Kendall Porter interviewed me for Willamette Week’s “Best of Portland” features! I told her all about Bloomers Poetry Club. The gatekeeping has officially come to an end. Is this what fame feels like? It’s already going to my head. You can read the article here.
If any other newspapers want to talk, I’m quite at my leisure!
Yours journalistically,
Judy
Interviewed by Judy Thorn
July 6, 2026
Ash and I sat down in the back room of my workplace for a chat, surrounded by racks of organic cotton shirts imported from Portugal and Spain. I had planned on an email correspondence, but we agreed this was more convenient. I treated the writer to a sparkling water from the mini fridge. She came back a week later, on her way to a wedding, looking for a misplaced hat.
A good interview is an opportunity for play. Do you want to play with me?
How? I mean yes.
We loved having you read at Bloomers. Tell me about receiving attention from strangers. How does it feel? Where do you sense it in your body?
I’d rather read confessional poems to a crowd of strangers than fill up a gas tank. Filling up my gas tank fills me with dread; humiliation excites me.
I thought they filled up your gas tank for you in Oregon.
I don’t think they do that anymore. I just got a car for the first time in six years.
Wow. Bit of a rude awakening.
Yeah.
You’re extraordinarily collaborative. How do you know when you’ve met someone you can create with?
The short answer is, I know a hierophant of literature when I see one.
But since you’re a fan of Mikko [Harvey], I met him when we were both fellows at Vermont Studio Center. I didn’t notice his existence until halfway through the residency when we were toasting our toast concomitantly, and he said he was a poet, and I said something like, “Well, do you like this or that poet…” Talking about the books I love with someone who loves the same books is like crack to me. I get such an adrenaline rush. By the end of the fellowship, Trump had been elected (for the first time) and we had written Skymall.
Do you have any advice for me personally?
Who was the mystic who said, “All is well, all will be well…”
Julian of Norwich?
Oh my god, I love you. Tell me more. I’m really into saints and mystics right now.
I’m interviewing you, though.
Fine.
How did you end up in Portland? Why not New York? San Francisco? Stockholm?
Why Stockholm?
I just like the sound of it. Stockholm.
OK. Well, maybe I’ll end up in Stockholm. If I do become the first female Asian-American president of the North American Sauna Society, maybe they’ll put me up in Finland or something, and I’ll have one of those saunas that’s in the middle of a lake, and then you dive into the lake and you do cold water swimming, and then I can get into all the restaurants without waiting because I can flash my badge that says “first ever female Asian-American president of the North American Sauna Society.”
I ended up in Portland because I wanted to be close to family. I had a feeling my dad was going to die imminently, and I had three young nieces I wanted to get to know. I love California, but too many people have eating disorders there. It’s bad for my body image. I like how the epitome of good-looking in Portland is kind of disgusting. It’s like, really ugly shoes and pimple patches and greasy hair that’s starting to get crusty… That’s Portland hot. It’s been healing for me after living in the Bay Area and New York City.
When I lived in New York City, I was briefly the most stylish person on the block. But I don’t have the energy to sift through piles of… This is boring.
What block exactly?
Orchard Street. Having a stylish outfit was like your business card. People would stop you, and then you’d end up collaborating and whatnot.
There you go again collaborating with people.
I love collaborating. Right now I’m collaborating with Nia Musiba again on Worm Slut. Do you know about Worm Slut? There are nineteen issues. But I’m making a bumper sticker. I’m making a couple. I’m gonna make “Worm Slut: I Love My Job” and “New Asian Driver.”
Tell us a story in seven words.
I don’t wanna do this question. I can’t.
Say bye bye!
Bye bye.
Ash also asked to put the phrase “nun-adjacent” somewhere in the interview.
You can find more relics of Ash Yang-Thompson on her site and Substack. See her read tonight at 7pm with Kiik A.K. at Word Virus Books. Still Worm is available to order from Bateau Press.
Interviewed by Judy Thorn
June 11, 2026
I sat down with Megan Alves over fizzy white wine and matcha snickerdoodles that tasted like fish food for an exclusive glimpse at her process. This interview was cut down from a 24-minute conversation on her couch. Her breathtakingly small chihuahua licked me on the mouth repeatedly, but I didn’t mind.
