August 23, 2019
It Will Be Empowering: An Interview with David Mura, Author of A Stranger’s Journey; Race, Identity, and Narrative Craft in Writing
This post is the eighth in a months-long series that explores the topic of craft: what it is, how it has evolved, who has historically had access to it, and […]
February 8, 2017
An interview with Natalie Diaz
What seems urgent to you right now in your writing life? And as a Mojave and Pima American, how do you handle, balance, or negotiate expectations that you are always […]
November 7, 2016
Trump and Jackboots (Also: Please Vote)
As I write this post, on a Sunday afternoon, a bit of news breaks: the FBI has finished its latest review of Clinton’s emails and recommends no new action. So […]
September 30, 2015
One Book at a Time
I’m not sure what felt better, successfully defending my dissertation, or returning 120 books to the library and being able to see the floor of my office again. My bookcases […]
September 25, 2015
Is Paris Still Paris?
“In a beautiful turn of phrase, Hugo von Hofmannsthal called [this city] ‘a landscape built of pure life.’ And at work in the attraction it exercises on people is the […]
April 30, 2015
Facing It
Today, though I stumble, as usual, I am “thinking through” my language–considering my word choices in a draft of a poem, in comments on student work, in conversations with other attendees on the steps […]
September 15, 2014
Finish What You Start
One self improvement I decided on recently is to finish what I start. I vowed this while on a treadmill at the gym, glancing from television screen to television screen, […]
September 7, 2014
Nostalgia, Sentimentality, and Robin Williams. Part 1
In my office the other day, prepping for an Intro Creative Writing course, I found myself ruffling through cabinets and drawers in search of a set of notes I made […]
September 23, 2013
Zen and The Art of Cover Letter Writing
The best insight I received about job applications came from a mentor who had led many search committees, who had seen the best candidates “on paper” simply bomb interviews, while […]
August 31, 2013
Not Guilty–Of Course
Out of the hurricane of words published in the wake of the Zimmerman verdict, I found Robin D.G. Kelley’s essay, “The U.S. v. Trayvon Martin: How the System Worked,” to […]
August 30, 2013
The Literary Self(ie)
My favorite part of any literary biography or memoir is usually the glossy white section with the photographs. The photo section, along with the text, constructs the literary self we […]
July 22, 2013
Pocketbooks, Part 1
I used to carry everything in a black bike messenger bag but switched a few years ago to a backpack. The pack is canvas, gray, accented in blue and black. […]