POST-BOOK: MARIANNE CHAN

The Halo-Halo Review is pleased to interview authors in the aftermath of a book’s release. This issue’s featured writers include Marianne Chan.

What is your most recent book? 

All Heathens (Sarabande Books)

When was it released? 

March 24, 2020

What has been the response/what has surprised you most about the response? 

Honestly, I am constantly amazed by the responses I receive about All Heathens. I went into this with low expectations, not only because I didn’t want to be disappointed, but also because I just think of myself as a little poet in my small world, making art for myself and my community. It’s such a gift to be able to share this book with others, with people I don’t know personally, and if it moves people, I’m always surprised and thrilled. 

Tell me something not obvious or known about the book. 

I’ve been writing poems about my family for at least a decade, but a lot of those poems do not appear in All Heathens. I think of those poems as practice—a part of the process—for the final poems that appear in this collection. About 1/3 of the book was written in the spring of 2018. During that period, something unlocked in my writing process and I was able to finish the book quickly. 

What are you working on right now? 

Right now, I’m simply writing new poems and seeing where they take me. It’s fun to be at the beginning of a project again! 

*****

Marianne Chan grew up in Stuttgart, Germany, and Lansing, Michigan. She is the author of All Heathens from Sarabande Books (2020). Her poems have appeared in Michigan Quarterly Review, The Cincinnati Review, West Branch, The Rumpus, and elsewhere.  She earned her MFA in Creative Writing at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and is currently pursuing a Ph.D. in Creative Writing at the University of Cincinnati. 

Foreword to GLIMPSES by LENY MENDOZA STROBEL

EILEEN R. TABIOS presents the Foreword to

GLIMPSES: A Poetic Memoir by Leny Mendoza Strobel (Paloma Press, 2019)

Foreword

Poetry asks: Must words be trapped by definitions?

That is one of the questions raised by my “MURDER DEATH RESURRECTION” (MDR) project.* Through MDR, I created a collection of 1,167 poetic lines by reading (at the time) 27 prior poetry collections. The concepts of “murder,” “death,” and “resurrection: were intended to symbolize how I was replacing (murdering and putting to death) the older poems with new (resurrected) poems. The resulting lines, as anticipated, veered off from the older poems’ original contexts—the new lines had to reflect my changed identity years after writing the older poems, the new contexts imposed by changed times as well as memory lapses, and new considerations of the language.

One of MDR’s intents, therefore, must be to show the fluidity of words—how they can mean, evoke, and call out different things from different readers and writers who use them.  I’m honored that Leny M. Strobel was moved to use the MDR’s poetry lines as impetus for new writing. When I published the MDR’s lines, it was with the intent of having their readers create new poems and art as a result of reading them—just as I had created new poems from reading older poems.

First, Leny created new poems by randomly combining my poetry lines. Next, and as shown in this book, she created a memoir by writing each section as a “free-write” from a randomly-chosen line. Many of these surprise—their unexpected results are a gift to the writer. Don’t we writers want to face new dimensions to our works as a result of readers? A Gift. Read how one of my entries, the line

“I forgot weeping over the language shared by a toddler and a stuffed animal”

becomes one of Leny’s brief memoirs ending with a sentence one could never anticipate from mine:

“Today, a German writer, Andreas Weber, calls these: Erotic encounters with the biosphere and geosphere.”

I could continue with so many examples. Instead, I invite you, Dear Reader to simply read Leny’s own words—you need not read these dated free-writes chronologically; feel free to open the book at random—and marvel, as I did and do, over a life so richly-lived and such a contributor to the diversity of the human race at our best.

You might also be moved to write in response to Leny’s writings, for great writing often inspires readers to write as well. Such is the fluidity of words: they are not meant to be trapped in stasis. They can move beyond dictionary definitions and contexts defined by other authors to become directly applicable to your life. Such is Poetry’s suggestion, and, to my and our gratitude, Leny’s book is proof.

—Eileen R. Tabios

Saint Helena, California, the indigenous land of the Wappo

April 23, 2019

______________

* More information about “MURDER DEATH RESURRECTION” is available on Eileen R. Tabios’ website at https://eileenrtabios.com/projects/the-mdr-poetry-generator/  Information about the official MDR monograph—used by Leny to write her memoir—is available at MURDER DEATH RESURRECTION: A Poetry Monograph (Dos Madres Press, Loveland, OH, 2018) or https://eileenrtabios.com/poetry/murder-death-resurrection/

*****

Eileen R. Tabios has released about 60 collections of poetry, fiction, essays, and experimental biographies from publishers in ten countries and cyberspace. Most recently, she released a short story collection,PAGPAG: The Dictator’s Aftermath in the Diaspora and a poetry collection, The In(ter)vention of the Hay(na)ku: Selected Tercets 1996-2019. Her award-winning body of work includes invention of the hay(na)ku, a 21^st century diasporic poetic form as well as a first poetry book, Beyond Life Sentences, which received the Philippines’ National Book Award for Poetry. Translated into ten languages, she also has edited, co-edited or conceptualized 15 anthologies of poetry, fiction and essays. Her writing and editing works have received recognition through awards, grants and residencies. More information is available at http://eileenrtabios.com

