Black dog on my back. But I like dogs, and this one won't stay for long.

"Yes, the most poetical thing, more poetical than the flowers, more poetical than the stars--the most poetical thing in the world is not being sick."

I'm home but still homesick. I need to see my friends, but I'm jet lagged. The ramen museum was probably a highlight of my trip (my favorite bowl was at the stand that has raw garlic flakes) and I also enjoyed the dan dan noodles at Iron Chef Chen's restaurant.

I'm here for work, This was supposed to be some sort of investigation into my childhood or something, instead I'm acting like a child. "Oh it's Japan again. Oh I can pretty much sort of communicate enough to scrape by, like the tourists in New York who think they speak English but they really don't." What is it like to feel white and not look it: alienating. Yesterday my unofficial Caucasian grandfather passed away - the man my dad called "father." I suppose I was closer to him than I was to either of my grandfathers; but my heart is stone.

Culture shock: suddenly and irrationally, all my Japanese coworkers annoy the hell out of me. When it was them visiting New York, I liked them fine (but they probably hated me).

I had planned to dine out and expense it all week but instead I'm hoarding snacks from the 7-11. I went to a hole-in-the-wall ramen store at peak lunchtime and lined up with salarymen against the walls until a seat at the counter freed up; had tsukemen there. Had walked past a less crowded place that took orders via vending machine coupon. Have also eaten at a fancy "congee and noodle" themed restaurant in I think the Mitsukoshi food court, and a bunch of fruits immaculately wrapped in plastic, and countless cups of very good milk tea and truly terrible coffee; swigged unsweetened green tea by the liter; from the 7-11 I got hot piza-man (tomato and cheese filled bun) and anman (red bean bun), endless onigiri including sake-oyako (salmon & salmon roe), natto, ume, mentaiko, and kombu flavors; salads and grated tororo yam and chicken curry and yakitori chicken and "hambu" Japanese style hamburger patty and instant shio ramen, etc.

Went plus-sized shopping at Isetan but the clothes were hideous, synthetic, and in the $200+ range.

Caught a cold, got slipped Tylenol w/ codeine by the hotel desk clerk. Watched episodes 1 through 8 of the final season of the Wire. Earned several thousand pieces of eight in Puzzle Pirates.

When I came in from the airport on the JR Yamanote line, the moment I passed my transfer point, Ebisu, a bunch of memory-like-feelings wisped past. Facts that I've always known suddenly became accessible, for example: the convoluted route to school. Counting in yen just felt natural, and also walking on the left hand side of the street (though in Sydney a couple years ago it had felt completely unnatural).

I miss my husband. I don't really feel like a person here. I'm still glad I'm here . . . but how I lovehate.

Wednesday March 26 2008 at the 92nd St Y. A two-part reading, of all unpublished poems (I think. I thought I had all of them, and I hadn't read these).

First part: CASSANDRA FLOATCAN. A poem on translation. Anne Carson stood at the podium and read. Cassandra - the problem of prophecy - does she float and how can she. Veils. The problem of translating Euripides. The untranslatable cry of grief uttered in Greek by a Trojan woman, which begins with syllables that sound something like "atatatoi..." Then, spaces slated for demolition. Lunch. Cathedrals. As she read, slowly about half a dozen members of the audience crept up and retrieved posters from the stage. They walked up and down the aisles displaying these posters, as architectural photographs flashed on a screen overhead. At some point we realize these are all works by Gordon Matta-Clark.

Second part: POSSESSIVE USED AS DRINK(ME): A Lecture on Pronouns in the Form of 15 Sonnets. On stage right, a table, like those used by panelists at a conference, with three glasses of water. Two women and Anne Carson sit down. Stage left has two dancers and Robert Currie sitting at a laptop silently. Anne Carson begins to recite the poems, but at some points her mouth doesn't move. One realizes that the sonnets are at least partially recorded. Then the other two women start chiming in at points with her. At times they are singing. At times there are definitely more than three voices. As the reading goes on the dancers dance silently on the center stage, and images of other dancers are projected overhead. By the final sonnet, which was supposed to have been "Fashioned from the Foregoing 14 by Chance Operations," it is close to impossible to make out the actual words.

The fifteen sonnets are:

1. Triple Sonnet of the Plush Pony: Part I; Part II; Part III
2. Sonnet Isolate
3. Recipe
4. Sonnet of Addressing Gertrude Stein
5. Sonnet of Addressing God
6. Merce Sonnet
7. Sonnet of Addressing Oscar Wilde
8. Deictic Quiz Sonnet: Parts I through VI
9. Drop't Sonnet
10. Sonnet of the Pronoun Event
11. Sonnet of Exemplary Sentences from the Chapter Pertaining to the Nature of Pronouns in Émile Benveniste's Problems in General Linguistics (Paris 1966)
12. Reticent Sonnet
13. Sonnet of "We Tried Doing It Without The Cue Sheet But Couldn't Remember What Color Referred To What Movement And What Had Been Done And What Was Left To Do"
14. Sonnet of the English-Made Cabinet with Drawers (in prose)
15. Crowning Sonnet (Fashioned from the Foregoing 14 by Chance Operations)

Awesomely, the program also contained one of the sonnets:

A. and I went to se Sunset Rubdown tonight at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple, where we ran into Anna and Misha, and met up with Yaniv and Amy. The templars confiscated my sealed box of chocolate soy milk but, thank heavens, did not find my kombucha bottle. And Sunset Rubdown were terrific, too loud, transcendent, dancey, impassioned. The noise was so great I could feel my body vibrating in all its layers and flaps. Sunset Rubdown are shy and like to play in the dark. So the stage lights were diverted into the crowd and I felt blessed bathed in lavender beams.

I'm lucky to be in New York, with so much going on. I saw Anne Carson yesterday, too . . .. maybe I'll write about it tomorrow.

It's been a while since I wrote sentences, so my sentences feel awkward. . . .

Sometimes I kind of want to try a bunch of different answers and see what responses I get. Like,

• "Taipan" (or some other nonexistent Asian-sounding country, Sainam, Chong Kong, Hainesia)
• "It's a disputed zone."
• "I'm from Asia. . . . . Yeah, Asia's a country."