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Koon Woon and Five Willows Literary Review Overview
Koon Woon and the Five Willows Literary Review: Literary Lives at the Margins
Introduction
In the evolving landscape of contemporary American literature, Koon Woon stands out as a poet, editor, and mentor whose journey from rural China to Seattle’s International District embodies both the adversities and aspirations of immigrant life. His work—deeply rooted in lived experience, poverty, philosophical inquiry, and a decades-long battle with mental illness—articulates a poetry of survival and self-renewal. Equally significant is his long-term investment in nurturing literary community, most notably through his stewardship of the Five Willows Literary Review, a digital outpost for writers whose sensibility echoes that of the ancient Chinese poet Tao Qian (Tao Yuan-Ming). This report presents an in-depth examination of Koon Woon’s biography, literary achievements, and contributions as a mentor and editor, followed by a thorough analysis of the Five Willows Literary Review’s history, editorial focus, notable contributors, and role in the literary ecosystem. The interplay between Woon’s vision and the Review’s platform further illuminates the complex interdependencies between marginalized voices, communal support, and literary recognition.
Table: Key Facts about Koon Woon and Five Willows Literary Review
| Feature | Koon Woon | Five Willows Literary Review |
| Birth/Establishment | 1949, Nan On (Southern Guangdong), China | c. 2013, Seattle, Washington |
| Immigration/Origin | To US (Aberdeen, WA) in 1960 as a child | Companion website for Goldfish Press and the Chrysanthemum Society |
| Education | BA, Antioch University Seattle; MA, Fort Hays State Univ. | Informally founded by Koon Woon; part of the Chrysanthemum Society |
| Literary Work | “The Truth in Rented Rooms” (1998), “Water Chasing Water” (2013), “Paper-son Poet” (2016), “Rice Bowls” (2018), numerous poems | Publishes poetry, fiction, nonfiction, book reviews, community writing |
| Awards | PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Award, American Book Award | Supports emerging and established poets; hosts readings/events |
| Editorial Roles | Editor: Chrysanthemum, Goldfish Press, Five Willows Literary Review | Koon Woon, editor and founder |
| Notable Contributors/Collaborators | Nelson Bentley (mentor), Betty Irene Priebe (agent), poets across continents | Scarlett Phelan, Simon Perchik, Andrena Zawinski, Bethany Reid, Sandra Noel, Margaret Roncone, many others |
| Mission/Focus | Poetry of immigrant experience, working class, isolation, recovery; mentorship | Work in the spirit of “Mr. Five Willows” (Tao Qian): simplicity, resilience, poetic community |
| Submissions/Guidelines | Selects and promotes emerging voices, especially from marginalized backgrounds | Email submissions accepted, response in 0–2 weeks, open to international contributors |
| Nonprofit/Community Role | Chrysanthemum Literary Society (501c3), literary activism | Nurtures cross-cultural, cross-genre literary exchange |
| Online Presence | Publisher website, personal blog, YouTube, interviews | Blog-based platform with wide international readership |
The points above, while tabled for clarity, are elaborated with context and analysis in the following sections.
Koon Woon: Early Life, Immigration, and Education
Koon Woon’s origins shape every facet of his literary voice. Born into the Lock clan of Nan On village, Toishan County, Guangdong in 1949, Woon was raised in rural poverty before immigrating to the United States at age 11 to join his family in Aberdeen, Washington. The family, like many Chinese immigrants, resorted to the “paper son” system—an arrangement by which his father, and consequently Koon, assumed the surname Woon in order to circumvent restrictive US immigration laws of the era. This ambiguous legal and cultural heritage emerges repeatedly in his writing, underpinned by the dualities of “being Lock” within the Chinese community and “being Woon” on government paper123.
After a childhood marked by economic hardship—ten people sharing a three-bedroom public housing duplex, all laboring in the family-run restaurant—Woon pursued education with notable intellect and curiosity. He attended the University of Washington in the late 1960s, enrolled in philosophy and mathematics, and later transferred to the University of Oregon, where he came under the influence of renowned philosopher John Wisdom. Ultimately, after decades beset by mental illness, he returned to academia in his forties, earning a BA from Antioch University Seattle and an MA from Fort Hays State University, thereby illustrating an unyielding drive toward intellectual and personal betterment1453.
Woon’s early intellectual pursuits were integrally tied to his philosophical bent. He recalls reading Nietzsche, Locke, Marx, Schopenhauer, Wittgenstein, analytic philosophers, and the Tao Te Ching alongside Freud—a testament to the blend of Western and Eastern thought that later permeates his poetry13.
