn’t right for that press at that time or for that issue of a journal.

10– How do you approach the idea of publishing your own writing? Some, such as Gary Geddes when he still ran Cormorant, refused such, yet various Coach House Press’ editors had titles during their tenures as editors for the press, including Victor Coleman and bpNichol. What do you think of the arguments for or against, or do you see the whole question as irrelevant?

I guess for me it’s irrelevant. I understand the arguments for it and against it and I think it’s a choice every editor/publisher needs to make for themselves and there aren’t any wrong answers—it’s just individual preference. Before my first book was published, I wanted it to come out on someone else’s press—both to have their support and structure, as well as their editorial input, and also I guess to have a kind of outside seal of approval, a feeling of validation from another editor and press that said “Yes, we believe in you and your work.” And I got all those things and so much more with Sue Walker at Negative Capability Press. For me it was important to have that experience of being published by someone else and I will always be grateful to Sue and Megan and the other folks at Negative Capability Press for believing in me and in So Late to the Party. But I don’t know how I will feel when my second book is done—I might, at that point, want to maintain control over the rights to my book, the distribution, being able to make e-books, etc. instead. All of that is so far away right now: I just want to concentrate on writing my next book rather than trying to predict what model of publication I’ll want to follow once it is written.

11– How do you see Augury Books evolving?

Well, we just made a really big change a few months ago. This past fall, we became an imprint of Brooklyn Arts Press. The transition from being fully-independent into being nurtured as a small wing of a larger press has been very smooth and we all (Augury and BAP) are really excited about our future collaborations with the books we’ll be publishing!

12– What, as a publisher, are you most proud of accomplishing? What do you think people have overlooked about your publications? What is your biggest frustration?

I am so proud of all the books we have brought out into the world. My biggest frustration is figuring out how to find a wider audience for our authors. 

13– Who were your early publishing models when starting out?

We definitely admire Wave Books, Slope Editions, Octopus Books, Flood Editions and Milkweed Editions, Ugly Duckling Presse, Four Way Books, Alice James Books, and others like them. I don’t know that we modeled ourselves on any of them precisely; rather, we loved the work they were publishing and felt inspired to—like them—help bring beautiful books out into the world.

14– How does Augury Books work to engage with your immediate literary community, and community at large? What journals or presses do you see Augury Books in dialogue with? How important do you see those dialogues, those conversations?

I don’t know that I see us as being in any specific dialogue, although I guess on a certain level all presses and journals are engaged in a larger conversation with each other and with writers and readers. We do seek to support and collaborate with other presses, and with writers and editors we aren’t formally affiliated with. I think the most obvious example of this is our new affiliation with Brooklyn Arts Press—as BAP’s imprint, we are collaborating with them through conversations, through sharing resources and ideas and networks and events, and through sharing table space at AWP and other conferences. We’ll also be participating in an offsite reading at AWP this year organized by Switchback Books that also involves BAP, Saturnalia, and Black Ocean. And Augury Books is also part of the Small Press Union, a wonderful resource-sharing  and support network created by Lynne DeSilva-Johnson of The Operating System. I think that it’s an absolute imperative for small presses to be supportive of each other, and there are many ways of doing this: we can be supportive of each other by organizing and/or attending events, by purchasing each other’s books, by helping publicize things (events, publications, reading periods, fund raisers, etc.) for each other and by offering practical help by working tables for each other or doing shipping or paying more of the table costs if we’re not able to be there in person. There are a lot of ways of being part of the literary community—we’re all in this together, although we all also have our own individual responsibilities and constraints so we may not be able to be in it together in exactly the same ways.

15– Do you hold regular or occasional readings or launches? How important do you see public readings and other events?

We definitely hold launch parties for all of our new titles and we try to do readings occasionally for other things as well—collaborative readings offsite at AWP and the occasional showcase reading when we have enough Augury authors in the same place at the same time. I love launch parties: they’re like a wedding or a baby shower—a wonderful way of celebrating something new and beautiful and welcoming it to the world. While I do like public readings both to hear work in the author’s own voice and also as a social occasion, I admit I engage more deeply when I’m reading a book alone as a silent solitary act rather than being in a crowd where the work is read aloud to me.

16– How do you utilize the internet, if at all, to further your goals?

Our titles can be purchased online so the Internet is part of our distribution. And we accept only accept submissions online so the Internet is also how we find new books to publish.

17– Do you take submissions? If so, what aren’t you looking for?

Yes we do! In fact, we have an open reading period during January this year. We aren’t able to accept anthologies or works in translation, for various business reasons, nor do we accept novels (I love novels but don’t feel qualified to edit or market one), but other than that we are open to submissions from writers at any stage of their career.

18– Tell me about three of your most recent titles, and why they’re special.

It’s hard to narrow down our catalog to just three books, but I’ll talk about a recent title in each of the three genres that we publish.

