Blog / Interviews

10 Questions for Yi Zhe

March 7, 2023 - By Edward Clifford

Because of my poor hearing
two old friends think
they can make mischief
in front of me.
—From "I Blacklisted Two Old Friends" by Zuo You, Translated by Yi Zhe, Volume 63, Issue 4 (Winter 2022)

Tell us about one of the first pieces you translated.
Zuo You has suffered from a hearing impairment at the age of six. Since then, he has been exploring sounds, eager to hear every day. His hope to communicate with the world has shaped his poetic practice. Zuo You writes with high accuracy to evoke feelings which strike home in the text, and to achieve self-transcendence. At times, his writing is insolent, modern, lyrical, direct, self-ridiculing.

I have been translating Zuo You’s poems about sound, deafness,...

February 2023 MR Contributor Publications

March 3, 2023 - By Staff

Rebecca Kaiser Gibson's novel,The Promise of a Normal Life, is out now from Arcade Press. Her poem "Osmosis" was featured in our Summer 2021 issue.

Climate Issue contributor Joseph Earl Thomas' memoir,...

10 Questions for Adrienne Marie Barrios

February 28, 2023 - By Edward Clifford

She says, I care little about what's said in the short term. She cracks her shoulder blades. She wonders if she waters them, would they grow wings? She says, I care about what happens tomorrow or the next day or the end of next month when the doctor pronounces my heart obsolete.
—from "That's Still Short Term, I Care About Long Term." co-written with Leigh Chadwick, Volume 63, Issue 4 (Winter 2022)

Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote.
It’s hard for me to identify what “first” means. I’ve had so many stops and starts in the writing world. I wrote many things in my childhood and teen years, including a poem published in an anthology I have somewhere in a box. I managed and wrote for a...

10 Questions for Wakaya Wells

February 23, 2023 - By Edward Clifford

Our old ones are dying. Their parents restrained every syllable. the children floated away from their homes to boarding schools. graveyards, and war zones. It is my fifth day in the hospital. Outside for the first time. I hold my medicine bag in my pocket, and I think about Granny Marie. A dandelion stands out amidst a patch of grass.
—From "Snake Dance," Volume 63, Issue 4 (Winter 2022)

Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote.
The first piece that I ever got published was a poem called "The Falling." I wrote it as an underclassmen in college, and was thinking a lot about drought and leaving the church. The opening line was one that had stuck in my mind for awhile and I don't remember the original reason it...

10 Questions for Christine Barkley

February 21, 2023 - By Edward Clifford

"I am a writer," and I hate this part. I am a writer, so I am grateful for the requisite third-person: she is a writer and she hates writing about herself.

This is her name. This is where she lives, and how. Here are a few facts that are true but safe, carefully chosen for mass appeal. This is how she wants to be seen.
—from "Third-Person Bio," Volume 63, Issue 4 (Winter 2022)

Tell us about one of the first pieces you wrote.
My elementary school had an artist-in-residence program, and when I was in second grade my class worked with a local poet. One of our assignments was to write about a day of the week, so I wrote a poem about how Tuesdays are blue. At the time, I felt that I was being completely literal—...