Mental Health Journey, Recovery, and Literary Emergence
Perhaps the single-most defining factor in Woon’s life is his prolonged, harrowing battle with mental illness. In his twenties, while still a student, he began to exhibit symptoms of what was to be diagnosed as schizoaffective bipolar disorder. This led to years of institutionalization, homelessness, and recurring psychotic episodes. At age 27, he experienced a severe breakdown on the streets of San Francisco—shouting verses in Chinatown before being involuntarily hospitalized. For approximately two decades, Woon’s ambitions and studies were interrupted by the vicissitudes of his illness673.
Yet poetry became, in his words, “a lifeline” and “form of self-therapy.” Writing allowed him to structure his fragmented reality. As Woon has written, “poetry saved my life—along with the care of psychotherapists, the kindness of my dear friend Betty Irene Priebe, and a continuous parade of literary friends”78. This therapeutic necessity endows his work with an emotional intensity and immediacy that has resonated across cultural and literary boundaries.
Woon’s re-emergence in his forties, stabilized and intellectually revitalized, marks an atypically late-blooming literary career. He speaks honestly of being “a big frog in a little pond” in the niche world of Asian-American poetry, and of how writing was never simply a hobby or career for him—but an “urgent means of survival and healing”.
Literary Achievement: Poetry, Memoir, and Thematic Concerns
Poetry Publications
Woon’s first major poetry book, “The Truth in Rented Rooms” (Kaya Press, 1998), encapsulates his years living in Seattle’s Chinatown—writing from the isolation and adversity of tenement hotels and low-income neighborhoods. Reviewers including Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Sam Hamill, and Bob Holman lavished praise upon the collection, identifying Woon as a voice for the Asian diaspora and for marginalized Americans: “Li Po in modern drag, the voice of New America,” wrote Holman91011. Ferlinghetti, in particular, celebrated Woon’s ability to animate the diaspora through his poetry.
His subsequent volume, “Water Chasing Water” (Kaya Press, 2013), compiles 40 years of poetic work and deepens his exploration of themes such as exile, memory, mental illness, and philosophical inquiry. “The High Walls I Cannot Scale,” a poem from the collection, exemplifies Woon’s capacity to merge the personal and the universal, evoking solitude in Chinatowns alongside the emotional distances of all diaspora communities12.
Other volumes further expand his literary life:
- Paper-son Poet: When Rails Were Young (2016), a multi-genre memoir interlaced with poetry and interviews, reflects on the “shadows” of immigrant heritage and the realities of displacement, mental illness, and class hierarchy in Chinatowns313;
- Rice Bowls: Previously Uncollected Words of Koon Woon (2018), compiles previously uncollected or unpublished work, and testifies to his resilience and ongoing literary production45.
Memoir and Prose
Paper-son Poet exemplifies the genre-blurring that has become Woon’s signature: it mixes prose stories, poems, and an extensive interview (notably with Frank Chin), presenting a psychological and spiritual excavation of his past32. It reaches for allegory (e.g. Plato’s cave as a metaphor for both immigrant illusions and enlightenment) and emphasizes the importance of “naming” one’s reality in the face of inherited stories and received identities.
Literary Themes and Innovations
Every element of Woon’s oeuvre is inflected by his biography—childhood impoverishment, legal/cultural duress, prodigious reading, intellectual isolation, mental illness, itinerancy, and ultimately, recovery. His poems frequently focus on:
- The existential conditions of the immigrant poor, particularly Chinese and Asian Americans
- Loneliness and alienation, especially as experienced in urban Chinatowns
- Family history, especially paternal legacy and the “paper son” phenomenon
- Meta-literary rumination: the act of writing as survival, self-healing, and philosophical investigation
- The interface of Western analytic thought, Chinese classical influences, and modern American experience
Woon’s poems are also notable for their blend of lyricism and plain speech, their fusion of street-level observation with philosophical ambition, and for their oscillation between classical Chinese and contemporary American literary lineages11938.
Awards, Recognitions, and Editorial Roles
Woon’s literary excellence has been widely recognized:
- The Truth in Rented Rooms won the PEN Oakland/Josephine Miles Award and was a finalist for the Poetry Society of America’s Norma Farber First Book Award10914,
- Water Chasing Water won the American Book Award from the Before Columbus Foundation in 2014495.
He is also the recipient of multiple nominations for the Pushcart Prize and had a poem nominated as the “best poem on the Internet” by Asia Cha journal in Hong Kong in 20131014.
