When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Further Possibilities

About Chen Chen

Chen Chen was born in 1989 in Xiamen China and grew up in Massachusetts in the US. His first book-length collection When I Grow Up I Want to Be a List of Further Possibilities (BOA Editions US 2017; Bloodaxe Books UK 2019) was longlisted for the National Book Award and won the A. Poulin Jr. Poetry Prize the Great Lakes Colleges Association (GLCA) New Writers Award the Texas Book Award for Poetry and the Thom Gunn Award for Gay Poetry. The book was also a finalist for the Lambda Literary Award for Gay Poetry and named a Stonewall Honor Book. He had previously published two chapbooks Kissing the Sphinx (Two of Cups Press 2016) and Set the Garden on Fire (Porkbelly Press 2015). His work has been widely acclaimed in the US with Poets & Writers Magazine featuring him in their Inspiration Issue as one of Ten Poets Who Will Change the World. His second collection Your Emergency Contact Has Experienced an Emergency is publshed by Bloodaxe Books in the UK and BOA Editions in the US in 2022. He earned his BA from Hampshire College and his MFA from Syracuse University where he was a University Fellow and is currently working on a PhD in English and Creative Writing through Texas Tech University as an off-site student and the recipient of a J.T. and Margaret Talkington Fellowship. He edits Underblong with the poet Sam Herschel Wein and serves as a contributing editor for Bettering American Poetry. Chen lives in frequently snowy Rochester NY with his partner Jeff Gilbert and their pug dog Mr Rupert Giles. He was the 2018-2020 Jacob Ziskind Poet-in-Residence at Brandeis University in Waltham Massachusetts.