Poets on a Tuesday

We had Angela Davis speak at my university a couple of years back. One of the many insightful things she said - protest in the way that aligns with your passion. If that’s poetry do poetry or music etc. Because then you will be able to sustain it. If naked bike rides are your passion, 100% do that.

I know it’s not technically polite, but I love having a conversation with other people who are comfortable with short interjecting interruptions. To me it makes the conversation feel more like something we’re weaving together rather than alternating individual presentations. It feels more alive.

Meanwhile, ed tech companies are salivating--eager to sell "solutions" to families whose schools will now struggle (even more than they already have) to meet their kids' learning needs.

(Here are a few of the ed tech ads I've been tracking over the past few months)

Making people afraid to be affiliated with antifascism—making people afraid to be associated with groups and people that actively oppose fascism—is some bleak shit.

In celebration of World Octopus Day, we wanted to revisit one of our favorite cephalopod sightings, the glass octopus — Vitreledonella richardi filmed during a month-long #PhoenixIslandsCoral expedition in 2021.

David Simon, creator of ‘The Wire’, being interviewed by Ari Shapiro (NPR)

Virginia Republican gubernatorial nominee Winsome Earle-Sears has no policy positions, has shared no plans for what she’d do if elected, grants no interviews, and isn’t even on her own campaign bus as it tours the state. She’s a candidate in name only.

It's so incredible how low homicide rates are in Europe. The UK, with a population of 70 million people, had fewer than 600 murders in 2023.
www.connexionfrance.com/news/double-...

Straight people think about queer people more than we think about ourselves. It’s fascinating. And boring. And creepy. Y’all don’t even go here!!!

And they aren't even reading books at school. If I assigned a book to my freshman they'd all stop coming.

Robin Williams' daughter has some quality thoughts on AI slop

keep your wonder alive, keep your aliveness alive

Every beloved novel ever written was once somebody's half-articulated dream.

I know it's small in the midst of the big but we're still doing 2-3 letters of rec for gd residencies, fellowships, grants and apps and it makes me want to lose my mind. I'm relatively connected, have a decent job, publish here and there, and I have no one to ask for this shit? It's such a barrier!

It is also an important time to be reading and writing.

Fortifying yourself with truth & good argument. Rest and take a break.

Repeat as needed.

This week at an event for THE PEOPLE’S PROJECT, a reader asked in a gracious and cheeky way what I would hope white readers in particular would get out of the book. Or more directly, what I would TELL white readers. And this was basically my answer:

African-Americans are experts on America.

Last year, CNN ran a “fact check” of Kamala HQ that claimed we were lying for saying Trump’s plan is Project 2025.

Now Trump is outright admitting it’s his plan.

Legacy media failed the country.

Wild

who doesn't like THE MUPPETS?

Here I am once again with my dry mouth
At the fountain of thistles
!!!!!!!!!!

Thinking about all of my US colleagues today that work for USGS, USFWS, US Parks Service, NOAA and the EPA. From front line environmental practitioners to scientists and policy makers, these folks ensure that waters are swimmable, fish are edible, that natural areas are accessible, etc, etc, etc.

It’s not just that video is too slow. It is that. It’s also not my own understanding happening. I also truly believe that the mind and life I want to have does not happen through watching but does through reading. Wild that this is even a little bit provocative but I suspect that mostly just online

This passage nearly broke me.