Poetry: Arisa White’s You’re the Most Beautiful Thing That Happened, a Lambda Literary Award Finalist for Lesbian Poetry, is one of our titles dearest to my heart. I’ll quote Christopher Soto’s lovely review of this collection for Lamba Literary where he calls this book “a love letter to our shared queer of color community” and notes that “titles of many poems in the collection are literal translations of the word gay. Many of the original words, before being translated, are derogatory in their original language. Thus, Arisa White repurposes that pain and inscribes it with love, tenderness, poetry. ‘You’ becomes witness to the beauty held in what was once called derogatory. ‘You’ is able to witness the act of reclaiming language.”

Fiction: Sara Schaff’s Say Something Nice About Me, a finalist for CLMP’s Firecracker Award for Fiction, is a fantastic collection. Sara’s prose is luminous and sharp, and the stories in the collection explore the risks taken—and illusions created—by her characters at turning points in their lives, trying to grapple with how to live in the unknown. I’ll quote Dan Choan’s assessment of her work her, as he says “The stories…intertwine in complex and fascinating patterns. They are all explorations of the meaning of human connection…Say Something Nice About me is a thoughtful and provoking book, the beginning to a great career!”

Creative Nonfiction: Randall Horton’s Hook, the winner of the Great Lakes Colleges Association’s (GLCA) 2016 “Discover” Prize for Creative Nonfiction, is a gripping story of transformation. This memoir by the poet, musician (Heroes Are Gang Leaders) and educator Randall Horton charts his early years as an unassuming Howard University student turned homeless drug addict, international cocaine smuggler, and incarcerated felon, and the redemption he found through writing. The book is structured as a multilayered narrative bridging both past and present through Horton’s memories, as well as his correspondence in letters with the anonymous Lxxxx, a Latina woman awaiting trial. To quote the GLCA judges, “Randall Horton delivers careful rough-hewn, poetically-charged language at the service of a memoir that runs against the grain of a typical ‘recovery’ narrative. What results is searing commentary, social critique under the guise of a memoir within a memoir…[T]his text has the potential to speak to people for generations.”

12 or 20 (small press) questions;

12 or 20 (second series) questions with Arisa White

Cave Canem graduate fellow Arisa White [photo credit: Nye' Lyn Tho] received her MFA from UMass, Amherst, and is the author of Black Pearl, Post Pardon, Hurrah’s Nest, and A Penny Saved. Her recent collection You’re the Most Beautiful Thing that Happened was a nominee for the 29th Lambda Literary Award and the chapbook “Fishing Walking” and Other Bedtime Stories for My Wife won the inaugural Per Diem Poetry Prize. As the creator of the Beautiful Things Project, Arisa curates cultural events and artistic collaborations that center narratives of queer people of color. She serves on the board of directors for Nomadic Press and is a faculty advisor at Goddard College. arisawhite.com

1 - How did your first book change your life? How does your most recent work compare to your previous? How does it feel different?

My first book, Hurrah’s Nest, brings attention to familial traumas and silences; I learned to write from a critically affirming place with that collection. To look critically with love and that then allows for some kind of release to happen, healing to occur. My most recent collection, You’re the Most Beautiful Thing That Happened, doesn’t feel different—it’s base is the same; I’m allowing some things to take center stage. You’re the Most centers queer black female experiences and the forthcoming chapbook “Fish Walking” and Other Bedtime Stories for My Wife is quite playful with language. It’s surreal and spiritual. I’ve challenged myself to not rely so much on the metaphor—there’s an unmasking I’m doing, which feels vulnerable, however, now, I’m imagining that all things co-exist in my reality, all ways of experiencing a moment.

2 - How did you come to poetry first, as opposed to, say, fiction or non-fiction?

Poetry is closest to my way of speaking and being in the world. We are such a perfect match—that poetic eye/I is present in my prose and dramatic writing.

3 - How long does it take to start any particular writing project? Does your writing initially come quickly, or is it a slow process? Do first drafts appear looking close to their final shape, or does your work come out of copious notes?

Starting is easy; it’s finishing that’s the challenge. Often I need to go away on retreat to truly finish a project—to get into it and notice the absences, the places where it doesn’t cohere. I need uninterrupted time to relate to it.

My first drafts, that is what I transcribe from the notebook to the screen, come out looking nearly close to its final shape. In my notebook, I’m working out the emotional truth of the poem and whether what it’s communicating is in alignment with my intentions—or sometimes I’m so surprised by what comes out that the poem shifts me.

4 - Where does a poem usually begin for you? Are you an author of short pieces that end up combining into a larger project, or are you working on a "book" from the very beginning?

I have an idea, but first the idea has to make its presence felt in my body before I’m moved to bring it to the page. Sometimes the idea can remain in the head, and I’ll make a note of it. But when my whole body concedes, it’s writing time. Maybe I’m often cross-training—writing individual pieces as they come and writing poems specific to book-length projects.

5 - Are public readings part of or counter to your creative process? Are you the sort of writer who enjoys doing readings?

