John James

I’ve got two new poems out in Image. Here’s a teaser, but you can read both poems in full on the website — or order the print issue!
imagejournal.org/issue-124

Harvard Will Not Comply With a List of Trump Administration Demands Federal officials said Harvard must enact “merit-based reform” in hiring and admissions and report international students who broke rules, among other steps. Harvard called the demands unlawful.

Thank god one of these universities has finally grown a backbone.

Finally someone stands up to this bs.

Do they have special parking spots for rideable luggage?

So sorry for your loss, but that’s a life well lived!

Yep.

'Columbia Has Lost Something It May Never Regain': Outrage as the University Yields to Trump's Demands | Common Dreams Columbia University faces backlash for caving to Trump admin demands after the school lost $400 million over alleged inaction to curb antisemitism. Critics decry the move. Is this the end of Columbia ...

'Columbia Has Lost Something It May Never Regain': Outrage as the University Yields to Trump's Demands www.commondreams.org/news/trump-c...

Louise Glück.

Um. Have you seen their beaks? Stuff of nightmares.

I read this as “I lick your assonance,” which I guess is okay too.

Please, New Yorkers. It’s time for new leadership. 😩

THRUST // The purple-stippled, / brindled cultivars defeat / the heat, wrest moisture / from topsoil desiccated / by the sun's dialectic / with the earth, ripe plums / further ripened, the fogged light / chalked across their skin / gesturing to the red flesh: / the plant supplants a word, world.

This is why they hate us. Because we make things. Because we resist their structures of power, and do so with intelligence. Because they know, as Shelley says, "Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world."

This one's mine, from Winter, Glossolalia (BSPG, 2022).
#smallpoemsunday.

Opinion | The View Inside Trump’s Assault on Universities (Gift Article) The Trump administration’s attacks on universities will lead to the permanent diminishment of vital American institutions.

“[W]hat we are witnessing is not just an attack on academia or a set of fiscal reforms or a painful political rebalancing. It is an attack on the conditions that allow free thought to exist. We may not yet know its full cost, but we will feel its consequences for decades.”
@meghanor.bsky.social

“We must learn from the past. We cannot remain silent in the face of authoritarian attacks on our peers, even if they have not yet come for us.”

Opinion | The Authoritarian Endgame on Higher Education This is a moment to trumpet the strengths of higher education and address its weaknesses.

I disagree with parts of this article, but one thing it gets right is the absolute cowardice of university administrators in the midst of an all out onslaught unfolding against higher education. Saying nothing will not save anyone.

www.nytimes.com/2025/03/15/o...

I used to do the same. I’m in a different place now, so don’t need to keep as many subs in circulation, but it was an effective way to get things accepted early on.

Opinion | This Is the Greatest Threat to Free Speech Since the Red Scare Mahmoud Khalil’s detention is a frightening sign of an authoritarian slide.

“If someone legally in the United States can be grabbed from his home for engaging in constitutionally protected political activity, we are in a drastically different country from the one we inhabited before Trump’s inauguration.”

www.nytimes.com/2025/03/10/o...

Mahmoud Khalil Is Moved to Immigration Detention in Louisiana Mahmoud Khalil is a permanent resident of the United States. His arrest sets up a fight over free speech and immigrant rights.

The arrest of Mr. Khalil represents a clear instance of retaliation against constitutionally protected free speech. This is an attempt to diminish support for Palestinian people and those suffering in Gaza (not to be confused with support for Hamas).

www.nytimes.com/2025/03/10/n...

I feel the exact same way, Meghan. It rings of McCarthyism, and I fear Columbia is just the test case.

Don’t… tempt me, Frodo!

As if he has control over most of this.

Oh yes. I much prefer “have written” to actual “writing.”

Terrifying times we’re living in.

I hear this is a pretty great contest, with some excellent winners from previous years. Submit!

You’d be doing better than the current administration.

Love the sound of “cored torso.”

😔

Does he not understand irony?

We Other Other Victorians

It definitely happens at some places! But I think it’s pretty rare. Like, that New Yorker sub I’ve had out since 2023? No one’s ever gonna read that.