It sounds kind of jerky, but I feel like I suffer from an abundance of ideas, and the hardest part for me has always been editing and slowing down. Sometimes I just have to empty out that imaginary mental junk drawer. I literally have this mental image that I use sometimes where I’m just shaking out the junk drawer and throwing stuff away. Mental clutter is something that I have a problem with. At times, people in the studio will roll their eyes because I’ll be like, “Hey guys, look at this. I made this and it could be this color and we could do this or this!” Everyone’s like, “Calm down, Emily.”

I would say I feel stuck more often than I feel creatively flowing. It’s about not beating yourself up about that, not getting on your own case for long periods of not being productive, because it can happen in a big sudden burst. And usually, forcing it too much has never really resulted in good stuff. So, it’s a lot of being patient and forgiving of yourself. I watch a movie every night and listen to a lot of music. I’m constantly surrounding myself with stimuli, that anything could be the spark that gets the creative juices flowing again. I have experienced times, though, where I’ve found it’s not happening, and I get tired of movies and music and I need something else. So, then I’ll go to an art museum or go see an orchestra perform and see if that helps.

Absolutely. I also have some ideas that are more philosophical—or maybe even spiritual—that have to do with my faith in language as material. I’m interested in allowing as much of my unconscious to come through. I think my own consciousness is not so interesting and I don’t generally write to express myself. I write to find deep truths for myself and for other people and to make poems that feel like they’re connected with a deep, essential aspect of human experience. Even if the poems themselves are very specific or particular, somehow they’re connected to those forces. That’s what I’m looking for in poetry. I need to get out of myself, in a way. I believe in language and I want to subject myself to it. That’s why I like working with found text or just putting myself out into the world where other people are talking, listening to what they’re saying, walking by signs and looking at newspapers and things. Picking up on the glimpses of truth in language, then trying to work that into the poems.

You know, I have doubts, but the images, like the movies, always inspire me. So when I’m empty, vacant, I start watching any movie, b-class, c-class, it’s okay. B-class kung fu movies are so inspiring. The music, for kung fu movies, very old kung fu movies, not sophisticated ones, is so inspiring. They’re so wild. I was watching those kung fu movies while I was making async .