I do enjoy readings and reading my work. When working on a project, and when the poems have stabilized themselves, I’ll bring them to the public. Reading to an audience is so much different than reading aloud to yourself, in your familiar rooms—the work has a chance to bounce off other bodies, take up a different space. It is then that I’m able to experience the work as its own distinct presence. I recognize where it is strong and the areas that need development.  

6 - Do you have any theoretical concerns behind your writing? What kinds of questions are you trying to answer with your work? What do you even think the current questions are?

Is there a water style? An earth style? I’m considering how the elements can be a way to craft the poem.

What is a queer black female aesthetic? How does it feel when I write out of queerness or blackness? Sometimes the two feel the same. My female body is a constant—it informs my everything. How my body is labeled (by force or by choice) is variable.

7 – What do you see the current role of the writer being in larger culture? Does s/he even have one? What do you think the role of the writer should be?

            The role of the writer is to shake us free from master(ing) narratives.

8 - Do you find the process of working with an outside editor difficult or essential (or both)?

When an editor is good, she is essential. My editor/publisher Kate Angus was an extraordinary person to work with on my latest collection You’re the Most Beautiful Thing That Happened. Her comments and suggestions for reordering the poems revealed gaps in the emotional arc of the collection. She edits with an understanding of how I like to use language and as a result, the language has extra pop.

9 - What is the best piece of advice you've heard (not necessarily given to you directly)?

Follow your obsessions, the things that catch and hold your attention. And I find this especially helpful on those days when I’m wondering, What do I write?

10 - What kind of writing routine do you tend to keep, or do you even have one? How does a typical day (for you) begin?

In the past 10 years, I have relied on The Daily Grind (TDG) to give routine to my writing. TDG operates online and each month you sign up and are assigned a group of writers to send work to each day. When signing up, you select if you want to be in a group working on New Poetry, New Prose, Revised & New Poetry, and my favorite is Manic Mixture. There is no commenting on each other’s work. You are showing up each day, sharing writing that you are capable of completing within that 24 hours. Why I like Manic Mixture is because, as my life has broadened as a writer—in addition to writing poetry, I’m writing plays, essays, course descriptions, interview responses, etc.— I don’t need to separate how writing shows up in my life. It is actively a part of who I am.

These past two months, I’ve been beginning my day with meditation. I then check emails, especially on the weekdays, and make a to-do list of the top things I need to get done for the day. Usually, writing comes in the evening, 4-8pm. Weekends, I wake up, meditate, read, and do some writing, but I allow myself to be chill about it, especially if I don’t have any deadlines to meet.

11 - When your writing gets stalled, where do you turn or return for (for lack of a better word) inspiration?

I return to books and art. I return to life, to the people in the streets and bars, to my friends, to the shit going on in the world, to the sun on my face, instead of the glow of a screen. I go for a walk.

12 - What fragrance reminds you of home?

Egyptian Musk reminds me of my mother, and mothballs remind me of my grandmother.

13 - David W. McFadden once said that books come from books, but are there any other forms that influence your work, whether nature, music, science or visual art?

All things influence my work—my experience of the world (word) is relational, so my work arises from the intersection of all things.

14 - What other writers or writings are important for your work, or simply your life outside of your work?

I read a healthy amount of theory, cultural studies, spiritual and metaphysical texts, and enjoy my fair share of popular culture. Poetry is the way I synthesize my various encounters in the world—and I like to imagine myself as the point in which all those encounters intersect.

15 - What would you like to do that you haven't yet done?

I would like to live in another country for more than a year. I love the experience of being in another culture, in another consciousness. The world becomes so much larger than where I claim citizenship. I get to step out of the echo chamber of my country, its pathologies, and learn to relate to my body outside of the national discourses that serve to limit how I access and actualize my humanity.

16 - If you could pick any other occupation to attempt, what would it be? Or, alternately, what do you think you would have ended up doing had you not been a writer?

Honestly, I don’t know what I would have done if not this. I’m very sure I would have been in the arts—maybe a professionally trained dancer. However, I have always wanted to come up with the names for nail polishes and lipsticks.

17 - What made you write, as opposed to doing something else?

            Desire—if my heart isn’t in it, it’s not worth my energy.

18 - What was the last great book you read? What was the last great film?

The two last great books I read was Learning to (Re)member the Things We’ve Learned to Forge: Endarkened Feminisms, Spirituality, & the Sacred Nature of Research & Teaching by Cynthia B. Dillard and In the Wake: On Blackness and Being by Christina Sharpe and Moonlight is the film.

19 - What are you currently working on?

I’m currently working on a children’s book in verse, which I am co-authoring with Laura Atkins. The book is about Bridget “Biddy” Mason who was enslaved, starting in Georgia, and with her Mormon master, walked to Utah then California where she petitioned for her freedom. Later she became a philanthropist and wealthy landowner in Los Angeles. Slated for publication in early 2019, this is the second book in the Fighting for Justice series, published by Hey Day Books.

12or 20 (second series) questions;