from Male Lust Jul 6, 2020 quotes “Think of a judicial system that not only favors heterosexuality but reserves its favor for specific types of heterosexuality: not S/M—that could Lines That Didn’t Make The Cut: Ruth’s Story Jul 1, 2020 my work & poetry It wasn’t like I showed him anything he hadn’t seen before. Besides, he took the ones with clothes, the good ones, only if I did a few from the Commonplace Question #1: How Did You Become a Poet? Jun 28, 2020 my work & poetry & commonplace questions I’ve been listening to Rachel Zucker’s Commonplace podcast for about two and a half years now. If you don’t know it, it’s definitely worth checking The Ethics of Bearing Witness in Poetry to Violence and Trauma Jun 13, 2020 my work & poetry The issues raised when one chooses to make literary art out of trauma are complex. Over at the Ploughshares blog, for example, Tracy Strauss has a If You Read Rumi in English, Read This New Yorker Article Jun 5, 2020 iran & translation & poetry & islam & sufism Written by Rozina Ali, the article is called “The Erasure of Islam from the Poetry of Rumi,” and it says something that Iranians I know have been Lines That Didn’t Make the Cut: Remembering Claudia Jun 3, 2020 poetry & my work The revision process leaves every writer with bits and pieces of work that no longer belong to the poem or story or whatever where they first from God’s Phallus, by Howard Eilberg-Schwartz Jun 1, 2020 quotes & feminism If the deity is the father writ large, then this divine masculinity is by no means simply a confirmation of human masculinity. It is at the same “Stand By Me” in Persian and English May 31, 2020 iran I was going through my old posts and I found this video from back in 2009, when demonstrations in response to Iran’s contested elections had the Craft Talk 2: Packing Lines with Sound & Meaning - Rosa Alice Branco, translated by Alexis Levitin May 29, 2020 poetry It’s hard to write about craft when you’re talking about a translation, especially if you can’t read the original, because it’s not always possible from “The Necessity to Speak,” by Sam Hamill May 26, 2020 poetry & quotes “The true poet gives up the self. The I of my poem is not me. It is the first person impersonal, it is permission for you to enter the experience I Just Learned About the Equal Justice Initiative - If You Don’t Know About It, You Should May 20, 2020 jewish & race In “The Lines That Antisemitism and Racism Draw,” a series of letters I composed during the summer of 2016 that were published in December of that Craft Talk 1: Quincy Troupe’s Rhythm May 16, 2020 poetry I’ve been reading The Architecture of Language, by Quincy Troupe, and I have been fascinated by how rhythm and syntax interact in the way he builds Reading Mark Nowak’s “Social Poetics:” Thinking About The First Tuesdays Cento and A ‘Flipped Script’ Poetry Reading May 13, 2020 poetry I’m just a single chapter into Mark Nowak’s Social Poetics—the chapter is called “A People’s History of the Poetry Workshop: Watts, New York City, My Year Long Writing Project May 8, 2020 poetry So. Thinking it would help prod me to start blogging regularly again—and, specifically, to start blogging about all things poetry and writing—I “My Companion’s Scent Seeped Into Me” - National Sa’di Day Apr 21, 2019 translation & jewish Today is National Sa’di Day, and I’ve been thinking about one of my favorite bits of verse from his Golestan: I held in my bath a perfumed piece of Prepping For Fall 2018: The Poetry Workshop Aug 10, 2018 poetry This is from an essay called “Here Today,” in Hayden Carruth’s Effluences from the Sacred Caves. In my early years as a poet, I learned more about Rachelle Escamilla’s Interview with Me On “Out of Our Minds” on KKUP Cupertino | San Jose Jan 26, 2018 my work & audio Rachelle Escamilla · Richard Jeffrey Newman on KKUP I had the pleasure last week of spending an hour talking with Rachelle Escamilla, who Some Thoughts About Harvey Weinstein and What He Represents Oct 16, 2017 feminism & sexual violence I met the man I have come to think of as my Harvey Weinstein when I was around 13 years old. He was the head waiter at the catering hall where I Trying to Write After Charlottesville Aug 26, 2017 jewish & race & my work I’ve been trying to write something in response to Charlottesville for the past two weeks, but I’ve had a hard time finding the words. It’s not that “Between the 1930s and the year 2000…only 32 novels were translated from Arabic into Hebrew.” Aug 20, 2017 translation The post that statistic in the title comes from is from 2011. It’s by Olivia Snaije, Arabic and Hebrew: The Politics of Literary Translation, on the