Dear Reader,
I'm the author of Young Enough to Play (University of the Philippines Press 2022) and The Sea That Beckoned (Platypus Press 2019). I was born in the Philippines and raised in the US. I teach Creative Writing at the Department of English and Literature at Silliman University.
The Sea That Beckoned
My first poetry chapbook, the now-out-of-print collection of 30+ poems, The Sea That Beckoned, explored what home and belonging meant to those who couldn't call a certain place home, who have moved so many times to have a home, and who never belonged anywhere. It was published in April of 2019, by former press, Platypus in England, United Kingdom.
Young Enough To Play
My first full-length collection of 62 poems, Young Enough to Play asks readers if they are still young enough to play though old enough to know the game. Riddled with references to poetic influences, this book explores the quiet catastrophes of love, in the meeting places of the mind, wherever it may find its own blossoming.
Research Topics and Interests
“Call-and-Response: A Theory of Form as Boundary in Formal Poetry.” 11th Literary Studies Conference. Universitas Sanata Dharma, Yogyakarta, Indonesia, October 3-4, 2023.
“Young Enough to Play: Constructing the Woman Poet Using the Lyric Persona in Love Poetry.” 6th International Conference on Philippine and Asian Studies. Silliman University, Dumaguete City, Philippines, June 1-3, 2023.
“Walking Through Concupiscence: Philippine Romanticism in Angela Manalang Gloria’s Poems.” Romantic Futurities. The British Association for Romantic Studies (BARS) Early Career and Post-Graduate Conference, Virtual, UK, June 11-13, 2020.
"No, I do not weep at the world—I am too busy sharpening my oyster knife."
Zora Neale Hurston