Michael Chang : coda

I encourage all young writers, particularly those from marginalized or “non-traditional” backgrounds, to get your work out there.  You don’t need a MFA to write.  Work hard, do your homework (read widely and obsessively, appreciate your place in the constellation of amazing writers throughout history), challenge yourself.  The world needs to hear from you.  Evie Shockley, a fellow lawyer-poet, once said to me: “No one else can create the art that you will make.”  Amen!

Michael Chang : part five

Why is poetry important? 

All poetry is political.  Let’s get that out of the way first.  For me, poetry is an avenue for political protest and bearing witness.  With my unique lens as a lawyer and political operative, I believe in storytelling as a means of affecting change.  Maya Angelou said that there “is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside of you.”  At a time when forces choose to pick at the historical scabs of inequity and injustice, we must bear witness!  We must say loudly: we’re here!  And use the language of seeing and telling as a means of strengthening our communities and advocating for our fellow people.

In my own work, I consider aspects of diaspora dislocation, estranging inheritance, the decentering of self, distance, rupture, and restlessness.  Ultimately, poetry is important because it challenges convention and introduces unruliness, boundlessness, borderlessness as a means of reclaiming power and enacting change.

Michael Chang : part four

What poets changed the way you thought about writing?

Oh, God.  It’s like an acceptance speech, I don’t want to offend anybody by leaving them out.  Here is a very short list: Rae Armantrout, Alexander Chee, Alice Notley, Bernadette Mayer, Cathy Park Hong, David Trinidad, Denise Duhamel, Dennis Cooper, Dottie Lasky, Eileen Myles, Ellen Bass, Frank Bidart, Frank O’Hara, Justin Chin, Kim Addonizio, Natalie Diaz, Rick Barot, Wayne Koestenbaum, and countless others. And Jason Koo, absolute master of the long poem!

Every single one of these poets has challenged convention in their own way.  I think that is the overarching takeaway from reading their work.

Michael Chang : part three

Has your consideration of poetry changed since you began?

Yeah, of course, it has to be a constant evolution.  I am very concerned, whether in my writing or reading, if I’m moving the ball forward.  One of my other passions is fashion, and fashion collections always hit me differently depending on certain ever-shifting factors like mood, time & place, what my body is yearning for, etc.  Same thing for poetry. 

There are definitely poets that I return to time and again, but I am also always on a path of discovery.  Because I teach, I find myself being a scout for new poets and underrated writers.  It is a constant curation: literally in the sense of reading lists for my classes but also mentally and spiritually for my own poetic practice. 

Right now I am reading New Poets of Native Nations (edited by Heid E. Erdrich), which is an anthology of amazing NDN poets.  Also Foreign Bodies by the inestimable Kimiko Hahn and Banana Palace by the legendary Dana Levin (who has the best author portraits).

Michael Chang : part two

How do you know when a poem is finished?

A poet’s poet would say that a poem is done when it has nothing left to say!

When I write, I go through the research process, let things marinate, and then start writing.  And because I’m not rushing to put things on the page, the poems usually come out 90% done.  I then make cosmetic changes and small tweaks.  I guess a poem is finished when I get sick of looking at it.  I’ll let it sit, or send it out, and then come back after some time has passed and the distance lets me see it with fresh eyes.

Michael Chang : part one

A Lambda Literary fellow, Michael Chang (they/them) was awarded the Kundiman Scholarship at the Miami Writers Institute in addition to fellowships from Lighthouse Writers Workshop, Brooklyn Poets, & the Martha’s Vineyard Institute of Creative Writing. Their writing has been published or is forthcoming in the Cincinnati Review, Summerset Review, Vassar Review, Minnesota Review, Santa Clara Review, Ninth Letter, Hobart, Harpur Palate, Poet Lore, The Nervous Breakdown, & many others. Their collection <golden fleece> was a finalist for the Iowa Review Award in Poetry; another collection <失恋王> was a finalist in the BOMB Magazine Poetry Contest.

What are you working on?

I have a lot going on!  I am doing a fiction workshop with Bryan Washington as part of the Miami Writers Institute.  I am this year’s Kundiman Scholar, so I am very grateful to Kundiman and the Miami Book Fair for inviting me to participate.

I am also taking a terrific course with Cooper Lee Bombardier called “Queer Bodies/Queer Forms.”  This was again made possible thanks to a full-tuition scholarship.  I am eternally grateful.

I am refining and will be teaching a course called Politics, Desire, and the Politics of Desire.  It’s going to be an exciting ride, so stay tuned for that.  I cover coming-of-age, gender & sexuality, family, food, the political, sex & shame, myth-making . . . it will be great fun to share my passions with folks.

I am moreover working on a full-length poetry manuscript that serves both as a love letter to America and an attempt to hold America to account.  It really challenges impressions of what a queer, gender non-conforming, Azn writer should and can write about.  It is a reckoning with America, boldly standing for the proposition that if you love something, it is your obligation and imperative to critique it.

Looking ahead, I will continue to riff on core themes of Americana, rebuilding our country in a post-Trump era, and—most importantly—unabashed self-love.  In calling forth a new America, we won’t apologize.