Interview

Self-Love, Mermaids, & Fairy Tales

Interview with Isabel Villarreal, Author of Brown Clay

My intuition has been a dominant guide in my life so one of the strongest messages I felt in the pit of my stomach was to keep writing and hold on to my words because someday I’m going to need them.

Brown Clay (Self-Published, 2021) unpacks personal experiences on the complexity of love, sex, and identity. Isabel Villarreal’s poems are like peeking into her journal. Only she’s giving permission. Villarreal is a Black/Latina American queer artist and writer, as well as an online activist for Black, Indigenous, and other POC in the LGBTQ+ community.

INTERSTELLAR FLIGHT PRESS: To me, Brown Clay is incredibly ambitious and comes across as quite personal. Almost like the poems are part of pages in your metaphorical journal. Did you always have this vision for the book? Or did it come together over time?

ISABEL VILLARREAL: I knew I was going to compile my poetry together, but I didn’t have a clear vision for how it would turn out. My intuition has been a dominant guide in my life so one of the strongest messages I felt in the pit of my stomach was to keep…