"... the sentences and executing scenes... they take their time. I rewrite them over and over, shifting words around, rearranging structure, listening for rhythm, waiting for the right tone to emerge."

"More than the topics, I concern the form of the writing: how the language can say something about itself."

"I stay open to moments. A color, a sentence, a smell: any of these might begin a piece of writing."

"I love experimenting with and blending different forms of art and genres. So you'll find theatrical elements in my audiovisual works and multimedia elements in my stage works."

"I write to depict the reality in my country. My philosophy as a writer is that I write to liberate and enlighten my people."

"As macabre as it may sound, I spent countless days listening to them discuss true crime, the criminal justice system—and the riot in particular: who they knew, what had happened, theories about why."

Today we have poet Donika Kelly in the studio! We discuss drawing curtains and dressing chickens, growing up in Compton, the English teachers of Arkansas, and more.

"The novel covers the brief and tragic episode of their relationship, their hardscrabble existence and their attempt to start a family."

"I found inspiration for this book through my own process of sitting in spaces of ambivalence over the question of whether or not to mother."

"I found myself reflecting on the dilemma that artists who pen memoirs must face when writing explicitly about actual people whom they had sexual relations with."

"I love how the university's campus is integrated into downtown. When I noticed this during my orientation, it made everything so much more lively."