Poets of Bodie: Ching-In Chen

Ching-In Chen has lived in Riverside, California for the last three years (and will be moving this fall to Milwaukee to begin a PhD in Creative Writing).  She hearts street food, the zuihitsu & other “hijacked forms” and gets lost easily.  She is the author of The Heart’s Traffic (Arktoi Books/Red Hen Press).  The daughter of Chinese immigrants, she is a Kundiman, Macondo and Lambda Fellow.   A community organizer, she has worked in the Asian American communities of San Francisco, Oakland, Riverside and Boston.  She is a member of the Save Our Chinatown Committee, a grassroots organization working to preserve the archaelogical heritage of Riverside Chinatown and likes to writes poems using found text and objects.  You can find her at www.chinginchen.com

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I’m going to write about the Chinese population of Bodie, which fits one of my general obsessions (coolies).  Also, I think ghosts & buried cities are fascinating & I like to follow their trails.  The book I’m currently working on has a speculative shiny city and its twin as inspiration, the buried city of Riverside Chinatown. I’ve never been to Bodie, but I hope to visit soon in the upcoming months.

Thanks for having me & looking forward to your poems!