ep. 115 - Jenny Qi

Jenny Qi is the author of Focal Point, winner of the 2020 Steel Toe Books Poetry Award. Her essays and poems have been published in The New York Times, The Atlantic, Tin House, ZYZZYVA, Rattle, and elsewhere, and she has received fellowships and support from Tin House, Omnidawn, Kearny Street Workshop, and the San Francisco Writers Grotto. Born in Pennsylvania to Chinese immigrants, she grew up mostly in Las Vegas and Nashville and now lives in San Francisco. She completed her Ph.D. in Biomedical Science (Cancer Biology) from UCSF, where she studied novel drug candidates in preclinical models of pancreatic neuroendocrine tumors. She currently works with life science and biopharma groups as a competitive intelligence manager, with a focus on ovarian cancer. Find the book and more at: https://jqiwriter.com/ As always, we'll also include live open lines for responses to our weekly prompt or any other poems you'd like to share. For details on how to participate, either via Skype or by phone, go to: https://www.rattle.com/rattlecast/ This Week's Prompt: A ballad is a music-based poem that tells a story. This form isn’t especially complicated but it does have very specific requirements. Webexhibits.org has great instructions on how to write your own ballad. (If you google “webexhibits” and “ballad,” webexhibit.org’s “Make Your Own Ballad” page will be the first hit.) “The Lady of Shalott” by Alfred Tennyson and “Casey at the Bat” by Ernest Thayer are examples of ballad poems. Next Week's Prompt: Write a spooky poem for Halloween. The Rattlecast livestreams on YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter, then becomes an audio podcast. Find it on iTunes, Spotify, or anywhere else you get your podcasts.