Art by Rana Roosevelt
Interview Questions by Claire Tang and Grace Marie Liu
Interview Answers by Anjanette Lin, Jane Lee, and Sienna Morris
Polyphony Lit's Volume 20 Fall Issue is now live, and for this issue, we're offering an exclusive behind-the-scenes look! Join our editors for conversations with Anjanette Lin (the author of "The Fractured Us"), Jane Lee (the author of "noodles & money"), and Sienna Morris (the author of "day in an hourglass").
Interview with Anjanette Lin
Author of "The Fractured Us"
Claire: “The Fractured Us” is such a beautiful journey through multiculturalism and living between two worlds. Your evocative prose really helps bring your story to life. How did you begin dabbling in creative nonfiction? And how has writing served as catharsis in navigating your identity?
Anjanette: I’ve been journaling and writing in my diary since I learned how to spell my name, and reflecting on my life through words has always been part of my daily routine. I was shy when I was younger, so writing became my form of communication. Words flowed between me and the page where they didn’t between me and other people. Writing gave me confidence because I could always edit and revise. Nothing is final, whereas sometimes it can be hard to take back what you say out loud. I’m much more extroverted now, but writing continues to bring me comfort. I’ve met phenomenal English teachers throughout middle and high school, and their evocative prompts compel me to think about my life from different perspectives. “The Fractured Us” is actually a revised and shortened version of my Junior year English final—to write a memoir centered around any theme we wanted (I chose my cultural identity).
Claire: I noticed that you used a lot of religious references in the first vignette: Red Sea for Moses for Christianity, and Siddhartha and Nirvana for Buddhism. Is religion something you often find yourself incorporating into your work? Are there any themes, whether present in this piece or not, that you feel yourself gravitating towards when writing?
Anjanette: Religion is something I also grapple with a lot because my family is Buddhist but the schools that I’ve attended have all been Christian schools. I go to Buddhist Sangha but I also pray during my school’s services. If you’ve read Life of Pi, I feel like Pi sometimes in that religions can coexist in me, and I can appreciate and practice multiple religions at the same time. I find that many of my stories or essays center around a social critique. James Baldwin’s advice to “write to change the world,” “write to find out,” and “write towards truth” resonates with me.
Claire: “The Fractured Us” is told in three fragments, with the “recipe” being sandwiched between two personal vignettes about your past and present life. Why did you choose to structure your piece in this way? And what was the process of choosing a recipe to characterize your two worlds? And I have to ask: why tiramisu?
Anjanette: I chose to sandwich the recipe between two personal vignettes because I felt like the recipe had to be situated in some sort of context (thus the first vignette), and I love full circle endings so I had to tie the first and second fragments together with a third. Honestly, there’s no sophisticated reason as to why I chose tiramisu. My mom always made tiramisu for family, friends, and school gatherings, and I sat down at my desk one day and craved tiramisu, so I wrote about it. I began thinking of each ingredient and layer in tiramisu (I’m a huge foodie) and thought “woah, I could really frame my identity around this and add it to my memoir.”
Claire: If you could offer one piece of advice for a young, aspiring writer, what would it be?
Anjanette: My advice is to write with intention. That intention could be as simple as writing to reflect and to appreciate, but it can also be writing to “change the world” and to find “truth” (going back to the James Baldwin quote). Words are valuable, so take time to explore yourself and understand the world around you before sharing what you’ve found. Be careful with what words you use and give those words purpose.
Anjanette Lin is most proud of her stash of secret diaries and battered sketchbooks dating to her Pre-K days. Expressing her thoughts artistically and on paper has always been a core part of her. As she completes her college applications and an assortment of papers for school, Anjanette holds on to this fondness for lines and words and knows that writing will never feel like a chore to her.
Interview with Jane Lee
Author of "noodles & money"
Claire: Unlike her older sister who chose noodles & money as a one-year-old, the narrator does not attach herself to any symbolic toy. The narrator is then seemingly overshadowed by her sister’s resoluteness in that first decision, her success and luck in life. What do you think the narrator “chooses,” both as a one-year-old and as her present self, by not “choosing” at all?
