An Interview with Khamil Riley

Khamil Riley is a twenty-four-year-old Jamaican-American poet, storyteller, performer, and visual artist. As an experimental and fervent writer of poetry, fiction, and prose, as well as an avid dreamer from the ripe age of birth, Riley’s work aims to communicate all that can be honest and true about the human experience. Born and raised in South Central Los Angeles, California, she prides herself on her connection to and activism for her community. With two degrees from Wesleyan University in English and African-American Studies and an award for the 2021 Erness Bright Brody Prize for creative written expression, Riley aims to encourage readers to fall in love with the world around them. Author of two independent chapbooks and currently working on her debut self-published poetry collection, Riley can be found anywhere spilling into the pages of her journal or plotting her next adventure. Sometimes both at the same time!

Who/what made you want to write? Was there a particular person, or particular writers/works/art forms that influenced you?

I have always been a huge reader and writer. As a kid, I would get lost in the worlds authors could build and it opened my mind and imagination to the worlds I wanted to build as well. Though I’ve grown into a poet, I started my writing journey as a short storyteller. Some of my favorite authors growing up were YA novelists like Tahereh Mafi, Ava Dellaira, and John Green. As I grew, I loved short stories like “Where Are You Going, Where Have You Been?” by Joyce Carol Oates, and “The Yellow Wallpaper” by Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Once I was introduced to poetry in high school, my favorite writers and greatest poetic influences were folks like Kai Davis, Brittney Black Rose Kapri, Sabrina Benaim, Nikki Giovanni, Lucille Clifton, and Toni Morrison.

What inspired you to start writing this book?

This collection started as the culminating project of my senior independent study at Wesleyan University. I set out on a semester-long study of secrecy in/as related to blackness through poetry as a creative medium. I aimed to use my personal experience to answer questions like what things have I learned to keep secret? What things don’t I allow myself to talk about? How has that silence affected me? Focusing primarily on experiences and growth made during my four years in undergrad, I saw this project as an opportunity to explore my own depths using poetry, musicality, and imagery to do so. My goal was to create a body of work that felt very intimate and like a strong reflection of myself, flaws, secrets, and all. Some of these poems may be about some very beautiful moments, and others might be about some tougher ones. And isn’t that the beauty of life?

Tell us the story of your book’s title. Was it easy to find, or did it take forever?

Ever heard someone say “Quiet as it’s kept…” in the middle of the story, and felt your ears perk up? A natural reaction given the fact that the next words out of their mouth are bound to be the juiciest they’ve said yet. I’ve heard this saying amongst many black families throughout my life. Usually around a kitchen table or from the lips of an AuntieSisterCousin. The excitement around the table is palpable as everyone leans in to hear what the latest word on the street is. Whatever gets shared will typically not be common knowledge, typically something kept secret. No stranger to listening for uncovered secrets, I wonder still, what are the things we ALL try to keep hidden about ourselves? That’s what I explored writing this collection, so this title when it came to me, felt beyond fitting. When researching if there were readings of the same name, I also loved the connections drawn between Toni Morrison and her approach to writing about race. My collection and writing style feels in conversation with this so that only solidified the title further for me.

If your book had a soundtrack, what are some songs that would be on it?

I love this question because I consider myself a multi-disciplinary artist so in addition to poetry, I am also a dancer who loves and communicates through music as well. I kept a playlist of songs that felt related to my writing and I hope to release it along with the collection so my readers have a true soundtrack to my life. Some songs I would include are:

“While We’re Young” by Jhene Aiko

“Happy” by Dachelle (tragically removed from streaming, but I think is still on SoundCloud!)

“All Night Long” by Mary J Blige

“Selfish” by SAInt JHN

“Brown Skin Girl” by Beyonce

“Give Up” by Dachelle

Describe your dream book cover.

The current cover of the book is a self-portrait I took and honestly the rawness and vulnerability of the shot feels perfect for the book so I think I did a great job with selecting the cover. I had a very intuitive process while writing this collection so for even the cover to have come naturally feels very on point with the story I am telling. Still, I am not too big of myself to admit someone with more experience in book cover design might have some brilliant ideas I am not privy too. I am a proud advocate for leaning into the strengths of your team, so if I knew someone had new ideas I hadn’t considered, I would certainly be open to trying their ideas on for size.

What other professions have you worked in? What’s something about you that your readers wouldn’t know?

I am a true jack of all trades. I have been a program coordinator for youth programs, I’ve done consultant and customer service work for interior designers, I’ve been a cashier in luxury retail stores, a tour guide, an RA. I love try and experiencing new things. Though my primary passion will always be writing, I think of life as one big storybook. My goal is to, by the end of it, have the pages of my life filled with excitement, joy, and new experiences. So I’ll never shy away from a job. Who knows how my three-month stint as an administrative assistant might contribute to my overall growth as a writer and human.

What books did you read (for research or comfort) throughout your writing process?

This one is a hard question because my process was so intuitive much of what I did was just allow myself to be guided toward what my book needed. That resulted in most of my time being spent reflecting, pondering, and writing about it. Still, my biggest inspiration would have been For Colored Girls by Ntozake Shange. I loved the poetry and the musicality in the playwriting as well as the vulnerability actors had to invoke in order to do the words justice. While the final format of the book turned out to be more poetry book than stage play, I originally set out to write a choreo poem in the spirit of For Colored Girls. I planned to one day reformat Quiet As It’s Kept into a play like that, so that may still be to come, but there was something to be said for letting these words exist as my debut poetry collection. I wrote this collection during one of the most mentally and emotionally draining years of my life, so to have such a beautiful and complete project be born out of that struggle is inspiring to me. It is a reminder that even when times are hard, I can always rely on poetry to get me through it.

What is one thing you hope readers take away from reading your book? How do you envision your perfect reader?

I hope my readers will feel comforted and like they aren’t as alone as they feel sometimes. I felt very alone while writing most of this collection, but the gift poetry has always given me is a sense of understanding. Especially when writing a project exploring secrecy, I felt empowered by owning my story and I hope to empower women in similar positions. There is so much freedom to be found in speaking your truth and dashing away the facades and the masks we hide behind. This is especially important to me because as a black woman, time and time again people prove they don’t care to hear a black woman’s truth. They’d rather keep walking and stepping all over us and have us suffer in silence. This project is my way of saying no, and saying that I deserve to be as free with my word as anyone else. I hope that my words could touch and inspire other black women to strive for the same liberation I’m aiming for. Where I may have once been scared silent, I realize now there is value in my experiences. No one alive has the perspective so through Quiet As It’s Kept, I hope laying myself out on the line will inspire other women to be open to embracing themselves the same way.

Are you a writer, too? Submit your manuscript to Atmosphere Press.