KARAN

Many of these poems explore how personal perception shapes or distorts reality. For example, in “兔年,” the speaker’s new prescription alters their vision, symbolically suggesting new ways of seeing or understanding the world: “But my eyes are still adjusting to the new prescription: the old one reversed.” The theme of identity too, especially fragmented or multiple identities, is a recurring motif in these poems. In “Zuihitsu,” the poem delves into multiple self-perceptions and the inner conflict they cause. “My selves speak different dialects but read the same scripts. They can never finish a sentence.” I love this! Would you please discuss the significance of fragmented identity in your work? 

KATHRYN

Fragmented identity is probably the nadir of my poetics — it drives my investigations of liminal spaces, intermediate tones, spaces of absence. I think it’s related to my aversion to narrative — I find it almost impossible to tell a linear story, both in writing and in speech. Fragmentation to me means mutability, the chimera, the implacable eel. My experience of Asian American girlhood invites a rejection of a singular selfhood, which has so often been inscribed upon me by hegemonic forces, telling me who I am or am not, what I was, what I ought to be. To me, the fractured self is a space of possibility, futurity. 

I’m also interested in what the scholar Lisa Lowe writes: “The making and practice of Asian American culture [can be considered] nomadic, unsettled, taking place in the travel between cultural sites and in the multivocality of heterogeneous and conflicting positions.” The way I think about my identity and its rabbit holes can sometimes contradict, cause friction, but that’s negative capability — that’s the most generative lyric space.  

KARAN

You treat time and memory as fluid entities, often depicted as mutable forces that shape identity. “Metonymy” addresses this directly through the motif of dreaming and waking. “Would wake on three-quarters of a bed. / Launder my face. Enter my dreams into evidence.” I love that beginning! Several of your poems address or confront or reconcile with the past. Would you speak about your writing process? Where do your poems come from?

KATHRYN

My dear poet friend Temperance Aghamohammadi once called the writing process “little torture of the self.” My writing process is similar; often it begins with an obsessive rumination that flails about my mind until scraping up a line, an image, a sonic bloom. Or sometimes it’s a series of events/feelings that suddenly align in my mind like a new constellation. Often it ends up in my Notes app until I can fully investigate it, which I need a lot of space and time to do — the “little torture” requires me to stare down my memories and my psyche in a way that is often uncomfortable, but ultimately necessary. I never come out of a poem the way I entered it.

In a conversation with another dear poet friend, Safa Khatib, we posited that one of the conditions of being a poet is a predisposition for obsessive rumination that traps you in a self-flagellating vortex — you tunnel out of the vortex through writing. Like a lot of poets, I am deeply neurotic, and I came to poetry as a means of negotiating my neuroses. 

Logistically, I write nearly every day, alternating between my journal — documenting the day and its emotional vortices — and my laptop. I go through many drafts between my indecipherable chicken scratch, Google Docs, and printed copies for markup. When I feel stuck, I’ll take the poem and write it longhand in my journal, eliminating the line breaks and focusing solely on the sounds of the language. I also read and research widely, looking at other poets’ work and losing hours to Wikipedia. I reject my impulse to work fast. I scrape out the bowl of my memories. I talk to my brilliant poet friends. 

KARAN

Natural imagery frequently symbolizes emotional states or existential dilemmas. In “North,” nature is intertwined with personal reflection and the quest for meaning. “When I was north I dreamt of hares. Cast stones to strike them from memory’s dark ravine.” How does nature serve as a backdrop for exploring deeper psychological or philosophical themes in your poetry?

KATHRYN

I grew up in the Appalachian foothills of Alabama, roaming around creeks and playing with bugs. I climbed trees when I didn’t want to talk to anyone. Deer in the road, opossums and armadillos in the backyard, coyotes trotting with a cat red in its maw. There was a kind of permeability between inside and outside — late into the night, my thoughts would merge into the soundscape of frogs, crickets, cicadas, and katydids. So my psyche was developed in this intermediary space, which is reflected in my impulse to root my work in natural imagery.