Jane: In terms of her one-year-old self, the narrator chooses to follow an unclear path—-she doesn’t particularly have a direction that she feels drawn to from the very beginning, which allows her younger self to explore her own interests. Although near the end of the poem, she struggles with the subjects her sister excels at, her passion and future is ambiguous. The narrator may eventually choose an object but within the context of the poem, she chooses not to remain confined within the few objects she has the opportunity to select, reflecting her childhood choices.
I originally chose the narrator to be depicted this way to echo my own experiences in struggling to find a clear direction that I could take as a student. In fact, the idea came to me after reflecting on my own first birthday where I, like the speaker, touched multiple objects.
Claire: “noodles & money” takes on a form that really stood out to me. The piece almost embodies the structure of a short story, while also carrying the fluidity of a poem, with the slashes resembling line breaks. I noticed that towards the end of your piece, you also begin to use the symbol “&” both to break up and begin the stanzas. What’s your process in deciding the structure and form of your poems?
Jane: “noodles & money” originally took the form of a traditional poem with stanzas and clear line breaks. I often try to start with a familiar style like this before deciding to alter the structure to affect the narrative in one way or another—the entire draft was written before I changed it into a more of a prose poem to highlight how the poem is made up of vignette-like pieces of the narrator’s life. In terms of the ampersand, the narrator speaks in a train of thought near the end of poem, thinking about her potential future; she circles around the familiar topic until the end, where she finally comes to a consensus on how she feels about her objectless identity.
Claire: Throughout your piece, I noticed the recurring mention of ox bone broth soup as it is depicted alongside the narrator’s sister or uncles. Is there a particular reason you chose to incorporate this soup into your poem? What significance, if any, does it hold to the themes of this piece?
Jane: The references to ox bone broth soup reflects the narrator’s helplessness. When she is unable to decide on her object during her birthday, the soup spills over to juxtapose how it is meant to be celebratory. This continues through her encounter with the Korean moms in the noodles shop, where the narrator is overlooked and all attention draws towards her sister; the ox bone broth she smells is a reference to her first birthday and the helplessness that came along with it. It also contrasts the hot pot she associates with her older sister in terms of flavor and audience, as hot pot is often eaten in a group setting, contrasting the narrator’s loneliness with her sister’s popularity. However, the two soups also connect the two together with their comfort foods and their identities, both finding peace within their separate choices.
Claire: “i have made the right choice, / even if no one else does” provides a powerful resolution to this piece about choices. Is there a specific group of people that the “no one else” is referring to? What has the narrator learned about choices throughout the poem? And did you ever imagine this poem concluding in any other way?
Jane: The “no one else” generally refers to those who feel confined with the choices that they (or others) have made for themselves. Growing up in a competitive educational community, I’ve always noticed the pressure to be “successful:” being accepted into an Ivy League and becoming wealthy. Throughout the poem, the narrator continues to accept more and more parts of her identity, regardless of those who evidently value her sister’s choices more.
I never imagined this poem to end any differently—my first draft ended with “and i will tell myself that i have made the right choice / even if no one else does,” before ultimately being edited. In spite of major revisions being made throughout the poem, I’ve maintained a similar ending to ensure that the narrator earns a hopeful ending for the future and to continue her journey of finding her self worth.
Jane Lee is a Korean-American residing in the Bay Area, California. She has been recognized by the Alliance for Young Artists & Writers, as well as publications nationally, and is an alum of the Sewanee Young Writers’ Conference. When she is not writing poetry, she edits for her school’s newspaper, leads her art studio’s youth group, and performs as part of the color guard at her school.
Interview with Sienna Morris
Author of "day in an hourglass"
Grace: First and foremost, I admire “day in an hourglass” for its dexterity in motion—how it leaps from one gorgeous image to another, conjuring associations that deconstruct and reconstruct the reader’s expectations. What is your relationship to movement? Feel free to interpret this question as broadly or specifically as you’d like.
