whoa, two blog posts from vinh back to back. something must be up. vinh must finally be getting his shit together… or maybe vinh has finally realized that blogging is a great way to procrastinate.

i guess i gotta say something about the superbowl, it’s mandatory considering what day it is. so let me simply say that it was a damned enjoyable game to watch… even with the refs halfway determining the game at points.

now with that out of the way… i figure i’m going to share with you exactly the music that i was listening to when i wrote the post, i’m going to be doing this from now on. so if you can, turn your browsers to vienna teng’s myspace. her crooning will hopefully put you in some semblance of the same emotional space that i’m in. it’ll be one of our little communions. don’t tell your significant other.

i wanta wax poetic on nakedness for a minute. yes, i subtly reminded you i’m a poet, i’m dope. but seriously.

we all build personas and barriers to protect ourselves from the world. great big heaping walls that prevent us from making connections, these preconceptions like durian shells to protect the soft inner core and the seed of human beauty that is in each of us. and by beauty to say, that sometimes viciously sublime and trascendentally ugly piece of ourselves that makes us truly human, as more than an animal, that connects us to the greater, for better or for worse.

we do it because we’re afraid, for a shitload of reasons, be it that we believe it to be ugly or not worth it, or because it’s tender from having burned before or whatever it maybe. i think the reasons are too multifaceted, too myriad to be listed in a boy’s blog.

i do it too, hella. i swagger. i have my hipster pretensions.

but i think that what allows us to keep moving the concept of humanity along, what allows us to connect with both others and ourselves is the effort to make ourselves naked.

but vinh, you say, it’s just a matter of taking your clothes off right? or maybe gently stripping off those we’re trying to connect with, peeling them like onions. don’t you know how to unlatch a bra?

it’s never that simple. human beings never are. if we do become reduced to such simplicity, we’ve become sheeple. or enlightened. one or the other.

i think, i hope, i pray, that i’m moving down that path to connecting with yall by ruminating so much, through my writing, through my performance. but hell, it may be one of my pretensions. i think i’ll make an effort to post more poems here, not polished finished pieces, but snippets and bits, those things from my day or from whatever i’ve read or whatever.

let me strip down for you.

…

are you blind yet? dude, i’m not that ugly, am i?

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so i’ve started working earnestly on the introspective musicology. thanks for the great response. i should be putting ish out there sooner than later.

but along the lines of my recent ruminations and my exploration of identity in general, i have another project, for which i have no catchy title yet.

it will come to me, i promise.

but as always, i need your help. especially if you’re an asian american woman. if you are, i ask that you send me, completely anonymously if you want, a few experiences that make you quintessentially you, no matter how you define it. i want formative memories and your thoughts on them, those life changing events that have become such a fundamental part of your character that, without them, you would not be who you presently are.

i know this can be a touchy subject, so if you want, please email me anonymously. or with your name, however you feel.

be as detailed or as vague as you feel that you need to be, but realize that i need to have some idea of what you’re talking about.

email experiences to vinh [at] vinh-hua [dot] com

the idea for this project came out of a discussion about what makes human beings who and what they are, whether certain experiences really do shape our lifepaths, and how big of an effect these actually have.

since i’ve been writing lots of two types of poems, either love poems or introspective ones, i figured it was time for a change, to explore identity once again outside of myself. that’s what the introspective musicology does. i intend for this project to do it another way, and hopefully with a more particular subject, it’ll be more enlightening. furthermore, “love poem to a vietnamese woman’ is still one of my favorite of my pieces, and it was an exploration of the identity of vietnamese women. i think it’ll be a challenge to do a series of poems that explore a larger subject, a ‘love poem to asian women (as an ideal)’ in effect.

and yo son, maybe i will finally understand asian women.

… probably not, but you knew i hadta make that joke for form’s sake if nothing else.
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random, but i made soup for the first time today. not stew, not curry, but actual soup, with noodles. i threw together a bunch of ingredients and it came out tasting pretty damned good.

to give this context, i’ve always been afraid of making soup, because it’s so easy to make it either uneatable or pretty much nothing but hot water. you gotta remember, i live in a single room occupancy with no kitchen, so i got me some ghetto tools.

but through hella swagger, it worked out. maybe this is a metaphor for life?

or i could just be reaching.

which reminds me, i need to buy a digital camera, anyone got an idea what i should be buying?

and lastly, sad to say, but the chapbook will be on hold for the next bit as i try to face my writing again, reflect on it and see how much it wass affected by the bad time i was having this fall. but i intend to continue working with geoff kim, maybe even working on a picture book, which is an idea i’ve had in my head for awhile now.

oh, and i think i’m going to start a band.

*edit* I am thinking about writing some vietnamese poems and songs, but since my grasp of the language is not nearly good enough, i was hoping someone could help me with grammar and vocab and spelling ad just the general vagaries of writing in a language with which i have the ability of a four year old.

peace and love till next we meet.