My new pamphlet, On Self-Expression After the Revolution, is about the fragility of humanity, and of humanism, at this particular moment in human history.
Humanism: the belief in the value of the human, the individual, over the religious, the digital, the institutional, the doctrinal, the national…and the corporate. Humanism is the foundation of my life and work—as a professional, once upon a time as a scholar and teacher, and as poet.
And I’m afraid it’s slipping away.
The evidence is all around us, in the pervasive feeling that we can’t change the world, can’t know the truth, can’t have a reasonable society based on responsible institutions…that we’re struggling against a demographic shift that will take generations to figure out. That the algorithms will replace us sooner than later.
What can we do?
Pragmatic optimists tell us to start small. The local. The nonprofit. The volunteer. To start outside of the traditional structures and institutions. In fact, we have to.
But I’m interested in a second possibility too, and one even closer to my heart as a desperate humanist in a dehumanizing world. As one of my poems in this collection says, ”I want to start with our bodies.”
That’s a loaded phrase in a post-Roe America, but so be it. If we can’t own our bodies, women and men too, if we can’t own ourselves, we’re fucked. And not in a good way.
Who and how we love. What we enjoy. What gives us pleasure, solace, comfort. How we define ourselves, present ourselves. What we call ourselves. What we consent to do and what we don’t consent to do. How we fuck. How we deal with “a passion so fierce and a lust so overwhelming.”
These must be our decisions alone.
As our culture continues to diminish the value of the individual in new and exciting ways, at the very least we need to preserve our dignity as human beings in human bodies.
It’s a modest ambition in the end, but we’re going to have to fight for it. It’s either the final frontier of our old lives, or the first frontier of our new lives.
Either way, we have no other choice.
Excerpt from “Bridge and Tunnel” from On Self-Expression After the Revolution
An invitation to, (what did she call it?) “a very upscale orgy.” I envision wonderful things, actually, but I never know my mind enough to try. A man should enter every room certain. He should know where to begin. I fear that I will always be my father’s son, a person becoming, never become.
Roundtable Podcast with Wild Roof Journal
I was very happy to participate in a recent roundtable discussion about writing with Aaron Lelito, editor of Wild Roof Journal, and Dawn Leas. You can find it on all major podcast platforms as well as on YouTube, including this sample clip:
Poem published on The Amazine website
I’m so happy The Amazine featured my poem “What Have We Learned,” on March 5, 2024. It’s a very personal one—modest advice written to someone struggling through a difficult moment—and I’m glad it found a good home.
Check Out the Be True Podcast
I’ve now posted thirty episodes of my podcast, Be True, as well as a few shorter bonus episodes. Each week I read one of my published poems as an introduction to a larger essay about poetry, family, music, whatever…If you haven’t listened yet, check out an episode here on Substack or else on most major podcast providers. Each episode stands alone and doesn’t require any prior knowledge. And they’re all pretty short, less than ten minutes long on average.
And if you like them, please leave some stars, or a review, and tell your friends.