Pacyinz Lyfoung

I am a French-born and raised, MN-grown Hmong/Asian American woman poet and activist. As a girl growing up, I used to dream about studying at The Sorbonne in Paris and becoming a French writing, as I loved reading. After moving to the US, working on social change issues and losing my only living grandmother--my tie to my Hmong heritage, I started writing poetry in English both as a social change artistic expression and to further explore the richness of my multi-layered identities. Overall, although often times a peripheral artist, I wake up sometimes in the middle of the night to write down poems that are floating in that half-dream state, because an experience was so intense it caught my imagination. I always feel motivated by the sense that I definitely have something to contribute as a writer and the world could be a better place, in whichever little ways, if I don't forget to do my part and use this gift too.