As an editor, publisher, and mentor, Woon operates Goldfish Press and has long edited the print and later online poetry journal Chrysanthemum, and established the online-only Five Willows Literary Review. In these venues, he has mentored hundreds of emerging poets and writers, offering both editorial insight and direct, often immediate feedback. The non-profit Chrysanthemum Literary Society underwrites these efforts and boasts federal 501(c)(3) status, with a mission of promoting literature, education, and world peace through the arts1516.
Koon Woon’s Significance in Contemporary Literature
Koon Woon is emblematic of literary achievement outside traditional institutional frameworks, combining working-class sensibility and immigrant perspective with philosophical, poetic, and editorial sophistication.
- Insider-outsider status: Woon brings to his work the vantage of a literary outsider who never received a creative writing MFA or a tenure-track job, and is thoroughly self-taught, yet has achieved broad recognition.
- Bridge between communities: By integrating Chinese classical traditions (particularly the influence of Tang poets, Tao Qian, and the Angel Island poets) with Beat poetics and American realism, he builds “a bridge between East and West, past and present,” as several critics note113.
- Witness and advocacy: In both poem and prose, Woon is a witness to lives on the margins—the dispossessed, mentally unwell, working poor—and an advocate for “making one’s own name” against injustice and erasure.
- Mentorship and community-building: As an editor and publisher, he has created and sustained platforms for other marginalized writers, often mentoring those with little institutional or economic support, and fostering a participatory, anti-elitist literary culture in Seattle and beyond17.
- Public engagement: Woon’s poetry has appeared in major anthologies (e.g., “Premonitions: The Kaya Anthology of New Asian North American Poetry”), and has been featured on programs such as PBS NewsHour and Seattle’s KUOW radio, broadening his impact112.
Through all these achievements, Woon stands as a model of literary survival and creativity—a writer whose “odds-defying” career, as one Five Willows essay puts it, is itself a refutation of the marginalization he endured8.
The Five Willows Literary Review: Origins, History, and Editorial Vision
Historical Overview
The Five Willows Literary Review (also called Five Willows or Five Willows Literary Society) was established c. 2013 in Seattle by Koon Woon as a digital literary magazine under the umbrella of the nonprofit Chrysanthemum Literary Society. Part of a continuum that includes Goldfish Press and the long-running (since 1990) print/online journal Chrysanthemum, Five Willows represents both a continuation and an evolution of Woon’s editorial mission1816.
The Review’s title and spirit are rooted in the life and legend of Tao Yuan-Ming (Tao Qian), a major Classical Chinese poet known as “Mr. Five Willows” for the five willow trees shading his rural home. Tao Qian’s poetry championed rustic simplicity, philosophical reflection, perseverance in poverty, and a love for wine. The Five Willows Review, explicitly “publishes literary arts in the spirit of Mr. Five Willows, a poor poet who was fond of wine,” signaling its embrace of the humble, the resilient, and the reflective18.
Editorial Mission and Focus
The Review’s mission—as stated on its site and in statements from Woon—is:
- To promote literature, education, and world peace through artistic exchange
- To publish work that “fits the spirit of Mr. Five Willows”—work that is simple, wise, resilient, and true to lived experience
- To support and showcase emerging as well as established writers, with special attention to those writing at the margins of the literary apparatus
- To encourage contributions from writers embodying multiple identities, genres, and geographies
- To maintain an international, cross-cultural conversation about literature, justice, and humanity181916
The journal publishes original poetry, fiction, nonfiction, book reviews, literary criticism, and occasional blog-style essays. Woon’s own writing—prose explorations, poetic experiments, memoir fragments, responses to world events—appears alongside work from contributors across North America, Europe, and Asia.
Online Presence and Submission Policy
The Review maintains an active blog-based platform, regularly updated and featuring new writing, commentary, and announcements (such as contests, readings, and calls for submissions).
Key features of its online presence:
- Accessibility: Open submissions by email, with a stated response time ranging from immediate to within two weeks. Submissions are to be sent both in the body of the email and as Word attachments19.
- Inclusivity: Accepts work from all geographies and backgrounds, as long as it resonates with the journal’s mission and the legacy of “Mr. Five Willows.”
- Transparency and Community: Editorial feedback is often direct, at times even posted publicly on the site; occasional essays reflect on the editorial process or the dilemmas of literary curation20.
- IRS-recognized nonprofit status: As a project of the Chrysanthemum Literary Society, the Review is not-for-profit; all donations are tax-deductible, furthering its mission of community-centered literary work1516.
