Miho Kinnas
Art: Poetry
Career: Corporate, consulting to freelance
Current Residence: Hilton Head
Hometown: Yokohama, Japan
Family: Husband, Ben. Daughter, Leslie, married and lives in Philadelphia. Dusty, the Labrador- deceased
When and how did you discover your artistic talent? How and / or why did you choose this medium? What do you love about it?
I was born and raised in Japan, my father a publisher, my mother an editor. The house was filled with books, but I didn’t know I would be a poet writing in English until I was 40 years old. We were living in Hong Kong, and I became unemployed and thought I’d become a literary translator. Then, one of my mentors, Allegra Wong, told me I must be a poet to translate poetry. Within ten years, the Museum of American Poetics published my poems, thanks to another mentor, Marc Olmsted, followed by a Master of Fine Arts in poetry from the City University of Hong Kong. I love the process of making a poem and putting together a book. The more I learn, the more I see how much freedom poetry offers to both readers and writers.