a.m. / p.m.

before the weight of water:

A boy carrying empty plastic containers follows his mother to help her fetch water, in Dala township, about 15 kilometers (9 miles) south of Rangoon, Burma. Several regions and states face acute water shortage especially in the summer. – voice of america, day in photos (from a week or so ago)

_______

it’s better to eat the sugar all at once
kaya says rather than having a bunch of insulin spikes in a day
we are walking the one block back from what i call
the trifecta of goodness
(sin lee market, minh hoa market, hing long market)
(a smaller slice of what others call ‘little saigon’)
with ginger candy, coconut water, dried mango and cookies called egg rolls
in our bag

_______

schedule taped to the wall at f & c’s place

any questions?

from a fellow maker

the u.s. military now says 102 or 166 prisoners are on strike while lawyers for the prisoners maintain the number is higher.
amy goodman tells it like it is
when she speaks of guantánamo bay
where the hunger strike has reached its 100th day
the prisoners launched their protest against indefinite detention in early fFebruary. most have been held for more than a decade without charge or trial

_______
it would be really good for my process to see you this summer
says barker (whom i met at art farm last summer)
which is one of the best lines ever to receive from a fellow maker

_______

sun-colored man with dreads for a helmet
and i bike down the same street
(35th on trash day
which means the bike lane is not actually useable
because it is filled with people’s trash and recycling bins)
each of us loaded with panniers on our racks
i like your bike he says
but i think what he’s really referring to is the glitter stickers
i like YOUR bike
i reply

_______

the book i would rather hold between my knees or
press between my upper arm and side
(whilst teeth brushing or doing things other than reading)
than put down

_______

day of two mice:
1. scrambling in the compost (so hot, it steamed as i dug into it)

2. running around my tiny stove

_______

list of spices for a wok full of chana masala:
hot green chili pepper, minced
ground coriander
ground cumin
ground cayenne pepper
ground turmeric
cumin seeds, toasted and ground
amchoor powder
paprika
garam masala
not to mention grated fresh ginger and
minced garlic

_______

an hour or two into a failed attempt with a cursive typewriter
i plug in
and after another hour or so
arrive at this

this is no small-scale catastrophe

over tom kha for lunch
i say something like
well, the world is going down
(this is no small-scale catastrophe)
but we (meaning all of us) can at least love each other while it falls

_______

rene hands me an orange flyer
and puts an orange sticker on my sweater
the color of the jumpsuits in media photographs
the color of hunger pain
(rigid tubes forced down nose into throat)
will you fast with me
rene says
in solidarity

_______

discovered on the internerd
The International Dark-Sky Association is the only
non-profit organization fighting to preserve the night.

_______

a day in the life of water:

Protesters clash with riot police during a protest against Turkey’s Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan and the government’s foreign policy on Syria, in Istanbul, Turkey. – voice of america, day in photos

A diver (L) rescues a man who was trapped in a flooded semi-underground store for 8 hours after heavy downpours hit Xiamen, Fujian province, China. – voice of america, day in photos

A boy bathes in a stream at Dara on the outskirts of Srinagar, India. – voice of america, day in photos

the anniversary that quietly came and went

last week, the detail collector turned four.

here’s what that looks like in numbers:
1,276 posts
43,892 views (from over 90 countries)
and 591 comments
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
not that those nubmers are what make this. there are other numbers too.  in the first year, it was about getting to 365.  once i got there, it was about making it to year three (three. it’s such a good number.) this fourth year has mostly felt like an absence, despite the almost daily showing up (missed a good amount during summer travel and during gradschool crunch). a year where i wonder what this practice is showing me. (in the first year, it revealed so much. and now, it is difficult to tell.) a year where gradschool slammed me to the ground. a year of water and transition.

a year where i begin to consider the paragraph because my linebreaks aren’t doing the work that a linebreak can do. a year where it becomes clear to me that that even though what drew me to gradschool was not the degree but the work i would dig into, i have unintentionally landed on some kind of career path.  it is a pretty dismal one. (universities hiring as many adjunct profs as they can so they don’t have to guarantee more than a semester of employment and don’t have to carry the cost of offering health care. arts funding slashed and slashed and slashed. i’ve been meaning to keep a running list now, of all the application/submission fees – but i’ve never been much of a budgeter [just close my eyes and put the money in the credit union and hope it stays there for a while]). i try to believe it’s not dismal. i try to believe, like anna joy said, do what you love and it will all come to you. and i do believe that. but it is also real, this capitalism (getting sharper and sharper) i am living under. like, i’d make more money doing restaurant work (if it tips well) than i would teaching. i’d make a lot more money doing sex work than teaching. i’d make a lot more money if i took the path a lot of my current students are taking towards working in bioengineering. it’s never been about the money, the wealth, but the sense of security the d0llars bring. as kate once said when she was visitin brazil, there is very little money between me and the sidewalk.

anyhow. i’ve been wondering for a while if showing up to the detail collector is like showing up to the assembly line lately. even though the showing up isn’t always joyful, it’s difficult to think about leaving. which is why i’m not. not yet. maybe not ever. happy anniversary, baby. we make good work together.