Readership and Impact
Despite operating without the resources or reputation of a university-affiliated or New York-based journal, Five Willows has developed a robust, international readership—recent site metrics show traffic from the Netherlands, United States, Germany, Russia, Sweden, China, Austria, Iran, Singapore, and elsewhere, with thousands of views weekly19. The Review serves as a literary commons where voices from various social locations participate on equal footing, echoing Tao Qian’s vision of the willow-grove as both retreat and community.
The journal has also hosted readings—both in person (notably at SoulFood Poetry Night in Seattle) and online—with contributors including Sandra Noel, Bethany Reid, Margaret Roncone, and Woon himself18.
Notable Contributors and Editorial Community
Five Willows Literary Review has published an impressive and diverse array of poets, writers, and critics, including:
- Scarlett Phelan
- Simon Perchik
- Andrena Zawinski
- Maura Gage Cavell
- Bethany Reid (winner of the 2012 Gell Poetry Prize; regular reader at events)
- Sandra Noel (visual artist and poet)
- Margaret Roncone (poet and reading curator)
- Keith Holyoak
- James Bertolino
- Katherine Grace Bond
- Kevin Minh Allen
- Thaddeus Rutkowski
- Matt Briggs
- Joe Musso
- David Fewster
- Dr. Ann Reitan
- Donald Gasperson
- Alison Mandaville
- Koon Woon (editor, sometimes contributor)1718
This list is far from exhaustive, but underscores the journal’s commitment to both well-published and lesser-known writers, and to genres ranging from poetry to fiction and critical prose. The Review’s connection to the Pacific Northwest literary scene is especially strong, but its geographic reach is global.
Five Willows also explicitly includes work by writers incarcerated or writing from the margins of society—reflecting Woon’s own history and editorial priorities20. In an editorial reflection, Woon describes the difficult but principled decision not to publish the work of a Southern prisoner whose submissions remained trapped in the “present situation,” demonstrating the Review’s commitment to insight and transformative vision as well as authenticity.
Cross-publication is common: several contributors to Five Willows also publish in Chrysanthemum, another Woon-edited journal, and are featured at events or in related anthologies.
The Role of Five Willows Literary Review in the Literary Community
Mentorship and Literary Activism
Five Willows is distinguished by its commitment to literary mentorship and activist inclusivity. Woon openly frames part of the Review’s mission as “nurturing talent that may otherwise be overlooked by mainstream journals, especially writers dealing with poverty, mental illness, immigration, incarceration, or other forms of marginalization”.
Editorial approach: Feedback is forthright and, at times, pedagogic—Woon’s own story of reviewing (and ultimately rejecting) a prisoner’s submissions is one example of the difficult, hands-on editorial work required in activist literary spaces20.
Literary Community and Internationalism
In the era of borderless digital publishing, Five Willows has intentionally fostered international dialogue, with contributors and readers from across Europe, Asia, and the Americas. Its openness to translated work, and its philosophical commitment to world peace and cross-cultural understanding, position it as more than simply a local or ethnic literary review.
The Review’s events—such as readings at Seattle’s SoulFood Poetry Night—help bridge online and offline community, expanding its impact and connecting diverse literary publics18.
Nonprofit Support and Advocacy
As a nonprofit initiative (Chrysanthemum Literary Society, IRS tax-exempt since August 2018), Five Willows is part of a broader ecosystem of grassroots literary advocacy in Seattle. All donations support continued publication, readings, and contests, such as the Betty Irene Priebe Poetry Prize—awarded for “poetry that promotes human warmth, kindness, and literary excellence”2115.
Accessibility and Non-English Literary Influence
Echoing the legacy of Tao Qian, the journal is open to writers whose primary language may not be English, and whose forms may be unconventional. This inclusivity both broadens its range and deepens its connection to the exilic and non-institutional roots of much American poetry.
Connection between Koon Woon and Five Willows Literary Review
The Five Willows Literary Review is both an extension and a laboratory for Koon Woon’s artistic and personal convictions.
- Direct editorial control: Woon not only founded and edits the Review but also shapes its mission, aesthetic, and community engagement.
- Autobiographical editorial ethos: The Review’s welcoming of “outsider” voices is a conscious reply to Woon’s own history of exclusion and struggle within the literary field; Woon’s journey from rural poverty, alienation, and mental illness to literary recognition is both a template and a beacon for contributors.
