I started working at literary magazines when I was 22, fresh out of undergrad and in an MFA program. I’ve always been artistic — as a child, I dreamt of being a Disney animator — as a teenager, I lost myself in Turner Classic Movie marathons during the weekends, a lonely queer kid grasping for connection — as a young adult, I prioritized museum visits, asking the eternal question of curation curation curation. Triple Sonnet. It’s no coincidence that now, the greatest poets and writers I admire frame their process discussions through the art of curation. I can forever play the clip of Claudia Rankine describing the making of Citizen like entering an art gallery. 

On top of curation, I’ve always valued discipline. That’s the immigrant kid in me. My parents are originally from Hong Kong. They sacrificed a lot, leaving a life they both worked tremendously hard for, coming to a new country just so my brother and I could get the best education possible. Sometimes, a night, I wonder what our life had been if my parents had never left. I dream of waking up in the middle of the night, hungry in Kowloon, and going downstairs with my mother and father to get street food. I’d do anything for curry fish balls right now! 

At Cornell, I learned both heart and discipline from the one and only Lyrae Van Clief-Stefanon, my Poetry Mother. I distinctly remember the spring day in Uris Hall (it’s ironic how the most beautiful poetry workshop was taught in one of Cornell’s uh we’ll say less than gorgeous buildings at a university where the number of gorgeous buildings reaches infinity) when she told our intermediate poetry workshop: “When writing we want to f with the ineffable.” I remember Lyrae pointing to the less-than-appetizing blue / gray carpet and asked us: “Describe the color of this carpet without any adjectives.” Wow. To this day, I am not sure I can adequately answer that question. I do know the answer starts with metaphor. And heart. 

And to this day, Lyrae’s “f with the ineffable” quote graces all my syllabi, not matter which class I am teaching. I owe almost everything to my parents and my mentors. I feel incredibly lucky to only be thirty-five and to have already lived such an interesting, captivating life. But I know there is much more to come — and that’s the infinite Lyrae always points to. In Tempe, Arizona, Norman Dubie, my Poetry Father, would tell me stories about working at The Iowa Review in its early days. Norman ended up taking a decade long hiatus from editing and writing to find Buddhism. Though there is no graceful transition — no graceful enough volta for this, Hive, I’m here to say that while Honey will always be my baby, I, now, must take a break from editing. It has been my honor to be your Editor-in-Chief and HBIC for these past five years. 

A couple weeks ago, a dear mentee of mine said: “It must be an honor to be able to close a chapter. I want to have that in the future.” I hold that moment dearly. And I think recounting that moment is the perfect ending to this note. 

Your HBIC Forever,

Dorothy Chan