The greatest joy of writing for me is the finished piece. I fall in love with my own poetry for what it becomes after my pen stops. It takes on it's own character and voice, it comes to a place where people can read into it and out of it things I can't begin to imagine. There are so many amazing poems out there that are life changing, and it's so great to see what other people are contributing to my list of personal favorites. I'm proud of what I have contributed to the pool for people to pick their favorites from. What a poem can become is the joy of it's author, this is at least the case for me.

The story behind my latest chapbook "The Gift" is two fold. At the time of it's conception I had, in my perspective, received two huge gifts. Poetry being one, and love being the second. I've been so captivated by so many poems recently it's hard to imagine life without wordplay and from that has come much of this collection. As for love, it is such a broad topic because it can be so many things toward so many other things. The feelings I have toward a crush or while star gazing or people watching or the compassion I have toward another human, all of this is love. It can't be contained in just one poem and so I continued to write about it. Most of the collection revolves around these two topics, however a few poems in "The Gift" are oddballs that I enjoyed writing and wanted to share. You could almost say they are bonus content. What is worth sharing if you can't put your opinions out there as well? I hope the oddballs make people think for a moment and reconsider where they stand on particular topics. I hope it presents them with that gift, from myself to them.

Other writers. Other poets. When I heard or read their works it inspired me. I started looking for ways to publish my own writing and I'm so glad that I came to find Smashwords because it has made this possible. I felt motivated to become an indie author when I found out it was possible and saw other people doing the same. I thought to myself "I could do that. I would like to do that." and eventually "I will do that."

I'm currently working on my second and third chapbooks that I plan to release soon! My hope is by the end of 2015, but we shall see. I don't want to spoil anything yet, so that is all I can say for now!

Anyone who enjoys my writing, although I wouldn't use the word "fan", means a lot to me. Everyone that I've shared my poetry with is another chance for my poetry to take flight on it's own. For that I can't be more thankful. What it means for me is criticism and growth, feedback and inspiration. Every time someone in the audience comes to me with a response leaves me with something I can take to heart and grow from in the future. It means that things get better and better. I like better, and I'm sure they do as well, which is why they are so important to me.

To be honest, I don't read that many novels or books... But I do read a lot of poetry and blogs. My favorite poet right now is Sarah Kay. I take a lot of inspiration from her works and I appreciate how deep some of her poems can be, and in spite of that how real they are. I appreciate that in an author. I frequent Button Poetry on YouTube and enjoy much of the work of the authors you can find there as well.

I am friends with so many artists, it's incredible. I throw an idea their way and it's amazing what they bring back! I really like to support my friends in what they do and it's great that they support me much the same way. If I could claim anything to do with the design, it's that sometimes you just have to let art speak for itself, and I'm not talking about pictures. The artist that did the cover for "The Gift" took inspiration from early drafts of the poems within the collection. Hopefully you find that the cover is complimentary to the works within, because that's what we were aiming for.

A better question is "What can keep me asleep at night?", there is far too much world and universe out there to sleep 1/3 of my life away. So much to see and always somewhere to be with so little time, some people live to live because they don't understand why you would live to die.