The amount of writing that passes through your body every day is astonishing. Do you ever wake up feeling swollen with language? How do you decompress?
I really like “swollen with language.” That’s awesome. I think it’s funny you say that, because sometimes I do. I have these bouts sometimes. I’ll wake up, and I’ll make coffee, and I’ll try not to look at my phone. Not just trying to sound good for the interview, but I really try not to look. Sometimes I’ll do the dishes or something, kill some time and just let my brain wake up before phone. But phone calls to me so severely, and I just get back in bed with phone and drink coffee, and I will send out a flurry of Tweets before noon that’s just every passing thought that I have.
It’s really like writing time. I’m very grateful that you’ve encouraged me to take my role as a writer as something I’m even doing. I don’t know why it’s hard for me to think of it that way. I do feel like I wake up swollen with thoughts to share and to post. I’m actually doing morning words, or whatever. Morning pages. I’m microblogging, which is a term I used with you the other night, which was something I discovered when I read an article about the beginnings of Twitter, which I found really … honestly moving to my personal practice of morning posts. My favorite people who use X-formerly-Twitter use it as microblogging. I want to hear little things that happen throughout your life and day in a way that’s beautiful. I feel like that’s definitely my style of posting, and some of my other favorite friends from that website.
But I was laughing because you’ve kind of taught me to take that a little more seriously as I make my posts. Sometimes it exits my mind, and I’ve Tweeted something like, “I like getting boba from a place called Bobadochi.” And that was the whole Tweet, just “I like getting boba from a place called Bobadochi.” And I thought, I’m a writer. I’m a fucking writer.
I find that your storytelling strikes a chord between authenticity and irony that is extremely satisfying. Are there any artists who have influenced your tone?
This one’s hard for me. I feel like I really struggle with recalling information. Maybe it’s just because I’m a Leo Sun, Libra Rising, Sagittarius Moon, but my personality flows out of me in a way I can’t control. If anything, I’m posting in such a fugue state that the inspiration forms in my head, and then I type it out, and then I hit send. There have to be people who have influenced me, but I don’t know.
Is there any exhibitionism to it?
You’d really think there was. I kind of have this problem where I don’t think about the consequence of anything as I’m doing it. If anything, as I’ve gotten older I’ve learned to hold my tongue, or hold my thumbs, if you will, before sending off those posts. Especially as I’m entering a romantic situation with someone, or there are personal things happening in my life; in the past, I’ve shared extremely personal things online that people love, of course, but then it hurts someone close to me, or it’s just off-putting to have someone live-Tweeting their life. I’ve definitely had guys be off-put by it. It’s not intentional exhibitionism. I’m just putting it all out there.
The person that’s coming to mind—and I don’t even think she influences me specifically, but I think she might have a similar authenticity-to-irony factor—is Jenny Slate. I really liked her comedy special where she incorporates her parents, and it gives you a roundabout picture of how she interacts with her family and how they’ve shaped her. Her tone is really sharp and quick-witted but also silly in a way that I enjoy. When I’m writing out a post, it should be poignant and also have this curve of humor or an unexpected adjective. What I aim for in a post is a satisfying string of words that mean something. A post is a satisfying string of words that mean something.
I mostly like pairings of words that mean something, but nothing really relevant. I recently drafted the two words “dirty sequins.” I like when they’re really dirty and the story that tells of a girl getting dirty in her dress. Dirty sequins. Refreshing flower. Squishy cookies.
People often come to you with questions about interior design. What advice do you have for someone who can’t seem to find harmony in their living space?
That’s a good one. Let’s imagine you have a space and you want to change everything about it, I guess. I would say identify your favorite thing in the room and design around that. If you really like this lamp, and you want it to stay, you can define what this lamp is. We’re looking at my ceramic 1960s seashell lamp. What is that shape? Not just a seashell. It’s a spiraled shell. This one is kind of hard to define. My place is very eclectic.
