Author: Shyla Shehan

Wasima Khan is a Pakistani-Dutch writer, poet, and jurist from The Hague, the Netherlands. She won the 2025 Willow Springs Surrealist Poetry Prize. Her work has appeared or is forthcoming in About Place Journal, Fourteen Hills, Sky Island Journal, Santa Fe Literary Review, Third Wednesday, and elsewhere. Her flash fiction, As If Nothing Is Burning, appears in Issue #23.

Tell us about yourself.

I am a daughter of Pakistani migrants, born and raised in The Hague, a small coastal city in the Netherlands. Here, I find solace in gazing out at the sea, imagining what lies beyond the horizon. Yet growing up as part of an ethnic minority in this country hasn’t always been easy. 

Before turning to creative writing, I studied law and earned two Master’s degrees. That academic achievement did not spare me from explicit Islamophobia while working as a law lecturer. Later, as a legislative lawyer drafting laws for the Dutch government, I saw policy being shaped by anti-immigrant politics and exclusionary assumptions. When I entered journalism in the autumn of 2023, I became disillusioned with the – sometimes conscious, sometimes unconscious – white supremacist undercurrents in Western reporting on Palestine. Even my own work on the occupation and settlements in the West Bank was partially filtered and censored to avoid unsettling certain audiences. Ultimately, that was something I could not accept.

In fiction, creative non-fiction, and poetry, I can tell my own stories, in my own way. Through them, I can seek to offer a deeper understanding than the one I encountered in my own life.

What compelled you to write the story appearing in this issue?

I wrote this piece to highlight the often-unnoticed privilege of everyday safety in the West, set against the backdrop of genocidal violence elsewhere. It is also an attempt to show that, ultimately, we always have a choice in how we use that privilege.

What unique or surprising detail can you tell us about the revision process or the final version of it?

While writing the story, I found it became a personal exercise in empathy. I do not fully agree with the protagonist, and I actually identify more with their more proactive friend, Amal. Still, I can understand the protagonist’s way of life; one that is, in fact, shared by many in the real world.

I deliberately chose to write the story in the second-person point of view. It’s a perspective rarely used in fiction, and it can be tricky, but here it served the story I wanted to tell. I avoided the first-person point of view because I didn’t want the piece to be mistaken for non-fiction, while the third person felt too distant. Instead, I wanted to slip directly into the reader’s mind. 

At what point in your life did you begin writing and working on fiction?

I’ve been writing for as long as I could hold a pen, though not always creatively. With a background in law, I previously authored award-winning essays on human rights and even compiled a law dictionary. Despite these accomplishments, I only began to call myself a writer – and a poet – last year. In 2025, I finally turned to fiction, driven by a desire to tell stories that not only engage the mind, but, I hope, also move the heart.

It helps that I came to fiction later in life. I bring with me a wealth of lived experience and a deeper understanding of people, which I can now weave into my work. 

You mention being a poet. Tell us about that or other genres that interest you.

I write poems, primarily in free verse. Poetry is the perfect form for exploring minimalism, ambiguity, and the beauty of language. Surrealist poetry, in particular, holds a special place in my heart for the way it allows me to unleash my imagination to the fullest. It takes me back to my childhood, when I would daydream about distant journeys and other worlds.

I also write creative non-fiction. I haven’t let go of my love for essays, but now I reflect on and share my own lived experiences. I have a personal piece forthcoming in Redivider, transatlantic in scope, which explores the impact of 9/11 on both my life and Muslim communities in the Netherlands and the United States. 

When or why did you decide to start publishing your work?

Last year, I made my creative writing debut with the politically charged poem “The Document” in About Place Journal.

As someone with Pakistani roots, I belong to an ethnic minority in the West, which is why I see representation as essential. I view publishing as an opportunity to amplify underrepresented voices. In doing so, I hope to help broaden and enrich the literary canon. I’m deeply appreciative of the work The Good Life Review is doing in a similar vein, helping to foster an inclusive literary community.

What fuels your desire to write (or engage in other creative outlets)?

Writing is a powerful way to cultivate empathy and understanding. It allows me to step into other people’s lives and worlds, and I hope to bring readers along on that journey. 

