hala alyan on the connection between poetry and psychology, music to cry to, eating lemons in the bath, and more

Poet and clinical psychologist Hala Alyan has a peripatetic soul — growing up, she moved frequently, living in several countries and many U.S. states, before settling in New York in her early twenties. Now, she lives in Williamsburg, and when she’s not writing or teaching at NYU, her favorite thing to do is wander around the city, often with her four-year-old daughter, Leila, in tow. In early July, we caught up with Hala while she was in Paris teaching at NYU’s campus in the city. We chatted about writing an accidental memoir, finding music to cry to, eating lemons in the bath, and more.

read our interview with hala

“I think I have to have hope. I have a kid, and I worked very hard to have that kid be in the world, and so it would be kind of irresponsible of me to luxuriate in a world where I don’t have hope. I have to try. And that is work. It is a conscious thing. I try to think about what I do have control over, in my little pocket of this world with her, and to make it better.

When she was born, especially given the genocide, I started to think, how do I want to answer the question of what I did with my time during these years? Like, what if she asks me what I did, what do I want to be able to tell her? You don’t have to have kids to think about that. You can then think about anybody in the future asking that. You can think about your future self asking that: What did you do with your time?”

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