Dear Readers and Applicants,

I must confess that I am extremely gratified by the number of amazingly talented and intelligent and fascinating young persons from four continents who applied for our internship. I feel sad that I can only take a maximum of two people but I would like to express my...

by Bill Hooker

Attention Conservation Notice: this post is here to ask you to sign a petition asking the White House to make all publicly funded research publicly available.  Read on for background, or go straight to the petition. 

You paid for it -- this is about research funded by tax...

by Namit Arora

It is often said that humans are the only animals to use symbols. So many other claims of human uniqueness have fallen away—thoughts, emotions, intelligence, tool use, sense of fairness—what's so special about symbols, you ask? I share your skepticism, dear reader, and in the...

My breathing system seems to be:
these lungs within; without: those trees
……………………….. —Inspiration.

Conjoined

There are mountains in this pic of withered leaves—
as from a satellite

and voids

in shadows they recede

but I see
brittle peaks

by Randolyn Zinn

Ed Bilous, the composer and teacher, met me the other day at Juilliard where he has created the Center for Innovation in the Arts. Last month he was awarded the William Schuman Chair at Juilliard and you will be able to watch a video of his stirring speech at the end of this...

by Rafiq Kathwari

As a boy, I stole
into grandpa’s study.

An art merchant,
he loved books
 
with gilded edges,
Aristotle to Zola
 
all stuck together
in the humidity.
 
I snuck Lo out
to his black Chevy,
 
rifled for dirty bits,

Robert Irwin. Slant/Light/Volume.

More here, here, and here.

by Rishidev Chaudhuri

Like the rest of us poor mortals, wandering in constant confusion between things and the names for things, bewitched by language and unable to resist it, mathematicians and physicists are constantly struggling with their representations and yet entirely reliant upon them to...

by Mara Jebsen

I met a tipsy older lady in a place;

She said, "Honey, it doesn't really come clear

'til you're sixty." But she wouldn't say

what. The television was blaring

about chimpanzees. Some journalist

had likened our president to a chimp.

Meanwhile, a chimp named Travis

by Omar Ali

Saadia Toor is an assistant professor of sociology and social work at the City University of New York and recently published a book about Pakistan titled The State of Islam: Culture and Cold War politics in Pakistan. She states that the book grew out of her PhD thesis (a doctoral...