New York Walkabout, Day 2
I better post this before it fades from memory. I would have gotten to it last week, but I have been chairing a search committee in my department and that has required a lot of time and attention (and which, to speak honestly, has been a terrific emotional drain). Anyway, NYC seems like a long [...]
NYC Walkabout, Day One
Left the hotel early on Friday morning and walked slowly uptown, got a coffee at one of the two million Starbucks along Broadway, and went to sit in Union Square for awhile watching dogs and people, mostly dogs. Bright, cool morning & everyone — canine & human — looked frisky. Went to the Strand and [...]
Breaking the Ice
I don’t think I’ve gone this long without posting something since I started blogging almost nine years ago. It’s been a busy semester — I’ve been serving on a search committee and a planning committee, both of which have had to navigate certain controversial issues. And I’m teaching a survey course — American Lit I [...]
Song: On Hearing That the Obama Administration Intends to Cut the Budget for the National Endowment for the Humanities
Song The fuck you say? Two hundred million (or whatever it is) won’t keep the Marines in bullets for a day. The fuck you say? The Pentagon won’t deign to wipe its ass with anything less than a couple billion. The fuck you say? An ancient master noted: All things are empty, true, but differences still count. [...]
The Poet as Buddhist Computer Geek
Meditation Note
My head is a house With a hundred billion hipsters Snapping their fingers To bad jazz
Vietnam Seems Far Away
Vietnam seems very far away at the moment. It’s below zero here and I’ve been running for ten days to catch up from . . . being in Vietnam. In a few days’ time I’ve gone from the leisurely life of a poet in a tropical clime to being a professor of literature living beside a frozen [...]
Observation
Sitting in LAX waiting for the redeye to JFK. I haven’t experienced any delays because of increased security. Hanoi’s Noibai Airport was not crowded today and everything worked smoothly; Taipei was no problem, either, though they were doing random searches after clearing the gate and before getting on the plane. And LAX was all right, too, [...]
Cafe Nau Nong
I am well and truly here, now that I have had my first cup of cafe nau nong–literally, hot brown coffee–at a cafe beside Hoan Kiem Lake. On my first morning in Hanoi, almost fourteen years ago now, I stumbled out of my hotel and found a small cafe, where I had my first taste [...]
Hanoi
Arrived after a day and a half in transit, my back aching and my legs a little wobbly, but in good spirits. I’m staying in the same hotel as last spring and it feels as if I’ve hardly been away. On the drive in from the airport — through the Red river swamps and paddies [...]
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