- Mentor and connector: Via Five Willows (and Chrysanthemum), Woon functions as a mentor, connector, and at times advocate for literary talent not easily absorbed by mainstream publishing. The journal thereby operates as both platform and shelter—continuing, in digital form, the tradition of willow-tree hospitality and philosophical resilience associated with Tao Qian and the classical poets of solitude.
- Community and cross-pollination: The Review often publishes or links to work originating in Goldfish Press, Chrysanthemum, and other related projects, creating a web of interconnected literary spaces defined by shared purpose and overlapping personnel.
Submission Guidelines and Editorial Practice
The Five Willows Literary Review remains notably accessible:
- Email submissions are encouraged (sent both in the body of the email and as an attached Word file) to Koon Woon directly.
- Editorial feedback is sometimes immediate, sometimes within two weeks. The process is informal and eschews the bureaucracy and delays of larger journals19.
- Openness to genre and form: The Review considers poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, book reviews, and critical essays.
- Invitation to new writers: The Five Willows ethos supports novice writers, outsiders to the academy, and those without formal credentials or connections.
The Review explicitly requests work that fits the “spirit of Mr. Five Willows”—that is, writing imbued with humility, wisdom, endurance, and an affinity for the underdog or overlooked18.
Contribution to the Broader Literary Ecosystem
Five Willows is more than a publication; it is an activist, nurturing space:
- Platform for visibility: By featuring literary work from across the world and emphasizing authentic engagement over prestige credentials, Five Willows gives visibility to writers who might otherwise remain peripheral.
- Mentoring tradition: The Review continues Woon’s own path of being mentored (notably by Nelson Bentley) and of “passing it forward” within the literary community81.
- Community events and readings: Through public readings, contests, and events, the Review supports live engagement and connection, not just solitary reading.
- Nonprofit, mission-driven model: The Review’s operation as part of a 501(c)(3) organization ensures that its primary allegiance is to community rather than commerce; revenue (such as donations) sustains programming rather than personal profit1516.
- Bridge for the marginalized: As a venue that explicitly works with (and on behalf of) marginalized writers—by identity, experience, or geography—the Review is part of a network of oppositional literary spaces seeking to democratize cultural production.
Continuing Legacy and International Reach
The digital era has enabled Five Willows Literary Review to achieve a truly international reach. Recent viewership demonstrates sustained interest across multiple continents, with contributors regularly submitting work from outside the United States19. Its influence is seen not only in the success of individual contributors, but also in the increasing visibility of Pacific Northwestern and Asian-American literary scenes on the global stage.
Five Willows thus serves as a model of how local, mission-driven, nonprofit literary efforts can assume global significance. It amplifies voices at the margins of culture—qualitatively expanding the canon and reminding American letters of its immigrant, exilic roots.
Conclusion
Koon Woon embodies the triumph of creative resilience over daunting odds—transforming personal trauma, exile, and mental illness into original, hard-won poetic insight. His literary and editorial work, inseparable from his biography, fosters community, cross-cultural exchange, and a radically inclusive vision of literary justice. The Five Willows Literary Review, as his digital and ethical extension, continues this legacy: a literary commons grounded in humility, open-heartedness, and the belief that every willow (and every poet) matters.
Their entwined story demonstrates that in an era of mass literary production, the spaces that matter most may be those that are least institutional, most fragile, and, paradoxically, most enduring—the willow-groves of late modernity, where the winds of adversity become the breezes of renewal.
This report is based on an exhaustive review of digital sources and draws on interviews, editorial statements, published poems, critical essays, nonprofit filings, and journalistic features to present a comprehensive, contextually rich account of Koon Woon, his literary achievements, and the ongoing work of Five Willows Literary Review.
References
21
Son of Paper Son: an interview with Koon Woon – Rain Taxi
Paper-Son Poet by Koon Kau Woon – Goodreads
Koon Woon’s Paper-son Poet explores shadows, realities of the past
Koon Woon | The Poetry Foundation
Koon Woon – Vermont College of Fine Arts
Odds Koon Woon faced to become a notable poet
Koon Woon on Survival through Poetry
Five Willows Literary Review: Rarity of Koon Woon’s Poetic Genius
The Truth In Rented Rooms – kaya.com
The Truth In Rented Rooms – amazon.com
Koon Woon – Kaya Press
Poet Koon Woon on his verses of solitude and the working-class …
Paper-son Poet: When rails were young… Paperback – amazon.com
The Truth in Rented Rooms: Woon, Koon: 9781885030252: Books – Amazon.ca
Chrysanthemum Literary Society · Koon K Woon
Five Willows Literary Society is a nonprofit charitable organization
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Five Willows Literary Review: October 2020
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