At the same time, it is a way for me to reclaim agency over my own life and experiences. Too often, I have been confronted with Western biases – simplistic narratives about me, Muslim women, or Muslims more broadly – stories in which I barely recognize myself. In my own work, I aim to foreground nuance and emotional complexity as a way of challenging those assumptions.

I also don’t take the ability to read and write for granted. My mother is illiterate; growing up, she didn’t have the same opportunities I did to pursue an education, let alone attend university. For me, reading and writing are a way of honoring the sacrifices she made so that I could have a better life.

What have been the biggest influences in your writing?

There are literary icons I deeply admire, and it is no coincidence that many of them are Black writers such as Maya Angelou, Toni Morrison, Audre Lorde, James Baldwin and Ta-Nehisi Coates. They have shown me how powerful it is to remain faithful to one’s own perspective and vision, even when it is marginalized by patriarchal structures or a white-centered majority. They continue to inspire me and remind me of the importance of sharing underrepresented perspectives and ways of seeing the world.

In the Netherlands, we are still far from where we need to be in terms of literary diversity, equity, and inclusion. In the American literary community, my voice has so far been more readily received, which has, in turn, inspired me to begin writing transatlantic pieces. I look forward to continuing to contribute my transatlantic perspective.

Are there any special projects, favorite pieces, or books you’d like to promote?

I’m proud of two award-winning pieces I wrote over the past year. My poem “Stranger Fruits Grew Here” won the 2025 Willow Springs Surrealist Poetry Prize, and my flash fiction piece “Leaving” received first place in the 2026 Blue Frog Flash Fiction Prize. You never quite know how or whether your writing will resonate, so the judges’ positive feedback was both humbling and reassuring. It has certainly encouraged me to continue chasing writerly excellence. Both pieces, along with other work, can be found on my website: www.wasimakhan.com 

What do you think when you hear, “the good life?”

Being yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you something else. That is the greatest accomplishment, as Ralph Waldo Emerson would say.

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Thank you, Wasima, for trusting us with your story, for sharing your poem (which is fabulous!), and for taking on tough issues! We appreciate your time and participation in this Q&A, and we wish you the best with writing and all life’s endeavors!

Matt Mason served as the Nebraska State Poet from 2019-2024 and has run poetry workshops in Botswana, Romania, Nepal, and Belarus for the U.S. State Department. His poetry has appeared in The New York Times, and Matt has received a Pushcart Prize as well as fellowships from the Academy of American Poets and the Nebraska Arts Council. His work can be found in Rattle, Poet Lore, Prairie Schooner, and in hundreds of other publications. Mason’s 5th book, Rock Stars, was published by Button Poetry in 2023.

Matt’s Poem, 8 Beautiful Things (About this Last Year), is available in Issue #22.

These first few questions are about the piece that was published in the latest issue…

What unique or surprising detail can you tell us about the origin, revision process, and/or final version of 8 Beautiful Things?

8 Beautiful Things (About This Last Year) was sort of an act of desperation to focus on something positive after so much time in lockdown. I have diabetes, my wife has asthma, so Covid precautions weren’t theoretically about helping others stay alive, they literally hit home. I did originally plan it as 12 Beautiful Things but felt these 8 did a better job, less cluttered, less forced.

The poem does wonderful work infusing light into what was otherwise a very dismal time for people in the United States and the world. Tell us more about that act of reflection and counterbalance.  

Thanks. That was the goal, writing in spring of 2021, to find positives, to remind myself that the previous year had been about more than just surviving, that there was beauty in it, too.

Knowing that it was about a very specific time period, what can you tell us about the choice not to provide the context of the year? 

I hope that works. I think it’s obvious but, well, I think a lot of things are obvious which clearly aren’t in the world today so who knows. And though the details are specific to the Pandemic, I think it’s important to also lead a reader to reflect on their past year right now and find some beauty as times are always complicated.

What do you hope readers who encounter the poem take from it, especially now, given the current volatile and polarizing climate in our country? 

I hope what they take is just a minute in someone else’s perspective. That’s what poetry is about for me and that’s why I really believe if there was more poetry in our daily lives we’d have a more connecting us to one another. I read poetry not just for enjoyment but to also get to take a few steps in another’s shoes and see a world that’s different from the one my own experiences bring me. 