My friend is moving into a new apartment, and they scored this really awesome Scandinavian teak dining table for their little kitchen nook. We went shopping, and they got this textile that’s kind of woven, and older, and it’s beige and it’s got these lime green lines throughout it. They hung it above the dining table, and they sent me a photo after our day of shopping. I said great, this looks awesome. You have this Scandinavian folk thing happening in the kitchen. My point is, identifying an object and giving it some key words to help you identify other objects to pair with it is a really helpful base. So I told my friend, you’ve got this Scandinavian folk thing going on. Maybe add some modern elements. Every time you find an item you’re thinking about putting in your kitchen, ask yourself, is it Scandinavian, or is it folky, or is it both, or is it a modern touch? It gives you these base words to start building out a vision. It’s been a helpful brain map for me in developing a space, to give it these key words and definitions. I’ve helped friends with spaces before and they get lost in the sauce. Well, return to your ingredients.
Girl to girl, what is the tea?
The tea is I’m sorry and I think I fucked everything up.
Some say Portland will never return to its hipster heyday. What’s so special about this city?
This is gonna be very Californian, but Oregon feels so seasonal to me. I’ve really evolved to live seasonally. We all get nice and cozy in the winter, and I feel like summer is this manic burst of plans and fun and this summer spirit everyone breaks into. Portland is very fourth wave. We’ve really cut out corporations from our world, outside the big design industries we have here. I feel like people are really down to live locally. Even in the industry I work in, which is vintage curation and vintage resale. That kind of market is celebrated here. Secondhand and shopping local is so built into Portland’s world. I find that really special and really important in moving away from capitalism, or at least trying to live within a local ecosphere. I think that’s really alive here and something that’s making me really double down on Portland.
There are a lot of cool things happening. Portland takes art seriously. From the first time I ever visited, I was like, Portland kind of never left 2010. I remember staying in the hostel, and I heard that Matt & Kim song “Daylight” over and over. This was in 2019 or something, a time when it was like, this really should not be playing right now, not even in a nostalgic way. Portland never left its twee hipster nature. We are a step away from mustache tattoo on the finger. I would lowkey get that tomorrow. We’re down to be quirky, and I think that’s important and fun. I’m turning 30 this summer, and I find this liveliness with fashion to be so encouraging of youth. It makes me remember that I can be cool and fashionable forever.
What does it feel like now that your Saturn has returned?
It feels like I’m having anxiety in a whole new way, and I’m having to regulate in a whole new way. I take my life a lot more seriously than I ever have, and therefore becoming unregulated feels a lot more serious, whereas I used to be able to messy bun, gangster rap, and handle it. I’m really having to tie that bun a little tighter, I’m gonna have to play that gangster rap a little louder, and I’m really gonna have to buckle down and handle it. I’m having reflections. I was actually journaling the other day about what my life felt like going into 30, and I was having these thoughts. When I read my old journals, I’m like, yeah you’re 22, no shit you felt like that. Obviously. I was writing some stuff that I was like, nnyeah. You’re 29 turning 30, like nnyeah. Like, we get it. I really wish you could get the tone of the nnyeah. I was writing that, and I was like, someday I’m gonna be 39 turning 40. Those things are settling in a little deeper. Yeah, I’ve really got three decades under my belt, and counting. I’m excited for my long life.
Interviewed by Judy Thorn
May 1, 2026
I sat down with my friend Autumn Schade over proverbial yogurt parfaits for the first May Wall Press editorial feature. Autumn works close to where I live and I see her often.
Do you remember being born? How did it make you feel?
I don’t actually remember being born. It is funny to me that you would think I’d be the type of person who could. My mom always says I was born saying, “hi guys, what’s up!” I think I was relieved to begin my life.
My first memories feel like sheets fresh out of the dryer. Holding my mom’s hand in the parking lot. Pointing at a flock of birds and calling it a bird parade. Learning how to read in the morning.
Imagining myself ever being so tiny, I sometimes wish I would’ve sipped dew drops from leaves or something. But of course, you don’t know you’re tiny when you’re new to the world.
Birth feels a little bittersweet to me. There is something melancholic about it. On one hand, it is important to self-actualize and feel like I’m meant to be here; on the other, I know I’m also just the result of circumstance. I exist because of a time when my mom felt manipulated, afraid, and without much control over her life. She says she would go through it all again just to have me and my two brothers, even without being ready to be a mom or having much of a choice.
