In a featured Getting to Know interview with Mass Poetry, Medford Poet Laureate Vijaya Sundaram shares her journey into poetry—from discovering a love of verse as a child in Chennai to carrying those early inspirations with her to the United States—and reflects on the literary influences and creative impulses that shape her work. The conversation offers a rare personal glimpse into her reading life, her poetic process, and the balance she strives for between imagery, emotion, and meaning in her writing.