last night we watched the stars from different parts of the planet (i was on a beach and you were in a forest.) the stars were a faint shy blue, so you sang “if you rescue me, I’ll be your friend forever” to cheer them up (“let me into your world, I’ll keep you warm and amused... oh the things we can do in the rain!”) you trace the sky with your fingertip and point out the big dipper, orion’s belt, the north star. “see how the north star flickers? that’s my reflection waving back at you.” we see a cluster of stars way out west floating just above the Pacific Ocean. we think that a parallel version of us lives out there. they're like us but backwards. they wear matching track suits and all. we don't know how they got there, but they’re hanging out together at this very moment, watching the sky, wondering how we got all the way out here too.

when we're together, a forest grows everywhere we go. when i'm without you, the forest grows inside me.

cloud in blouse / cloud in trousers



(by mr. mucho, via no knock room)

it’s not make believe if ...

the elephant vanishes?





and this one might be norwegian wood!






(paintings by andrew schloutz)

i feel porous





milligram's nestled house.

columbia wants to hear my life story, in approx 500 words.

Asian American 98 teaching assistant. Theatre Rice comedy troupe. Poetry for the People student teacher poet. Theatre Rice course coordinator. Regret co-director. Soulstice Art Gallery co-curator. Asian Pacific American Issues Conference co-coordinator. War on 54 concert organizer. Til Our Chests Burn concert organizer. A+ on my paper on Slavoj Zizek, Jean Baudrillard, 9/11, and the War in Iraq.

looking at this now is like finding old clothes that are now too tight (did i really used to wear this?) i need to tear them up and sow it together into something that makes sense. all of that is another life now, back in the day when we were talking about becoming rock stars. i got to pull an Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and leap through my mind and rescue memories before they fade away. hope it's not too dusty in there.

beau mot plage

about two years ago i wrote this in my blog:

i graduate from college the fall of 2004. i move back into my father's house in sherman oaks, los angeles, and i start a small but exciting internship at a big architecture firm. i spend my days making photocopies and my nights playing playstation 2. i live rent free and i put all my income into savings for my own house in the suburbs. i have nothing to worry about so i gain weight. one night i try to finally start working on my book and i realize that i had forgotten how to write. i learn that safety inhibits creativity and that the most daring things only come out of a fear of dying. i pack my bags to travel the world for a year and i learn all sorts of amzing things that i forget within 2 months of returning home. i decide to go to an architecture graduate school that no one has ever heard of. i graduate. i become an architect at 30. i'm bored so i get married. my wife and i move into our own house in san diego. we have a daughter. i forget all my worries and i become all my daughter's worries. i live my life renovating homes and designing parks. i die at 56 by a heart attack.

i graduate from college the fall of 2004 and i move into an apartment in the east bay with two college friends. we're all unemployed. we spend the day looking for jobs and the night painting, writing, and reading poetry. our apartment is an artistic mess. we complete a short film every two months. one of my roommates finishes his play and spends his time to directing it in san francisco. we get invovled in the asian american artistic movement in the bay area. i find a job as a high school teacher. i also volunteer at a city planner's office. i go to film school in new york. i use the resources to make a feature film and i shop it around film festivals. it doesn't work out. i decide to risk it all to make another film. i break even when a distributor buys the rights to release the film. i make more movies but the love becomes a job and i lose the passion for it. i live in a vineyard in the south of france. i marry once but she leaves me. we have no children. when i retire i spend my days swimming in the mediterranean sea, hiding my tears below sea level. i drown at the age of 72.

i graduate from college the fall of 2004. i marry early and we settle in san francisco, where we struggle financially together. my internship at an architecture firm doesn't pay enough so i take a night shift as a security guard at the mall. i have no time for writing. i have no time on my own. i hate my job. she gets pregnant. i leave her one night and i move somewhere far away. she has a daughter named emily who never meets her daddy. i move to hong kong and i feel more lost than ever. i teach english at a chinese school. i visit all the places of my childhood. i write to my ex-wife often, begging forgiveness, but she won't see me. i return to america but i can't stand to write anymore. it hurts too much to pick up a pen. i decide that i want to be a doctor. i work the night shift as a volunteer at the local hospital. i go to med school at the age of thirty three. i become a doctor at thirty eight. i open a practice in chicago. i adopt a daughter. i raise her to be a poet and an activist because i didn't dare be one. i am dreaming of emily when i die in my sleep at the age of 64.



so here's what happened:

i graduate from college the fall of 2004. i am lost. i linger in California for a couple months, feeling like something is missing. i decide to see the world. i visit Vietnam. i write poems. when i pass by Hong Kong i interview for a job in an architecture company. i am offered a job. my desk faces a skyscraper with a swimming pool. at 4 pm my colleagues gather around my desk to watch the girls sunbathe. i travel Asia. i design skyscrapers for people i will never meet. i am the youngest guy at every meeting. i learn how to yell at people on the phone. i am at the office until 2 in the morning. my team and i win awards. i dance it off. i write love letters that i never send. i go to the movies to understand what it is that i am missing. i buy new shoes. maybe what i am looking for i will never find. i leave my job. i come back to California. i am 24 when i see you again.

to be continued.

drift, drop, dodge, dance, dart, dunk, dive, dash, delve, duel, dress, draw, drive, duck, dump, doubt, dare, dig, dip, do

(dieter glauser)

You will be born from a dream that is born from another dream.

You will be paper, and you will be ink. You will be a folded airplane, a crumpled note, a scissor cut tree. You will be ballpoint scribbles, riffs of lines, curved scrawls. You will not speak. You will be rhythm. You will be what pulled my pen across this page, what colored the b-flat blue, what made this second stop on a dime.

And I will be ( )



There is a room made out of paper, made out of ink. And somewhere else, there is a planet, a solar system, a forest, just waiting to be drawn, just waiting to be folded into place.