On teaching Asian American Lit for the first time
Johann G Herder on Kant
“The history of mankind, of nations and of nature, natural science, mathematics and his own experience were the wellsprings which animated his lectures and his everyday life. He was never indifferent to anything worth knowing. No intrigue, no sectional interests, no advantage, no desire for fame ever possessed the slightest power to counteract his extension and illumination of truth. He encouraged and gently compelled people to think for themselves: despotism was alien to his nature.”
Read MoreArtists in National Parks
I want the National Parks Service to run a major grant program that fully funds travel and support for writers and artists–especially from communities who are less likely to utilize the Park System— to visit, camp, hike our national parks and produce writing, artwork, film, dance, music inspired by our landscapes. Let’s go Ford, Carnegie, Guggenheim, NEA, NEH, AWP. Let’s go, Oprah. Let’s go, rich Apple guy and the other guy who does the other computers. Figure it out. #artistsinnationalparks
Read MoreField exercise
Think of a field — imagined or from memory. You can describe the field, but I’ll suggest another challenge:
Write down all the rules of that field.
Every field has its rules. A meadow or clearing abides by the rules of its ecology (ecologies). A magnetic field or a field of energy has its rules. Think of graveyards and gardens, which are curated fields. Or mine- and battlefields. One of the horrors of war is that its violence exposes the interior of buildings and homes to the outside–an abrupt return to some version of their original state— field. (Most human structures seem to want to arrest the field, which isn’t just a space but a process; the field in nature is always changing.)
At Length » Brooklyn Antediluvian →
People often ask how long it takes me to write a poem. I’ve been working on the same 11 pages for almost six years. I’m grateful to Jonathan Farmerfor publishing “Brooklyn Antediluvian” in At Length Magazine. The poem is about floods of the imagination, gentrification, violence, memory, joy, names, but also a bit about real floods, Katrina, Ondoy, Sandy. I should say too, that Galeano’s gone, but I’m hoping somehow some of his spirit is in this poem. Also, I hope you enjoy it:
… When my mother married my father, as goes
the Western tradition, she changed her name
from Gelacio, which is Spanish, derived
from Gelasius, the Latin name of an African
pope, a Berber, they say. Look how far
a name can travel, borne by a brown body
whose old name vanished when he crossed
the sea as one condition for him to rule
the Christian world, which he did,
according to some, with wicked orthodoxy.
32 Essential Asian-American Writers You Need To Be Reading →
MFA Writing Alum Festival | Facebook →
I’m headed back to Sarah Lawrence College on Saturday for their MFA Alumni Festival. 11am, Ross Gay and I are giving a craft talk titled BFF XOXO
BFF XOXO with Ross Gay and Patrick Rosal
Each writer interviews the other about poems from their collections.
They’ll talk about process, shared and divergent artistic influences,
how they didn’t once take a class together at Sarah Lawrence College
but turned their XOXO into almost two decades of collaboration in
teaching, editing, writing, and a whole lot of other jackassery.