Switching topics to your recent transition away from being the Nebraska State Poet. In your tenure, you set a goal to visit every county in Nebraska, speaking, teaching, or both, which was a great success. Congratulations!

Now that that is squarely in the rearview, have you set your sights on a new goal or goals? 

Yes! I want to do it again… or keep doing it… or, well, just keep going. I started a new nonprofit, Poetry Forward (poetryforward.org) and am also working through Humanities Nebraska, the Nebraska Arts Council and others to keep doing poetry talks, readings, workshops and more. This is my job now, I see the value it brings into schools and communities as well as to me, so I want to do this forever. But, well, “Professional Poet” isn’t a well-broken-in career path, so it’s a bit of work but, so far, worth it to keep doing what I love and what I’m best at and what I see making a positive difference in the places I present to.

What can you tell us about your time as state poet that not a lot of people might know?

What surprised me the most is how hard it can be sometimes to get a response for a poetry event. Not always, but I think teachers are so busy, many librarians are time-crunched volunteers, and when someone you’re not familiar with calls or emails saying they’re a poet and want to come through, it can get weird. So, yeah, sometimes it got weird. I didn’t get hung up on ever until one county where three different libraries hung up on me when I phoned. 

How do you feel your writing changed through the experience of representing Nebraska as the State Poet? 

I felt I needed to show myself and my writing more value. I prefer being humble and taking more of a backseat, but I found I needed to show poetry as something valuable and you can’t be too humble when you have a title like State Poet unless you want people to think poetry isn’t important.

More about your writing… I seem to recall hearing you speak about writing a poem a week. Is that still something you continue to do? If so, where do you come up with new ideas to keep things fresh?

Yes, I have a deadline of Monday night at midnight and need to start at least one new poem each week. This started due to a poetry writing class I took in college, 1986 or ’87, where the teacher said we’d turn in a poem each week, 10 poems in 10 weeks, and I didn’t think I could do that. And then I wrote 15 poems in those 10 weeks. With a deadline, a serious deadline, you are looking for poems and not waiting for them, and when you look for poems they are all over the place. Mainly, they come in the things you find yourself involuntarily reacting to with a physical reaction: a double-take when you see something beautiful out your car window, a sigh at something ridiculous a friend says, a clenched jaw at some stupidity in the news. These are all things we forget 5 minutes later but, if we’re looking for a poem, we might at least write a note about it for later. In every day, there’s at least 5 or 6 poems for everyone to write if we’re looking for them.

Do you write in genres other than poetry? 

I really don’t. I have published a couple essays but really just love and focus on writing poetry. And emails. And answering lists of questions for literary magazines.

Give us some insight into your revision process? That’s a huge topic, so feel free to pick a specific aspect of craft or revision and speak to that. 

Revision is crucial. I don’t consider myself a great writer but I DO consider myself a great editor, so it’s in revision where my poems come together. I write by hand in a notebook, then scratch things out, change things up, often end up with a page that’s hard to read with all the additions and arrows and codes to insert a stanza from another page somewhere. I read the poem out loud over and over as it’s different in the air than on the page, showing me changes. Then when I type it up, the poem is completely fresh again, looks completely different, and I can work more on the shape of it (the stanzas, more with the line breaks, indentations, etc.). I enjoy revision because, for me, its takes the ideas which inspired me to write and helps them take a shape which does them more justice than my first drafts.

And finally, a few very TGLR questions…

In 2023, we asked you what the first thing is that you think of when you hear the phrase ‘the good life’. You responded that you “think of living with peace in your heart, living a life with integrity and value, truth and beauty.” What is the second thing you think of?

Life with less anxiety.

Many of the people we publish are early in their journey as writers. What advice would you give them about the road ahead? 

Enjoy it. Reinvent your genre: don’t write what you’ve been told a poem or a story is, write in the way and about the things you wish you saw more of in the writing world.

Do you think Lucia would share that cookie recipe if we ask nicely?

No. She’ll always be changing it.

Thank you, Matt, for being a big part of our literary community and for your involvement and support in helping TGLR grow and thrive. We also appreciate you for spending extra time with us on this Q&A and wish you the best with the Poetry Forward project, writing, and all of life’s endeavors!