Foreword to EVOCARE by AYO GUTIERREZ, EILEEN R. TABIOS AND BRIAN CAIN AENE

ARIENNE L. CALINGO Engages

BOOK LINK

EVOCARE: Collected Tankas by Ayo Gutierrez, Eileen R. Tabios, and Brian Cain Aene

(GMGA, Philippines, 2019)

Before beginning to read this collection of tankas, one would do well to have a brief sense of the history of tankas.  Tanka, which translates to “short song,” is the lyrical, five-line poem that has historically served as the basic form of Japanese poetry.  Despite its shifts in style over the centuries, tanka has remained a poem that captures the nuances of human experience by exploring the simultaneous simplicity and complexity found in nature, relationships, and situations.

Evocare offers tankas of love and lust, solitude and togetherness, the familiar and the unfamiliar, hope and heartbreak, strength and weakness, among other themes.  The authors leave room for readers to draw their own connections to the poems.  Upon reading Evocare, I admired its sense of fluidity within structure, and depth in meaning within such simple, compressed form.  Each tanka offers spiritual nourishment through practical teachings that are embedded in the lines.

Some of what you will find in these pages are teachings that help us to cultivate a conscious awareness and acceptance of contrast:

Nature is balance
Between birth and death of all
Demand and supply
Too much birth brings extinction
Too much death makes life grow strong. (Gutierrez)

Ayo Gutierrez asserts that a balance is possible between contrasting realities.  By using juxtaposition, she explores these notions of contrast and balance in other tankas, as well.  In one poem, she tells of the powerful policeman who was once skinny and, presumably, powerless.  In another, she highlights the difference between elevating above ground level and being on ground.  Gutierrez teaches us to be aware of balance, changes that time can bring, dichotomies, and contrasting forces as we navigate through the complexities of life and living.

There is, as well, much in these pages that helps us to bridge the past and the present:

“If only bullets

Could create peace, not make wars”

A schoolchild once hoped

This fantasy pays homage

To the students as they march. (Tabios)

Here, Eileen R. Tabios uses tanka to allude to a 2018 United States gun violence protest.  Likewise, she uses tanka to refer to the Marvel universe.  Tabios illustrates that modernity and tradition can interweave and hold hands.  Her innovative approach to tanka is present in both content and style.  In particular, Tabios introduces readers to her experimental tankas, including the “ducktail tanka” and the hay(na)ku.  Her inventive tankas corroborate the fluidity of poetry while maintaining structure.  These dualities between fluidity and structure, and past and present show that a deep connection between contrasting forces can generate new meaning, development, and understandings.

In addition, the book reveals that we can find a wealth of lessons from experiences that have challenged our values or hurt us:

Portrait 72:

When things break apart

Think back how He broke bread in

Pieces to feed men;

Sometimes, it takes broken heart

To feed souls with great lessons. (Aene)

Brian Cain Aene reminds us that pain can be transformed into power.  Similar to Gutierrez and Tabios, Aene forges a connection between contrasting forces, namely the negative and the positive.  Moreover, Aene’s tankas provide a sensory experience for readers, engaging the senses with insightful portraits about complex subjects that cannot be easily defined, such as home, love, and lust.

An underlying theme in this collection of tankas is the power of connection.  The following tankas, overall, manifest a connectedness between things that are unseen, but authentic—our feelings and evocations—with the observable world in which we live.

The tankas in Evocare connected me back to my own beginnings as a poet.  I was reminded of the loneliness and despair I felt as a teenager who was bullied and my reliance on poetry as a source of comfort.  I used poetry as a means to understand my feelings and to transform all negative energy into strong, connective energy, weaving together words, symbols, feelings, and rhythms that empowered me.

Poetry projects power and can touch the soul in myriad ways.  I hope that the authors’ humble efforts in this book present you with profound mantras for living, inject you with a renewed passion for life and living, and instill within you a sense of connection to something that evokes feelings of comfort and empowerment.

*****

Arienne L. Calingo obtained her master’s degree in International Education Policy from Harvard University, where she was the only Filipino in her graduating cohort. Prior to studying at Harvard, Arienne worked in the Philippines, Thailand, and United States, as well as competed in national pageants. She is the 1^st Runner Up to Catriona Gray at Miss World Philippines 2016 and semi-finalist of Binibining Pilipinas 2017.  As an educator, Arienne has had the opportunity to teach and deliver talks about cultural diplomacy, diversity and inclusion, and international higher education around the world, including in Malaysia, South Korea, China, Thailand, South Africa, Slovenia, the United Kingdom, and United States. During her free time, Arienne enjoys writing poetry and tries to write at least one haiku per day.  Her poems Until They Learn, The Drive, and Palms of Promise were featured at the ASEAN@50 Art Exhibit by the Harvard University Asia Center (October 2017). Her all-time favorite poet is E. E. Cummings, and her all-time favorite poem is “The Square Root of Three” by David Feinberg.