Today we’d like to introduce you to Kelsey Bryan-Zwick.
Hi Kelsey, thanks for joining us today. We’d love for you to start by introducing yourself.
My origin story includes almost being born in a library and learning a second language ahead of my second birthday. So, becoming an author feels like gaining my superpower. I can make and break worlds in a single sentence. I can travel the universe in verse. All at once, everything is within my grasp. It is a habit I do my best to hone into a skill. I began editing for my high school’s literary journal at Poly in Long Beach (Go Jackrabbits!) as a teen, which is when my writing started finding publication as well. I applied to universities with thriving writing programs and ended up getting my B.A. at U.C Santa Cruz studying with poet and printmaker Gary Young. I was encouraged to bind my own books, combine art and poetry, and to really dig into my own voice. These are lessons I carry with me to this day.
As a disabled queer person pursuing a writing career is likely a different journey than my peers. Early on I knew I wanted to find the literature and art that met my needs and not the other way around. It is on this foundation that I have branched out into the writer I am today. There have been many steps, and everyone worth celebrating.
Rejections, typos, on-stage Freudian slips, all come with the territory, and all mean I am learning something new. I call it leveling up, each year I set new goals, new challenges for myself, and win or lose I know I am in the game, building toward the life I want for myself. I am super honored to be ending the year as a featured poet this November at the annual Southern California Poetry Festival where I will be reading from my debut collection of poetry, Here Go the Knives. I’ll be sharing the stage at the historic Beyond Baroque with my fellow Moon Tide Press authors, and everyone gathering for this three-day affair.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Due to my disability, most days are a struggle. But it’s feeding myself, and getting to doctor’s appointments, and applying for benefits that really drain my energy. Being an author is a joy, though it can be tricky these days. To write and read I rely on voice recorders and digital readers. To diminish the strain on my eyes I also change the background color on documents and zoom way in. I prefer printed materials when I can afford them. It can be a lot to figure out, but with these technologies, I can get my ideas to soar. Poetry is my main love; however, I am all about honing my skills so that I have the confidence to tackle prose. I really enjoy getting to express my views in the form of book reviews, how-to-essays, newsletters, and what I call “direct action writing” which is my way of engaging politically. Though I have faced many limitations in my life, the way art and literature impact me and my voice as a result, both feel infinite in my experience of the world.
Throughout my life there’s been way more support and encouragement for consuming literature and art while all kinds of discouragement for being a creator. The discouragements always center around money. But as a disabled person, I never expected to be able to “make money,” so I have given myself permission to make art, to be the person I want to be in the literary landscape.
I am living that dream—my first book is now available from Moon Tide Press. Here Go the Knives is a collection of poetry and illustrations that is part memoir and part magical realism. It is my attempt to pull back the hospital curtain to expose the medical levers that quantify my life. I have been under the knife now for nine spine-fusion surgeries, a journey I began as an eleven-year-old diagnosed with sever idiopathic scoliosis. In the tradition of Frida Kahlo, I created a self-portrait, centering myself in a narrative in which my perspective is often questioned, marginalized, or outright ignored. In these poems, I find myself and define for myself. As 1 in 5 people will experience disability in their lifetimes, I find there is great interest in this topic specifically. I also find pain is a universal theme we all grapple with. Especially now, as we collectively live and suffer through this pandemic. There is this image that comes to mind, from the peace movement, where people are holding hands all the way around the entire planet Earth—maybe it feels like a hug—it is this kind of healing energy I really wish for us now.
Alright, so let’s switch gears a bit and talk business. What should we know about your work?
I am lucky to have had some formal training in my field of choice and to have studied poetry with some truly kind souls. As an artist though I say I am community-taught. I’ve had advice and lessons from several women artists that recognized my passion and took the time to share their skills. As a young person, I babysat for an artist that gave me a view into what a studio was like— the materials and tools used to create. With the availability of YouTube-how-to videos I also soak up whatever I can when I can. I dream of my work becoming more and more multi-modal. That is, I like to layer sounds and images, words, and texture. As a disabled person, I understand that my written work may not be accessible to everyone. Creating a version of poem then that has visual art, a voiced recording, and other elements means folx with sensory differences can still experience the art.
Connection is the aim of my work. I want people to feel connected within their bodies. To feel connected to their needs and desires. To feel connected to this planet and to find balance in this reality. I want folx to feel connected to each other, to the past, present, and future. To the food we eat, the air we breath, and to the bodies of water that we too account for.
And don’t worry, I don’t plan on accomplishing this myself. But I am adding my voice to this cause, I am dedicating my own body to this task. I really am ready for a paradigm shift, aren’t you?
Do you have any advice for those looking to network or find a mentor?
I love this question and think it is so important for young artists. I find the community in and around Los Angeles to be super supportive of one another. I find folx here are really doing the work of upholding marginalized voices and making space for one another as people. But the design of the county is very hard to navigate with my mobility limitations which creates a kind of “gatekeeping,” that ends up excluding many disabled folx. I mean it’s hard to create a network when I can’t even get in the room. Even as my work finds publications sharing that work with a gathered audience is difficult for me. With the pandemic, everyone was suddenly struggling with the same issue. And then Zoom blossomed and I could go anywhere! I got to read poems all over the world! And suddenly, I could participate in a way I hadn’t even realized I was missing. I joined The Poetry Lab team and began learning from the incredible Founding Director Danielle Mitchell how to teach and curate creative writing classes virtually. I joined the Los Angeles Poet Society team and began writing my first reviews and interviews under the guidance of Director Jessica M. Wilson. I got involved with the Stonewall Democratic Club and learned to write in a journalistic style with the encouragement of Stonewall’s now President Alex Mohajer and Vice President of Communications Jonathan Welch. With this experience, I have now been asked onto the Cultural Daily as a staff writer by the Poetry Editors Alexis Rhone Fancher and Mish Murphy. For the first time, I really feel like I get to collaborate with my friends and peers in the community.
I wish of course this door had been opened differently.
When we center our health needs, we really can create a world in which everyone has the room to thrive. It is this powerful vision that drives me to be someone who does their best to move and shake the ideas that govern our world. I have high hopes.
Pricing:
- $15.00 + shipping to order Here Go the Knives from moontidepress.com
Contact Info:
- Website: https://kelseybryanzwick.wixsite.com/poetry
- Instagram: @theexquisitepoet
- Twitter: @exquisitepoet
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCC3jVyCmzH_uJPZU8bB2HGg
Image Credits
Donna Hilbert
Kelsey Bryan-Zwick
Robert Jay
Kelsey Bryan-Zwick
