March 2018

It is strange to write from an editorial perspective, which presupposes power, about a peer’s work I so admire, which has within it the indisputable power of true poetry. The understated surfaces of Tommye Blount’s poems belie the living heat that drives them, the clarity of their perceptions, and the quiet disjunctions to their lyric fluidity.
Read the rest of “Why We Chose It.”

June 10-16, 2018
Playwrights Conference

June 16-23, 2018
Workshops in Fiction,
Literary Nonfiction, Poetry, and
Nature Writing

July 7-12, 2018
Writers Workshop for Teachers

July 7-14, 2018
Workshops in Fiction,
Hybrid Writing,
Literary Nonfiction,
Poetry,
Spiritual Writing, and
Translation

You can find detailed information and application instructions here.

From “Sightlines”:
I am familiar with occupying liminal spaces. I am Asian American whose life has been shaped by a long familial history of assimilation. I am queer, but as a femme I can pass as straight. In being unseen, I adapt to live. I am not static. This is an old story, the story of women, the story of people of color in the US, of queerness. Read the three poems and the entire essay.

1. My mother is old at the yogurt shop. The small storefront tucked in between two pharmacies, the inside walls painted white. A boy ladles yogurt into a polyethylene bag, hair parted to the left with clumps of gel.
2. My mother is old in the car sitting next to me as I drive, my wrists tight and young in front of me, hands on the wheel, wrinkle-free.

Read the story.

How has your writing changed as a consequence of moving to the United States?

It hasn’t changed. I have been quite sure of what I want for a long time, even though sometimes I achieve it and sometimes I don’t. It amazes me how people are amazed that I continue writing after leaving Cuba, and under precarious conditions. My writing is a gesture. I can write in whatever dirty hole. The only thing that changes is the perspective; the eye stays the same. Read the entire interview.