Sienna: When I think of movement, I think of time– the way it flows both steadily and haphazardly. One moment may be warm and slow and soft, and the next, rushing past you like the wind. There are instances where you can feel connected to the onslaught of colliding pasts and presents and futures, and others where you are disjointed from the tether to reality. In the same way, movement will always be a part of us in different ways, shapes, or forms, whether we ourselves are moving or are still. In my writing, I try to emulate that feeling time imprints on us during a moment through form or structure or imagery. So it means a lot to hear your words!
Grace: I’m interested in hearing about your process as a creative. How do you generate and revise? Any ideal writing conditions?
Sienna: I have a very random process, to say the least! Thoughts and ideas come to me whenever– sometimes at a reasonable hour and mostly in the middle of night. When it comes to poetry, I’m not someone who can force myself to write. It’s more like I get forced to write when an idea pops into my head. It’s not the most ideal, but it allows me to write more in the moment, which I find quite effective when trying to capture those little bits and pieces. My revision process is a bit of a slow one, too. I’ll go in and soften the rough edges from time to time, until it feels right. I also love and will take any advice or critique I can from others– they always notice things I don’t! As for ideal conditions, give me a mocha or some peppermint tea, rain, and a dog, (preferably a fluffy one!), and I’ll conjure any story or poem for you!
Grace: One of my favorite lines appears toward the end of this piece: “we write poetry in our takeout bowls, / smearing moon-dust to chicken teriyaki.” How do you approach the transcendent and the mundane in your own life (and in your poetry)?
Sienna: I’m a bit of a romantic, so I try to find beauty in every nook and cranny in life. I over-poeticize, daydream, and take great joy in palming a second, a moment of life into my collection of photographs (both metaphorically and literally). Each and every day is another one to exist and live, and as a friend of mine put it, feel God’s breath in our lungs and His spirit in our bones. I think that in itself is something to be grateful for and proud of. Yes, life gets crazy or ordinary or tough, but the way we deal with what happens is what’s going to last eventually. So, I try my best to count the daisies in my backyard, the millenia the sun has always shined for, rather than the raindrops falling that one day, or month, or even years. If we really look for them, there are stars scattered across the skies waiting to be plucked up and written into a page, (or even a takeout bowl).
Grace: I’m a big believer in the irreducibility of poetry—i.e., a poem can’t be summarized. Still, if you could construct a mood board for this piece (representative songs, colors, quotes, etc.), what would it look like?
Sienna: (Excuse my informality here for one second), but I love this question! I tend to associate whatever I’m writing with a color, and while I was writing this piece, the one that kept chiming into my head was blue. But at the same time, looking back, I feel like it gives off a bit of warm color vibes. So there could be some warm blues and some very subtle, soft pinkish-toned colors. Think– dusky, old city shots with blue skies and the barest hint of a sunset, hands reaching in front of a vintage filtered sky, and those rose-tinted sunglasses. (I’m getting way too excited about this question). I think some songs that could fit are “Yellow,” or “Viva la Vida,” by Coldplay, “Let Her Go” by Passenger, “cardigan” by Taylor Swift, and “People Watching” by Conan Gray. And lastly, some quotes could be, “Isn’t it funny how day by day nothing changes, but when you look back, everything is different,” (which isn’t directly attributed to anyone), “What if I fall? / Oh, but my darling, / what if you fly?” by Eric Hanson, “Some memories never / leave your bones. like / salt in the sea: they become / part of you. / –and you carry them” by April Green, and “Chase your stars fool, life is short” by Atticus.
Sienna Morris is a poet and prose-writer hailing from Texas. She lives amongst dreams and the unbearable southern heat, collecting memories whenever she can. Her work has been recognized by Tadpole Press, LEVITATE, and Scholastic Art & Writing Awards, among others.
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