Song of a Reformed Headhunter

Very pleased to be one of the 21 poets in this zuihitsu portfolio , edited by Dana Isokawa and published in the Asian American Writers' Workshop's magazine The Margins. Asked for a note to accompany my three zuihitsu, I wrote this: "I was introduced to the zuihitsu in a workshop on Japanese poetic forms taught by Kimiko Hahn and immediately fell in love with it. How fresh Sei Shōnagon sounds across the centuries! What is the secret to such eternal freshness? Trained in traditional Western forms, I was looking to expand my repertoire by looking again to the East, and what I found was not so much a form as a voice. Sure, Sei Shōnagon is a privileged snob, as a literary friend pointed out with a sniff, but I love to put on her beautiful robe, rub some precious rouge on my cheeks, burn a fine incense stick, and wait for my lover to arrive in the night."

(Q Thomas Bower) Happy Valentine's Day! Ocean Vuong guest-edits a portfolio of poems on desire and love over at the Margins, the on-line journal of the Asian American Writers' Workshop. The lovers-poets are Cathy Linh Che, David Mura, Joseph O. Legaspi, Lee Ann Roripaugh, Timothy Liu and Victoria Chang. I have a poem, "Eve's Fault," in it too.

The Asian American Writers' Workshop expanded its annual awards ceremony into a literary festival. The one-day event took place yesterday at the Powerhouse Arena, in Dumbo, Brooklyn. Two separate readings took place at every hour from 11 AM to 6 PM. I attended the 4 PM session "Sex and the Cities: Stories of Love & the Metropolis" with readings by Hari Kunzru, Monique Truong and Mort Baharloo. From where we sat we could hear the other reading, and so it was hard to concentrate, especially during the mic-wrecked question-and-answer that followed. The day ended with a reading by Jhumpa Lahiri, the main reason why six students, who studied her work last year, came with me. This was my third time hearing her read, and she continued to wow me with her thoughtful poise. When someone from the audience asked an obnoxious question, she declined firmly but gracefully to give an answer. In her replies to her interviewer, she did not try to say more than she meant. One answer s...