_______

news from the water world:

Police use water cannon to disperse the hundreds of Indian Youth Congress party supporters protesting in New Delhi against the Bharathiya Janata Party’s demand for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s resignation. – bbc day in pictures

_______

and then there’s this. (the most important page of my thesis… which is not quite finished yet but should have been dropped in my thesis committee member’s mailboxes yesterday.) the dedication page:

not copyright, copyriot

this weekend i said something about coming
home, home being the structure we (queer/genderqueer/trans poets)
create/become when we gather in the same place
home being this thing inside
us meaning the next
time one of us encounters the other, it is really like
encountering all 100some creatures who converged this weekend
and when i said these things this weekend i was
tired because the sun spilled early
over the roof i slept on
which means my voice was worn and by the looks of the people around me while i spoke this
i think they thought i was going to cry
which i kindof almost maybe was
but didn’t realize it til i saw it on their faces

_______

san diego cabs whose names i have begun to write down
(printed in big black along the back of the trunk and on the side doors)
today i collected:
nordic cab
jazzy cab
cool cab
specialty cab
sw cab
asap cab
which i scribbled in to the pocked notebook alongside the previously collected:
eritrean cab
blue ocean cab
river cab

_______

things ricardo dominguez says at the front of the lecture hall
and by the way, he was on today:
you can’t arrest a conceptual art project
electronic disturbance was our urinal, find your urinal
not copyright, copyriot

 

 

storm of laughter

thank you thank you thank you to a.m. o’malley for that fabulous week of guestblogging!
and thank you, readers, for jumping on that new train for a week!

these details aren’t from today, but perhaps a gathering of moments from my absence over the past week:

i say this is my poem
and ask the circle-seated audience to listen
for one minute
(wind in poolside palm
a motor revving beyond the white walls
whindchimes chiming)

_______

taurus the constellation glowing on a new moon night
a shooting star for each of us
i fall asleep on a mattress on a roof in a desert city
trainsounds yellhowling from the track

in the dream
there was a runaway roof
on a dolley/dowel
gaining speed down the street
what are you doing!? i yell
we’re gonna crash!
as i jump to a nearby roof we woosh past

in the waking
our storm of laughter trickles down the pitch
tiny finches and desert doves
carve fast paths above
mountains rising to the east
pretty leaves (like bric brac, like lace)
dangling from house-side tree

_______

unexpected reunions:
squid, hazel, molly (who remembers me from fancyland)

_______

we stop at two checkpoints
and are waved on
because of our whiteness?
our four door sedan no older than five years?

 

details again: guest blogger a.m. o’malley

We have the day to ourselves.

St. John’s parade:

Giant teeth crying for Flouride,

“real” pirates,

A $8 inflated Dora,

all for Wren-the-five-year-old

who helps me see the best thing about the parade:

The fancy women on flowered horses.

Not having your own child means you are allowed to get tired.

**

After a dinner of roasted cauliflower, kale salad, beets, loin.

Fizzy water with salted rims.

I put on a clean dress, red shoes, splash my warm sticky face with cold water

it seems we are wandering out the back door

our Juni cat follows us down the block, I try to shoo her home

she runs into the open door of the neighbors house.

I take one step over the doorframe, see a house that isn’t mine

and I remember that I am not a cat.

“hello?!” I call

We stand and laugh with the neighbors. We meet them.

we walk through the iris strewn streets, under cotton trees, we look for the cats.

Burtin says “it’s the Catting hour”

A stand is set up, a girl greets us like the owner of a boutique.

She is selling paintings. The price list says:

Paintings $1.50

Paintings with rainbows $2.00

Fanisy paintings $2.50

We decide to get a “fanisy” painting.

It portrays a row of girls and a giraffe

a scientist, a ballerina, a gardener,  a girl with an apron and a bouquet and the giraffe

across the top it says “Be Yourself”