Video: Central Oregon poet recounts a year COVID-19, fear in 'Last Year'

"I'm first generation. My mom was born in the Philippines," she said. "I think with everything that happened with COVID, my specific experience was a lot about fear."

Though she hasn't experienced COVID-19-related threats or violence, she's well aware of the uptick in violence against Asian Americans.

"Most people think I look Middle Eastern or Mexican, like no one really knows that I'm Asian," she said. "Personally, I'm not receiving a lot of threats about coronavirus or the 'Asian virus,' which is a big thing … especially for older folks. So that was really in the forefront in my mind right now."

Amascual didn't start off a poet, but her artistic bent — along with trauma she experienced in her 20s — led her there anyway. 

"I do a lot of different kinds of art, and so I think over time, poetry just became one of them. I didn't study poetry or anything like that in school," said the 34-year-old Amascual, who holds a bachelor's degree in economics and a master's in public policy and administration.

Amascual started out working in politics in Los Angeles, but "burned out really fast," she said. After five years, Amascual decided to make a 180-degree turn.

"I left political work and I just decided I was going to open a store and do something for myself that was more, to me at the time, slow-paced and fulfilling creatively," she said. "It was like a metaphysical shop. We had community meet-ups, meditations, but we also sold books, poetry, flowers and crystals and all these amazing things."

The shop, Flowers Magic Meditation, also had a stage and began holding open mic nights.

"We had a lot of singer-songwriters and also a lot of poets," she said. "We teamed up down there with a poetry publisher who also did a lot of pop-up poetry readings around Los Angeles, and so we started hosting them. And that is kind of how I got started, more so hosting and stuff. I was drawn to poetry and art in general."

Her therapist suggested she write, too.

"My writing started off as journaling, and then very quickly turned into poetry," she said. 

Two years ago, she closed down her Los Angeles business and moved to Central Oregon, where she found an anemic poetry scene. 

"There isn't much in terms of poetry gatherings, readings, plans, meet-ups, spoken word," she said.

Upon moving to Bend, Amascual met Bend poet, artist and rapper Jason Graham, aka Mosley Wotta, a key role player in the local poetry community over the past couple of decades — including the popular monthly poetry slams that took place in Bend over a decade ago.

Amascual recalls saying to him, "Jason, come on, this is it?'" 

Their plans to change that include reviving a bimonthly or monthly slam.

"He and I, right before the pandemic, connected about trying to start it back up," she said. "We were going to launch it, and then COVID happened, and so everything took a screeching hold. … Maybe here this summer, we'll be able to hold some stuff outdoors."