blue jorts, white jirt

in the mood for moon

what a gay gamble, every little poem of mine

the poet-scholar-translators are the coolest poets

so many of my happy (happiest?) moments are alone with a notebook

i love a super gingery ginger ale

one of my favorite expressions in chinese is 完蛋 (wándàn), which means doomed, to be done for, cooked. and it literally means finished egg, though not a cooked one. a cooked egg is beautiful. a finished egg is disastrous.

tree love is true love

revisiting this Mary Oliver poem. or it’s revisiting me.

just finished working on a whole book of poems and all i want to do is write a new poem. what is wrong with me and how is it my whole life and why do i love it

time! is weird!!

it makes me sad when people seem to have a huge vocabulary for critiquing writing but very few ways to describe what moves them, what they find effective or exciting or memorable, what they love—and why

something about a late-night sandwich is more replenishing than any other food at any other time

love being a gay guy and texting my gay guy friends other gay guys' posts (big butts) with a message that's like "Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all / Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know" and them texting me back "i saw this already"

a Dickinson poem i might get tattooed.

make art with your friends!!! perform art with your friends!!! BE art with your friends!!!

YES this really is so important!

such gay nonsense are my days, and i wouldn’t have it any other way

so important to coordinate poetry reading outfits with your bestie for your joint poetry reading

the question "why are you a poet?" seems to me much like the question "why are you gay?" as if i could explain. and even if i could, i wouldn't want to. i like thinking of poetry and queerness in a similar way—that which needs no explanation. all the most beautiful things don't.

i need to eat much more ice cream this summer. i need to eat much more ice cream in general.

sorry i can't make it to your thing, i'm exploring some really wild conundrums rn

Friends!! The Kettle Pond Writers' Conference is June 20-27 this year and there's still tons of FELLOWSHIP FUNDING STILL AVAILABLE!! Come hang out with @chenchenwrites.bsky.social and I by the lake and write some poems with us!! It's the best week of the year. kettlepondwriters.com

the older i get the more clearly i see just how much trend-chasing there is in poetry (a phenomenon that has always existed, i suspect). and i want to encourage poets, especially younger ones, to give up the chase, to write instead according to your own concerns, courages, strange uncouth pulses.

receiving blurbs for my craft book (which will be out from @noemipress.bsky.social in december) and wow. i feel so lucky to be read with care by writers who i admire so deeply.

Happiness is being on the beam with life—to feel the pull of life. —Agnes Martin

Know that the desire to be perfect is probably the veiled expression of another desire—to be loved, perhaps, or not to die. —Ron Padgett, from "How to Be Perfect"

really into people, places, and things these days

sometimes sneezing is way too embarrassing, like why did i just achoo so achooly

in the mood for tteokbokki

forgot how good flat whites are. remembering now :)

If you don't have a song to sing, you're okay You know how to get along, humming —Fiona Apple, from "Waltz (Better Than Fine)"

On my way home, I ask the sky to come down and keep me company, but the sky prefers its own boundlessness. —Yuki Tanaka, from "Chronicle of Drifting"

and: 250 hampshire college staff & faculty are facing sudden job loss without severance pay. please support this emergency fund if you can/help spread the word. helphampshireworkers.com

please check out this urgent community effort to reimagine hampshire college. and make a pledge if you can. hampshirenext.org

my fetish is revising a poem until i hate it :)

in a weird mood today (and always)

good gay sex and good chinese food really are everything

tbh i don't think you should be judging any sort of poetry prize if you're completely cynical about poetry *except* for the kind you and your friends write (how convenient)

i need a lot of gay experiences after being out in the straight world for too long

i hate it when people act like i didn’t understand their point. i understood it perfectly. i just think you’re wrong.

white leftists’ fantasies re: china are once again getting out of hand.

idk maybe time for a moratorium on white leftist hipster opinions on work by writers of color.

it reminded me of being back in grad school (derogatory)

i hate it when someone clearly has a need to act like the smartest person in the room. though it is funny when they just end up saying stupid things right off the bat.

bringing up that the CIA supported the creation of the Iowa Writers' Workshop has gotta be a leftist cliché in creative writing discourse now. sorry this is such a niche complaint. but if you're using that as some serious critique of writing you just dislike... lol.

very glad right now to not be working full-time for any white literary institution, especially any predominantly white english department. i don't know how faculty of color do it. one long, tiring meeting and i'm done.

have you ever encountered a level of snobbery that you're shocked still exists?

well, that was one of the worst professional experiences of my life. and i've been through some wild ones. anyway, i've given my feedback.

was just on zoom for ~6 hours. this should not be allowed lol