KARAN

These poems often present dualities—life and death, past and future, reality and illusion—that challenge the reader to navigate complex emotional landscapes. “We All Have Our Own” plays with the idea of external perceptions versus internal realities. What do you think about these dualities/contradictions and how they enrich our lives or enhance the thematic depth of poems as you write?

KATHRYN

I think my interest in dualities and contradictions is also an interest in fluidity and purgatorial space. To consider two things together is to also see the space between them and, as an extension, think in the spectrum of both/and. 

Binaristic duality is a political question. It’s crucial in this late stage capitalist empire called USA to identify binaristic thought and how its dominance manipulates us — further, how language itself is used as a political weapon to manufacture consent to the US-funded genocide of the Palestinian people. What liberatory futures can we build when we break from the binary of American thought? To quote Audre Lorde, the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.

KARAN

Let’s talk about endings. Your endings are so fantastic! They’re well earned and are super impactful. The prayerful quality of “May the winds carry you  / out of your own self-hatred.” or the goosebump-giving “The skin makes for a warm coat.” I know a lot of poets who find it hard to end a poem. Do you have a method for your endings? If not, are there any patterns you’ve noticed in your approach that might help others find their perfect poetic ending? 

KATHRYN

Like good jokes & horror movies, poems are tangos of tension & release. I don’t have a prescriptive method to my endings, but I usually consider this tango and whether the poem has released the energy it has cultivated. The perfect ending hums in the chest. I don’t think a poem has to answer every question it poses — in fact, I think it’s wonderful to have a little mystery and ambiguity — but I don’t like unproductive confusion.

KARAN

Exploration of the metaphysical is central to these poems, where existential questions about purpose, existence, and the nature of being are prevalent. “Perhaps Embodiment Is So Bewildering, Even God Grows Wrecked with Doubt” directly addresses these themes through a contemplative dialogue. “I want someone to address, but o darling is a Bloody Mary chant to apparate my own panting self.” Is writing poetry a way for you to ask the big questions? I’ve mentioned this in a few of the recent interviews: there is poetry of the body, poetry of the mind, poetry of the heart, and poetry of the soul. And of course the best poems cannot be categorized into any one. But if you’d like to put yourself into one or two of these categories, which do you think would it be?

KATHRYN

My poems are body & mind poems that aren’t interested in the Cartesian divide. My mind is an extension of my body, and my body is piloted by my mind. Aristotle wrote in Poetics that ideally, poetry enacts catharsis — a release of emotion that is corporeal, located in the body. When I am freaking out about whatever the hell, I take it back to my senses: I clench and unclench my muscles, control my breath.

Usually, I’m talking to myself in my poems — I’m meditating. You can say things in a poem that you can’t say in everyday conversation. Writing is thinking; writing is where I can be utterly naked and vulnerable. Poetry is an excellent way to ask the universe questions. So much prayer is poetry. 

KARAN

Additionally, because we believe in studying the master’s masters, we would also love to know poets who have influenced you most (preferably around 5 but more if you wish).

KATHRYN

I am most influenced by poets who demonstrate sharpness & concision. I love poets who make the familiar strange. I love sonic play, but not systematic rhyme. I also am greatly fascinated by documentary poetry and the blending of the lyric with other modes of speech. Currently, my influences are: June Jordan, Diane Seuss, Solmaz Sharif, Jenny Xie, Muriel Rukeyser, Pierre Reverdy, and Gerard Manley Hopkins. 

I am also greatly indebted to the generosity of my teachers at the Alabama School of Fine Arts, University of Alabama at Birmingham, and Washington University in St. Louis: Ashley M. Jones, Iris Rinke-Hammer, Kwoya Fagin Maples, TJ Beitelman, Adam Vines, Tina Mozelle Braziel, Carl Phillips, Mary Jo Bang, and Niki Herd. Grateful forever to my fearless poet-peers at WashU: Safa Khatib, Abbey Frederick, Asha Futterman, Carlota Gamboa, Temperance Aghamohammadi, Ariana Benson, David Ehmcke, Zain Baweja, Syd Westley, Stefania Gomez, Joe Jungho Jang, Edil Hassan, Kieron Walquist, and Kelan Nee.