HDS communications reached out to our 2021 graduating students to hear from them in their own words about their experiences at HDS, the people who've helped and inspired them along their grad school journeys, and their plans for the future.
How I've Changed
As a first-generation graduate student at Harvard, it’s easy to feel like a stowaway on Emerson’s ‘long winding train reach[ing] back into eternity,’ but I quickly learned that many of us hadn’t arrived here holding a golden ticket. I didn’t know what I was getting myself into, coming to Harvard, but I can say that it’s everything I thought it would be and nothing I thought it would be all at once.
As a poet and writer, I’ve grown up here. I’ve learned how language can build and rebuild communities, how it can deepen the human experience in a mosaic of unexpected, remarkable ways. I’ve learned why I do what I do and how to do it better, and I’ve learned how to help others do the same. Harvard has taught me many things, but the most valuable thing I’ve learned here is how to remember. We are here to remember, collectively, and to honor the experiences that led us to our work in the first place.
Memorable Moment
Getting a final group project published. This was fun. I and three other course-mates were in a course together taught by Professor Amy Hollywood. We decided to collaborate on a group writing project for our final, now titled THEOPOETICA: A MICRO-ANTHOLOGY. This project will be published as a book later this year and will be available wherever books are sold. Equally memorable was being invited to speak about poetry and animism by the Center of the Study of World Religions' Animism Reading Group, hosted by Natalia Schwien. This community, our discussion that evening, will forever stay in my heart.
Message of Thanks
To my professors, instructors, TA’s, and classmates: I am profoundly grateful and honored to have been in this community with you. You are brilliant, kind, active and engaged, and my work will forever be colored by my knowing you. Thank you for doing the good work, for keeping the conversations going and for creating the ones that needed to be created. To my dear friend, Dr. Janet Sylvester: Thank you for initially steering me in this direction and for offering your wisdom, energy, and time to my pursuits so generously over the years. I would not be here were it not for you. To Ma and Emma: Thank you for always keeping the light on. I love you.
Future Plans
Upon graduation, I will continue to write and teach at University of New Hampshire, where I will serve as an English Instructor while earning a second master’s in my field.