When people ask me “What do you write?” I always hesitate before I answer. The answer is that I write everything. Horror, fantasy, science fiction. Poetry, essays, short stories. I was writing flash fiction before I knew what flash fiction was. Were we even calling it that in the 90s?

So yes, I write, and yes, I write a lot of different things, of different lengths and types. But poetry was what I started with, and poetry is something I always come back to. There’s just such a personal triumph in finding the exact words to express the exact thing you were thinking about or dreaming about or observing. Or in finding just the right word that means three different things. Or in making that weird form or rhyme scheme actually WORK. It’s a challenge to and from yourself. And every time, it is fresh, imminent, harrowing, immersive.