Birth isn’t something we’re meant to remember so much as something we spend our lives making sense of, finding meaning for something that began before we had any say at all.
How has your writing practice been going since reading at Bloomers Poetry Club in December?
Right when I joined Bloomers, I had made a resolve to work on being less private about my art and writing. Then after attending, I made a quiet decision that if Judy ever asked me to read, I would say yes enthusiastically, regardless of my anxieties, and just go for it.
After performing, I realized I had been making this privacy about my work thing into internalized drama. Sharing is still new to me, but since that experience, I’ve been more open and have continued to put my work out there. For example, I’m now in a private creative writing workshop and am printing a zine very soon (shameless self-plug).
Think about yourself as an artist. Where are you in the timeline?
Creating has always been something I do, whether consciously or not, with or without a clear purpose. It’s hard for me to place myself on any kind of timeline. I think of myself as an artist who creates for the love of it, without much concern for discovery or recognition. This has always been true for me.
I understand why some artists feel a strong pull toward visibility and recognition, but I don’t experience that urgency. For me, that kind of pressure can feel draining. It’s more than a hobby, but I don’t want to make it my job. That’s part of why I’ve tended to keep my practice private. But, as you know, I’m working on that. So no matter what, it just makes me happy to know I am an Artist. As long as I can make things, I know I’m on the right timeline.
Out of the thousands
who are known,
or who want to be known
as poets,
maybe one or two
are genuine
and the rest are fakes,
hanging around the sacred
precincts
trying to look like the real thing.
Needless to say
I am one of the fakes,
and this is my story
“Thousands,” Leonard Cohen
If you could only keep one of the books in your collection and all the others tragically burned, which would it be?
NIV, True Images Bible: The Bible for Teen Girls. It was a gift from my mom when I was 12. She was a single mom making $8.00 an hour at Great Clips (plus tips). The Bible itself was really expensive. Years later, I tried to give it to the thrift store and she saw it in my pile and wept. I promised her I would hold onto it.
Do you think I’m pretty?
Beyond… Like many people, I was starstruck when I first met you at the Word Virus grand reopening. I told you Yoshitaka Amano could draw you very well.
Did you ever recover the amulet?
Oh, that poor little amulet!
Only in fragments.
Clutched and quiet are those pieces;
my amulet—you aren’t meant to sit in a hand,
circle my neck and lie upon my chest.
Only in fragments.
I found the glittering cast metal,
green with nickel-sickness,
costume jewelry gone dull at the joints.
Wipe the tarnish from its small forgetful face,
let it rest against my pulse like an open window.
It will be recovered soon enough.
May Wall Press is a trans-operated literary project in the greatest city in the world: Portland, OR. I named it after my great-great-grandmother Emma May Wall, born 1880 in Liverpool.
The Press has taken root with a growing network of 30+ featured local writers and hundreds of guests at Bloomers Poetry Club, a monthly DIY traveling reading series made to entertain my friends and help us get through dark PNW winters. On a shoestring budget, with little to no connections in academics, publishing, and the art world, Bloomers is now the fastest growing literary event in the city. We have been at full capacity since the first reading, in which we somehow squeezed 50 people into my old studio apartment on Flanders Street.
My debut chapbook Everything is Something Else: A Theory was self-published in summer 2025. I distributed 60+ copies to readers in six states and two countries. Index Letters, a book of found poetry written in collaboration with Nadia Niva, is coming June 2026. Keep an eye out for future titles, including the Bloomers printed anthology.
We’re proud to be part of a creative collective that includes Path of Play, Film School, Heavenly Pit Chess Club, Listening Club, Graft Union Reading Series, Dreck, and more.
As May Wall Press continues to spread her wings, I’m looking for help! I want venues that can host 80-100 people, stage and sound equipment, and connections with artists and writers in the Portland area. Please get in touch! Email maywallpress@gmail.com and let’s wake it up.
Yours forever,
Judy
Est. 2024
Contact
maywallpress@gmail.com
May Wall Press 