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10 Questions for Harry Harootunian

January 4, 2019 - By Emily Wojcik

"When I was younger I had a recurring dream of walking in the ruins of Ani. Ani was a city of the Bagratid Kingdom in eastern Anatolia (“Higher Armenia”). It had been a powerful fortress as early as the third century, but by the ninth century Ani became the center of a large kingdom that covered a good part of the region. It was known for its architectural splendors and, as a city of 1,001 churches with a population estimated to be at least 100,000, larger than any Medieval European city at the time, it stood at the crossroads of several trade routes between east and west."  —from “In the Ruins of Ani,” Volume 59, Issue 4 (Winter 2018)

Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote.
Since I’m a...

10 Questions for Arhm Choi Wild

January 2, 2019 - By Emily Wojcik

"A woman walks in alone after hours, all the machines quiet, though she can’t hate them today. The dry-cleaning tank is square and tall so she must stand on tip-toes to run her cracked hands along the top, muttering old Korean in neat strands of sound. A piece of skin flakes off when she rubs the metal of the shirt press." —from “13^th Anniversary,” in Volume 59, Issue 4 (Winter 2018)

Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote.
One of the first pieces I wrote was about my mother, in the same dry cleaners that is featured in “13^th Anniversary”. I wanted a way to showcase how hard she worked, as a single mother, as a small business owner of a grueling industry, and as an immigrant...

10 Questions for Marilyn Chin

December 28, 2018 - By Emily Wojcik

Chaos said, “O, Mei Ling, give me eyes so that I can admire your beauty.” So, Mei Ling punctured two wounds into his forehead. And as he gazed longingly into her eyes, Chaos said, “Oh beautiful one, I can’t smell your sweet scent.” So, Mei Ling cut two holes for his nostrils. Chaos said, “O melodious poet, give me two ears, so that I can hear your fine poems.” Again, Mei Ling obliged. . . . —from “Chaos Had No Eyes,” Winter 2018 (Volume 59, Issue 4)

Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote.
I remember finishing a poem called “The End of a Beginning” and thought that it was a cool poem. I was...

10 Questions for Joseph O. Legaspi

December 26, 2018 - By Emily Wojcik

My husband swelters, fevered to a mercurial pitch,
thundering from the raw ribcage of our bedroom.

Where have I taken him to? To my ancestral
home, a country a point of reentry for us both.
He, however, stands tall in these parts. From afar

I’d spot him in thick crowds: a small volcanic
island lapped by flotsam. . . . —from “In the Tropics.“ Winter 2018 (Volume 59, Issue 4)

Photograph by Rachel Eliza Griffiths

What inspired you to write “In the Tropics,” your poem in the current issue of the Massachusetts Review?
The jumping-off point of the poem is the misery of being sick with fever and congestion and phlegm in the tropics with its sweltering heat and...

10 Questions for Samina Najmi

December 21, 2018 - By Emily Wojcik

"I called her Amma. It’s an old-fashioned word for “Ammi,” mother, but I called her Amma because that’s what my mother called her. Before she shrank, Amma was five feet tall. She had long, black hair which she pulled into a single braid down her back, eyes that glistened, and teeth so precisely formed, they looked like two rows of pearls when she smiled. I loved her girth, her mellow edges. Amma’s flesh circled her midriff like the clasp of a lover, and when she lay on her side, you could see her stomach in profile, lying next to her." —from “Amma,” from Winter 2018 (Volume 59, Issue 4)

Photograph: Samina Najmi (right) with her sister and Amma in 1994.  ...