Author: admin
-
Curriculum Vitae
Education The Writer’s InstituteCUNY Graduate Center, New York, NYCertificate anticipated May 2026 CUNY Graduate Center, New York, NY Ph.D., English Literature, February 2015; M. Phil., May 2009 Queens College, Flushing, NYPost-Baccalaureate Certification Program in English Education, 2014-2015 City College of New York, New York, NYM.A., English Literature, May 2004 Tufts University, Boston, MAB.F.A., May 1997…
-
By Defunding the Humanities, Colleges Risk Zombification
In fall 2019, to demonstrate our community college’s commitment to the humanities, a high-level administrator in academic affairs convened a Halloween-themed panel about monsters in literature. What better way to demonstrate devotion to the humanities than through an investigation of the inhuman? A fellow English professor, tasked with chairing the panel, begged me to give…
-
Lemon Sky and Detritus at Sunrise
I read about hope this morning on Maria Popova’s site The Marginalian. Popova ponders Steinbeck’s observations about hope as a survival effect of humans—Steinbeck calls it a “diagnostic human trait” (qtd. in Popova)—while he was on an expedition studying sea creatures. Nonetheless, as much as Steinbeck acknowledges that “hope cushions the shock of experience” (qtd.…
-
Hit the road, get trucking
Ween’s “Piss up a Rope” came on my playlist as I was running this morning. I think I spent the last six months of 2022 preparing for this to be my anthem for 2023.
-
A monkey broke into my kitchen, made a mess, then left me to clean it up
I had a panic attack in the parking lot of the emergency vet, then paid the money. The x-rays only confirmed what I already knew: I had to euthanize my cat, then my relationship. Heartbreak is inevitable when we adopt a pet or start a love affair. There may have been a slow decline for…
-
The Weight
I had a dream while Dan and I were dating, one of the times that we had broken up. I was in a web like a moth’s cocoon. I had no responsibility, no fear; I was just suffused with a feeling of safety and inner peace. I remember feeling like that as a child, lying…
-
The End of Ramadan in Queens
It is 9 p.m. in northeastern Queens, a cool evening in late July, at the end of Ramadan. Three little girls skip down the street. Their relatives, arrayed in long cotton tunics, trail behind.