Sterling Silver River
Mentor: Bob Krut
Sterling Silver River is a creative engagement with the social, religious, and gendered constructions of virginity. It is a collection of poems that will offer the readers raw and personalized views of the subject. I seek to normalize discussions of virginity, as it is often associated with the taboo and I am determined to challenge the heteronormative constructions of virginity. To that end, I will be conducting detailed interviews with a range of subjects that include the often-overlooked members of the LGBTQ+ community. This wider range of experiences will allow me to address a number of different aspects of virginity, such as purity, self-worth, temporal markers of the “before” and “after,” and the personal and cultural capital of virginity. This project aims to deconstruct the dominant literary tropes built around virginity, and it invites the reader to see it through a more contemporary and fresh perspective.
Read the Excerpts from Kiana’s Poetry Collection, Sterling Silver River
